Yup, this also lines up with how (American) undergrads empirically seem to get most enthusiastic about career-centered content (maybe because they’re starved for good career guidance/direction).
And a nitpick:
In most cases, individuals can do much more good by changing their career path or donating
I initially nodded along as I read this, but then I realized that intuition came partly from comparing effective donations with ineffective volunteering, which might not be comparing apples to apples. Do effective donations actually beat effective volunteering? I suspect many people can have more impact through highly effective volunteering, e.g.:
Volunteering in movement-building/fundraising/recruitment
High-skill volunteering for orgs focused on having positive long-term impacts, or potentially for animal advocacy orgs (since these seem especially skill-constrained)
Volunteering with a mainstream policy org to later land an impactful job there (although this one’s iffy as an example since it’s kind of about careers)
(Still agree that emphasizing volunteering wouldn’t be very representative of what the movement focuses on.)
Fair enough. I would guess you can usually have a higher impact through your career since you are doing something you’ve specialized in. But the first two examples you bring up seem valid.
Controversial opinion, but I think most volunteers are probably fairly ineffective, enough to round down to zero.
However, it’s super easy to be an effective volunteer. Simply: A) Be autonomous/self-motivated B) Put in some significant amount of effort per week C) Be consistent over a long period of time (long enough to climb up the skill curve for the tasks at hand)
Yup, this also lines up with how (American) undergrads empirically seem to get most enthusiastic about career-centered content (maybe because they’re starved for good career guidance/direction).
And a nitpick:
I initially nodded along as I read this, but then I realized that intuition came partly from comparing effective donations with ineffective volunteering, which might not be comparing apples to apples. Do effective donations actually beat effective volunteering? I suspect many people can have more impact through highly effective volunteering, e.g.:
Volunteering in movement-building/fundraising/recruitment
High-skill volunteering for orgs focused on having positive long-term impacts, or potentially for animal advocacy orgs (since these seem especially skill-constrained)
Volunteering with a mainstream policy org to later land an impactful job there (although this one’s iffy as an example since it’s kind of about careers)
(Still agree that emphasizing volunteering wouldn’t be very representative of what the movement focuses on.)
Fair enough. I would guess you can usually have a higher impact through your career since you are doing something you’ve specialized in. But the first two examples you bring up seem valid.
Controversial opinion, butI think most volunteers are probably fairly ineffective, enough to round down to zero.However, it’s super easy to be an effective volunteer. Simply: A) Be autonomous/self-motivated B) Put in some significant amount of effort per week C) Be consistent over a long period of time (long enough to climb up the skill curve for the tasks at hand)
I agree with you. See Volunteering Isn’t Free as one example of elucidation for why taking on volunteers is hard, often net negative.
That said, I do not think this is a controversial opinion, whether within EA or overall. :)
Fair enough, perhaps it just feels a little risky for me to say “out-loud”