Thanks so much for writing this; super interesting and important.
Your post also highlights to me the importance of having EAs with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. For instance, the overwhelming majority of EAs have white collar jobs, so I suspect a lot of us didn’t know/wouldn’t have guessed this:
“White collar work is often characterized by higher levels of transparency, and dishonesty is frowned upon and frequently held to account. None of these are true of HVAC work, where honesty isn’t a strong cultural norm, and many tasks lack sufficient transparency to allow for its policing.”
Thanks! Tbh I was pretty close to cutting that part due to superfluity so I’m happy to hear you found it insightful.
I agree that there are potential areas where drawing from a wide range of backgrounds could be better than the current structure. Tbc, I don’t want to overrate this and it’s likely highly domain specific. Long before this I started a piece on the widespread conflation of physical skills vs knowledge that characterizes much of the collapse recovery focus. This also also seems like a potential white collar silo phenomenon.
Thanks so much for writing this; super interesting and important.
Your post also highlights to me the importance of having EAs with a wide range of backgrounds and experiences. For instance, the overwhelming majority of EAs have white collar jobs, so I suspect a lot of us didn’t know/wouldn’t have guessed this:
“White collar work is often characterized by higher levels of transparency, and dishonesty is frowned upon and frequently held to account. None of these are true of HVAC work, where honesty isn’t a strong cultural norm, and many tasks lack sufficient transparency to allow for its policing.”
Thanks! Tbh I was pretty close to cutting that part due to superfluity so I’m happy to hear you found it insightful.
I agree that there are potential areas where drawing from a wide range of backgrounds could be better than the current structure. Tbc, I don’t want to overrate this and it’s likely highly domain specific. Long before this I started a piece on the widespread conflation of physical skills vs knowledge that characterizes much of the collapse recovery focus. This also also seems like a potential white collar silo phenomenon.