Summary
80,000 Hours’ mission is to get talented people working on the world’s most pressing problems.
We expect to increase our staff count by ~50% in 2022, and to continue scaling from there. We’re looking for an operations specialist to help build the organisation and systems that will support this growth.
They’ll run the team that manages our office, help scale our internal processes as we grow, and oversee a range of other projects according to their personal fit and our needs as an organisation (e.g. helping to analyse our user survey or organise our team retreat).
Location: London, England.
Salary: ~£58,400 for someone with one year of relevant experience (higher for candidates with more experience).
To apply, please complete this application form by 11pm GMT on Sunday, April 3, 2022.
80,000 Hours
80,000 Hours provides research and support to help students and graduates switch into careers that effectively tackle the world’s most pressing problems.
Over one million people visit our website each year, and more than 3,000 people have told us that they’ve significantly changed their career plans due to our work. We’re also the largest single source of people getting involved in the effective altruism community, according to the most recent EA Survey.
The Internal Systems team
The Internal Systems team is here to build the organisation and systems that support 80,000 Hours to achieve its mission.
We oversee 80,000 Hours’ office, finances, and impact evaluation, as well as much of our fundraising, org-wide metrics, tech systems, HR, and recruiting.
Currently, we have two full-time staff (Brenton Mayer and Sashika Coxhead), some part-time staff, and receive support from CEA (our fiscal sponsor).
Role
This role would be excellent experience for someone who wants to build career capital in operations, especially if you could one day see yourself in a more senior operations role (e.g. taking on more management, and perhaps eventually being a Head of Operations or COO).
Your responsibilities will likely include:
- Creating an outstanding office environment. You’ll hire and manage the team that oversees our beautiful central London office. Your team will be responsible for all the systems that keep the office running smoothly, as well redesigning them to accommodate larger numbers of staff (e.g. reconfiguring our office layout to allow for a 50% increase in staffing this year).
- Managing our operations associate. You’ll be responsible for managing, mentoring, and retaining our part-time operations associate. Our associate is currently focused on the day-to-day running of the office, but will be able to work on other responsibilities delegated by you.
- Scaling various internal systems. You’ll figure out how to scale our internal processes as we grow, as well as notice opportunities for improvement and implement those that are highest priority. Examples might include:
- Designing a system that enables the team to quickly find the documents they need.
- Improving our use of internal communication channels.
- Figuring out how 80,000 Hours can ensure it has accounts on new social media platforms which might become critical for spreading our ideas.
- Improving our system for tracking quarterly team goals.
- Work on additional projects. We’re excited to help you double down on your strengths, based on 80,000 Hours’ needs and your personal fit. Examples of additional projects might include running a search for a larger office, analysing the results of our user survey, or helping to organise our team retreat.
About you
We don’t have any specific requirements for this role, but you might be a great fit if you:
- Are excited about joining a small, fast-growing team and helping us to design and build the systems we need to scale.
- Are organised, detail-oriented, and able to keep track of a large number of tasks at once.
- Have excellent written and oral communication skills — in particular, you demonstrate strong reasoning transparency and enable others to easily identify the most important aspects of their communications.
- Love to build systems that run exceptionally smoothly, and have promising ideas for how we can improve upon our current processes.
- Have good judgement: you’re able to weigh up tradeoffs between different options and make real-world decisions under uncertainty.
- Have strong interpersonal skills and are excited to manage others.
- Have an interest in effective altruism and/or longtermism.
Experience in operations, project management, or community building would be a bonus. However, we’re more excited about your potential for growth than previous experience, so a lack of experience shouldn’t discourage you from applying.
We’re also aware that factors like gender, race, and socioeconomic background can affect people’s willingness to apply for roles for which they meet many but not all the suggested attributes. We’d especially like to encourage those from underrepresented backgrounds to apply.
Role details
This role is full-time and in-person, based in London, England. We are able to sponsor visas for this position.
You’ll be managed by the Head of Operations (a position we’re currently hiring for).
The salary will vary based on skills and experience, but to give a rough sense, the starting salary for someone with one year of relevant experience would be £58,400 per year.
Our benefits include:
- The option to use 10% of your time for self-development
- 25 days of paid holiday, plus bank holidays
- Private medical insurance
- £5,000 annual mental health support allowance
- Long-term disability insurance
- Standard UK pension with 3% contribution from employer
- Shower facilities, a small gym, and unlimited free food provided at our London office
Application process
To apply, please complete this application form by 11pm GMT on Sunday, April 3, 2022.
The application process will vary depending on the candidate, but is likely to include 1-3 written work samples, an interview, and a multi-day in-person trial. The work samples and trial will be paid.
