I founded and work at Magnify Mentoring.
KMF
Karma: 1,579
I think I nested this below Jon’s comment in a reply so I will re-post as a new comment and retract the previous:
Hi there! Thank you for this write-up. Before starting this post, I want to be clear that I currently work for The Giving Games Project. I wish to add a couple of points and, if I may, offer some clarifications to this document.
“Giving Games” are a broad category of outreach activities, including “Speed Giving Games” (i.e. tabling activities where participants are asked where they would like to donate $1. Speed Giving Games, which I believe you are referring to in your review, are designed to offer an effective and exciting hook with the goal of gathering as many email addresses as possible so you can follow up into the future. They are not designed to provoke long-term behavioural change, they are designed to get as many people into the top of the funnel as possible with the expectation that many will not engage further. Eli Nathan here discusses this approach in the broader context of Fall Outreach events and mentions Oxford who follow-up with sign-ups throughout the academic year and appear to utilise (I welcome corrections here from the group) a “Get as many chances at a second pitch as possible” approach. As such, I might suggest you a) clarify that you are discussing “Speed Giving Games” not “Giving Games” (which are longer-events and used in a ton of different contexts) and b) clarify the aims of a “Speed Giving Game” verses a “Giving Game.”
On long-term behavioural change and Giving Games. While Speed Giving Games alone are not designed to provoke long-term engagement, both Speed Giving Games and Giving Games can be combined with activities such as pledge weeks. An examples of this combination model is designed here (“We had a huge turnout of 110 students, which resulted in a total of $1,100 being donated to the three amazing charities, with Against Malaria Foundation receiving the highest number of votes. Ten students were inspired to take the 1% pledge. We felt it was really beneficial to have the Giving Game outside to involve people who otherwise might have not attended the event. It took no more than 15-20 minutes of their time and they were very receptive to One for the World’s mission! The Giving Game was a huge success that helped spread the message of effective giving.”) Given Aaron’s comment below, you may wish to amend or footnote the comment, unless he objects of course :)
On the Giving Game (not Speed Giving Games) impact, we describe here how we approach this here. We will release these results by the end of 2019.
As a meta point, I encourage you to reach out to me (kathryn.mecrow@thelifeyoucansave.org) if you would like testimonies on the impact of Giving Games (Speed or otherwise) or information on the Project more broadly, I am always happy to help and would have been able to point you at some of our most recent write-ups. Many of them are here.
Thanks so much for this Eli! Just to add two resources here that may be useful from some groups that have recently run Speed Giving Games.
1) Vaidehi’s write up on early stage EA group building at a liberal arts college, and,
2) Madhu’s write up on Picnic Speed Giving Games.
Thanks!
Hi there! This document is excellent. May I share it on our Giving Games Page and potentially cross post it on the Giving Games Blog? Assembling use-cases is really great for our other facilitators to learn from. Kathryn (Project Lead on Giving Games).
I may have misunderstood your argument, so apologies if so. As someone who has definitely tried both approaches here, my anecdotal experience is that it depends on what you value and/ or need. I value and need a life outside of work and a solid in-work support system, to be happy and maintain my mental health. If I go for too long without investing in these areas, my productivity suffers in the longer-term, ought-weighing any short-term productivity gains. I think alot of the results you cite here (i.e. “Living frugally is kind of like (metaphorically) living in an isolated cabin in the woods”) have short-term productivity gains with the potential for long-term productivity detriment. For me, I think dividing it into “Happiness” and “Productivity” is misleading and for many the former feeds into the latter. So, when I buy a gym membership, while I loose the 120 minutes it takes to work out, I gain better quality and longer-sustained work later.
Hey Aaron! Yes, indeed. If you go to https://game.thelifeyoucansave.org/admin and press “Create a new Giving Game” you fill out the details and it will send you a Number and password. This is in the Instructions for the Platform here <https://drive.google.com/open?id=17ye2I5NUUAJu-oK-ZXXaGTuo6RMp6v7Post8wy2zI7A> also on our resources page. Thank you, Kathryn :)
Thank you Aaron :)
Hi Aaron,
Absolutely. I would certainly be wary of over-interpreting these results but I thought a case study would be useful to show the steps we have begun taking to track our impact. Our strategy update is based on a larger pool of data (250 pre- and post- responses) and facilitator reports.
You are absolutely right about the correlation issue. Aside from self-reports, we employ back-end tracking with The Life You Can Save and our recommended charities. We have just introduced steps to track involvement in the EA community (inclusion of Giving Games in the EA survey), and pledges (One For The World- update to follow).
I will look at your paper today. Thank you so much for sharing and do let me know if you have any further ideas for impact-tracking.
Hi Farhan,
My information here may be outdated. However, when I worked in Bangladesh I worked with Dr. Kamal Hossain and Associates who at the time provided pro bono legal advice and may be able to offer legal support, particularly if you have video evidence of the incidents (khossain@citechco.net, inquiries@khossain.com). I think the value added of contacting Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch may be fairly low, as incidents like these have already been logged and published, but if you have any further evidence, I would definitely get in touch with them.
Above all and my reason for posting here, I am sure you are already aware, but please be very careful when contacting any of these organizations or publishing material on these incidents to take measures to protect your identity and your safety generally. You may wish to contact the Centre for Social Activism, a Bangladeshi human rights organization who supports activists in Bangladesh for advice before proceeding with contacting external organizations (including the ones I recommend) as they will have much more information on the current political, civil landscape than I do). I am fairly confident on CSA as they are one of the peer reviewers in the United Nations UPR process (although I still urge caution). You may contact me at kathryn.mecrow@gmail.com if you wish for me to submit materials on your behalf so as to remain anonymous (as I am not currently working or living in Bangladesh).
On a personal level, thank you for posting here and I am terribly sorry to hear of these incidents. The thoughts of my family are with yours and your loved ones during these difficult times.
Hi Larks, I am leaving this comment in my personal not professional capacity (I noticed this while posting some resources related to Giving Games). I think it may be useful if you defined what you mean by your comment regarding diversity. To flag, this area is regarded by many EAs as very important to community health, and the long-term engagement and retention of members. There are a ton of great resources on this issue (I found EA London’s write-up particularly useful!)