I have work experience in HR and Operations. I read a lot, I enjoy taking online courses, and I do some yoga and some rock climbing. I enjoy learning languages, and I think that I tend to have a fairly international/cross-cultural focus or awareness in my life. I was born and raised in a monolingual household in the US, but I’ve lived most of my adult life outside the US, with about ten years in China, two years in Spain, and less than a year in Brazil.
As far as EA is concerned, I’m fairly cause agnostic/cause neutral. I think that I am a little bit more influenced by virtue ethics and stoicism than the average EA, and I also occasionally find myself thinking about inclusion, diversity, and accessibility in EA. Some parts of the EA community that I’ve observed in-person seem not very welcoming to outsides, or somewhat gatekept. I tend to care quite a bit about how exclusionary or welcoming communities are.
I was told by a friend in EA that I should brag about how many books I read because it is impressive, but I feel uncomfortable being boastful, so here is my clunky attempt to brag about that.
Unless explicitly stated otherwise, opinions are my own, not my employer’s.
Hmmm, that is a good prompt. I can’t really think of any. I do want to see more EAs know how to manage people, to understand what project management actually is, to understand how to run a meeting, how to develop a team, and so on. But those aren’t skills that EA has a comparative advantage in training people. I guess I see so many EAs with alignment and general EA knowledge, but lacking these kinds of general professional skills, and I really want these people (who have devoted so much time and effort to EA) to have better professional competencies. But that is probably less efficient than finding people who already have the experience/skills/competencies. So I guess I’ve been viewing this more emotionally rather than rationally.