Some lose thoughts around this: 1) There are not enough people is correct if you understand it as “enough people with the right fit, for the jobs currently on offer”—so there can be thousands of candidates, but only a small percentage fit the very specific criteria. 2) I doubt there is a good way to communicate this and not deter candidates, and therefore lose the chance to find those great people the charities need. 3) The current problem is the lack of good training programs in impact-focused thinking, so it’s hard for people with tons of experience and great credentials to get to the required EA-ness stage (impact-focused mindset, landscape familiarity) quickly enough to get the positions on offer, when they join EA. 4) Yes, most of us should be doing earning to give, because there is not enough opportunities, why some of us, that can handle the stress and pressure of launching new projects, should create opportunities for ourselves. 5) Noone have mentioned that an organization can only scale if it’s cost-effective, and to keep being cost-effective, it can’t just absorb talent because we want to have jobs. Too many hires and you’re spending much more than you’re creating in impact, which should not be the case. 6) The other thing is that scaling is very hard, and we don’t have a lot of expertise in the movement on how to do it right, while remaining cost-effective. So this expertise is developing slowly, but not fast enough to create many opportunities. 7) Another bottleneck is people management experience. This is also a lacking skill in EA, so I can see why people will be slow and careful about hiring to ensure a good culture fit and maintain equilibrium within teams. 8) You are right that insane salaries should be used differently; there should be no insane salaries in our movement, CEOs/directors should not be paid much, much more than other people in the team. I think this is the case in charities I worked/work for, like Ambitious Impact, Rethink Priorities. There are no huge gaps between employees and leadership, as we all create the impact together. 9) There are some organizations trying to address talent gaps, e.g., IAPS has fellowships, AIM has research fellowships, AIM has an incubation program, RP is fiscally sponsoring new impactful projects that people want to launch. AIM helped create “Effective Spenden”—like orgs in various countries. This is all absorbing some talent, but obviously not enough. 10) This is why I think we need to birng back earning to give, but ensure earning to givers have local communitis, where they can meet with like-manded individuals, and this is proerly fostered, so that they feel needed, they have connection with the impact they are creating etc.
The current problem is the lack of good training programs in impact-focused thinking, so it’s hard for people with tons of experience and great credentials to get to the required EA-ness stage (impact-focused mindset, landscape familiarity) quickly enough to get the positions on offer, when they join EA.
Aren’t we mitigating this with things like MATS and BlueDot et al? These should be producing useful hires at a high rate so training isn’t the issue it seems
I don’t know, as I’m not very familiar with EA’s AI side. I guess, for AI, the pathway is very specialized and only for extremely skilled individuals who can get into these highly competitive programs and become the very best in them. There is a huge chunk of EAs interested in working in other cause areas, and for that, I am unsure whether we have anything good. I’d love AIM to create this kind of program, but it’s not its role in the ecosystem. We have EA courses run by CEA, but I’ve heard many complaints about the recent ones, so I am not optimistic they’ll add much value, especially for experienced professionals who want to switch careers, rather than very EA-ingrained students, for whom they will be easier.
Some lose thoughts around this:
1) There are not enough people is correct if you understand it as “enough people with the right fit, for the jobs currently on offer”—so there can be thousands of candidates, but only a small percentage fit the very specific criteria.
2) I doubt there is a good way to communicate this and not deter candidates, and therefore lose the chance to find those great people the charities need.
3) The current problem is the lack of good training programs in impact-focused thinking, so it’s hard for people with tons of experience and great credentials to get to the required EA-ness stage (impact-focused mindset, landscape familiarity) quickly enough to get the positions on offer, when they join EA.
4) Yes, most of us should be doing earning to give, because there is not enough opportunities, why some of us, that can handle the stress and pressure of launching new projects, should create opportunities for ourselves.
5) Noone have mentioned that an organization can only scale if it’s cost-effective, and to keep being cost-effective, it can’t just absorb talent because we want to have jobs. Too many hires and you’re spending much more than you’re creating in impact, which should not be the case.
6) The other thing is that scaling is very hard, and we don’t have a lot of expertise in the movement on how to do it right, while remaining cost-effective. So this expertise is developing slowly, but not fast enough to create many opportunities.
7) Another bottleneck is people management experience. This is also a lacking skill in EA, so I can see why people will be slow and careful about hiring to ensure a good culture fit and maintain equilibrium within teams.
8) You are right that insane salaries should be used differently; there should be no insane salaries in our movement, CEOs/directors should not be paid much, much more than other people in the team. I think this is the case in charities I worked/work for, like Ambitious Impact, Rethink Priorities. There are no huge gaps between employees and leadership, as we all create the impact together.
9) There are some organizations trying to address talent gaps, e.g., IAPS has fellowships, AIM has research fellowships, AIM has an incubation program, RP is fiscally sponsoring new impactful projects that people want to launch. AIM helped create “Effective Spenden”—like orgs in various countries. This is all absorbing some talent, but obviously not enough.
10) This is why I think we need to birng back earning to give, but ensure earning to givers have local communitis, where they can meet with like-manded individuals, and this is proerly fostered, so that they feel needed, they have connection with the impact they are creating etc.
Broadly agree but:
Aren’t we mitigating this with things like MATS and BlueDot et al? These should be producing useful hires at a high rate so training isn’t the issue it seems
I don’t know, as I’m not very familiar with EA’s AI side. I guess, for AI, the pathway is very specialized and only for extremely skilled individuals who can get into these highly competitive programs and become the very best in them. There is a huge chunk of EAs interested in working in other cause areas, and for that, I am unsure whether we have anything good. I’d love AIM to create this kind of program, but it’s not its role in the ecosystem. We have EA courses run by CEA, but I’ve heard many complaints about the recent ones, so I am not optimistic they’ll add much value, especially for experienced professionals who want to switch careers, rather than very EA-ingrained students, for whom they will be easier.