We’ve seen a lot of change in our relatively short existence in the movement. Early on, ACE was one of few organizations working to synthesize the existing research, and now we’re in a position where there are lots of organizations doing really great research. This has led to a really positive collaborative spirit, and strengthened the body of research we have available to us in the movement. We are now seeing substantially more funding into research that is of a better quality and using stronger norms (e.g. use of the Open Science Framework). We think there is still room to improve—it can sometimes feel like there is a disconnect between organizations focused on direct work and those that are conducting research, in that it is hard to know what is best to prioritize to serve their interests, and to what extent they are utilizing that research. At ACE, this has caused us to realign our research aims towards conducting research that primarily improves our ability to conduct evaluations and evaluate grants in our Effective Animal Advocacy Fund, as we can be more certain of the impact that research has.

Regarding your question about using more sophisticated techniques in causal inference: Absolutely! We’d love to see more of this type of research.

Regarding your question about the allocation of resources in the movement: My intuition is that our balance is not terrible right now. To give a better answer, I would need to know exactly what the allocation currently is.

Regarding small sample sizes: we are worried about this too. It's important to consider the full range of evidence when RCTS aren’t an option.

I would recommend that those who are trying to better understand their intuitions around which cause areas to prioritize try out 80,000 Hours' problem quiz.

The team overseeing recommendation decisions is typically well aligned in making these decisions, and by the time reviews have been drafted for each charity, there are fairly clear levels in the charities’ overall performance. That said, we do of course have disagreements. I think these are more likely to arise when a charity’s status may be changing from the previous year, e.g. an existing charity changing recommendation status or a new charity that might be recommended for the first time. When disagreements arise, we provide as much time as possible to reach an agreement, first in a meeting to understand our points of disagreement, followed up by email discussion if necessary. We then take a final vote to decide. If there is a split decision, the Executive Director makes the final call.

Hi Ben, that’s a great question. We don’t have a lot of conclusive research on this topic, so what I’m sharing here are just my personal intuitions. I think that food technology will play a major role in the future reduction of farmed animal suffering. However, I wouldn’t consider this an “either/or” question. Many people who work in the food technology space around this issue view their work as advocacy. Additionally, many of the people focused on improving the welfare of animals currently living on factory farms see their work as complementary to the food technology space—some welfare improvements drive up the cost of animal products, perhaps making animal-free alternatives more cost-competitive. Additionally, welfare advocacy raises the importance of animal welfare in the public eye, which is often a strong motivator for those who choose to reduce their animal product consumption.

Hi Michael, this is a big question! It's getting a bit late but I want to give you some of my quick thoughts:

Research into reducing fish suffering (scale, promising interventions, tractability, etc.) is needed, and there are a few groups working in this area, such as our Top Charity Albert Schweitzer Foundation and newly-founded organizations Fish Welfare Initiative and Aquatic Life Institute.

Economic research, including research into economic interventions. We have an economist starting on our team in May!

Research into ways we can positively influence the welfare of wild animals, which is something that Wild Animal Initiative is researching (one of our EAA Fund grantees).

Research on estimating the effectiveness of intervention to improve the lives of farmed animals in general. This is something that ACE has worked on, as well as groups like THL Labs, Rethink Priorities, Open Phil, etc. We’d especially be interested in seeing research on how interventions support and interrelate to each other.

I also think it is important for us to look at considerations around longtermism in EAA.

Hi Tobias! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

EAG attendees tend to be fairly familiar with ACE's work, but if I have to speculate, here are a few things that people may get wrong about ACE:

• ACE's charity recommendations are heavily dependent on our CEEs. Please see this page on our use of cost-effectiveness estimates for more details.
• ACE is a "watchdog" organization. I think that this misconception is less prevalent in the EA community, but it is one we encounter fairly often. We recently published a blog post explaining why ACE is not a watchdog organization to help clear up any confusion.

Hi Michael, I'll respond on behalf of Leah/ACE:

The competition for roles at ACE varies depending on the position. We receive around 10 intern applications every month, so this is by far the most competitive of all positions at ACE. Given our niche area of work, replaceability is a challenge; when we're looking for someone who has a research background, is interested in effective altruism, and is passionate about animal advocacy, we're looking at a very narrow group of people.

Speaking more generally, people are replaceable, but the costs—in terms of both time and money—can be very high. It can take months for managers and leadership to recruit, vet, and interview new candidates and up to six months to fully onboard a new hire. During the time we are rehiring for a role, the work assigned to that position is either stagnant or has to be redistributed to other team members who are already operating at capacity. There’s also the opportunity cost for the managers and leadership participating in the process whose time (and corresponding wages) could be better spent on programs and other activities more directly fulfilling our mission.

And while the costs of turnover are high, it’s important to note that the primary reason ACE prioritizes its people is for their inherent value. Each ACE team member is an individual with their own experiences and talents that contribute to achieving our goals. We use job descriptions as guidelines, but welcome the unique insight, ideas, and skills each person brings into their role.

Year after year, we’re able to maintain, and even improve, the quality of evaluations, research, and grant-making for which ACE is internationally known by investing in our people—people with exceptional competencies and the dedication to finding and promoting the most effective ways to help animals.

Hi Michael! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

We seek to gather data about this question through our annual Donor Survey. Our most recent published data is from 2018, and we are planning to publish the results from our 2019 survey soon.

Hi Saulius! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

My intuition on this is that our movement spends an appropriate percentage of our resources on research, but I’m sure others have different opinions on this question. I’d like to see the total budget of EAA increase dramatically though—both the amounts spent on direct work and the amounts spent on research.

Hi Lauren! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

There are a few ways in which we see ACE changing and evolving in the future. Given the number of new research organizations that have entered the EAA space since our founding (yay!), we will likely narrow our focus to make sure we continue to add as much value as possible to the movement and don’t duplicate the efforts of others. In particular, we’ve chosen to narrow the focus of our non-evaluations/grantmaking research this year exclusively to questions that can help better inform our decision-making in those two processes. This is partially because other orgs are doing a great job working on some of the broader foundational questions facing our movement, and partially because we feel most confident in implementation of research that we know we can implement ourselves.

We are also making some changes to the way that we operate internally. This year we will be rolling out a new operating model, based partially on Scrum and Agile project management frameworks, with the goal of streamlining and speeding up our workflows, empowering all of our staff members, and alleviating high workloads for senior staff members. We call our in-house project management style “Scram”...

Hi Misha! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.

Hi Louis! Thanks so much for your question. I feel that the movement's strategy should always be influenced by the holistic context in which we operate and current events. One quick example that comes to mind of a project working directly with farmers is Mercy for Animals' recently launched “Transfarmation” project, which helps support farmers in transitioning out of animal agriculture and into growing crops for plant-based products.

Thanks for the questions.

Regarding animal advocacy, some EAG attendees might assume that animal advocacy is all about direct care of injured animals, especially companion animals, and about changing the attitudes and opinions of the general public towards them. However, animal advocacy is a broad and diverse movement, where people carry out varied interventions targeting different animal issues, ranging from lobbying politicians to advocate for farmed animal welfare laws, implementing alternatives to animal products, developing research on how to help wild animals, and building alliances with other social movements.

Regarding effective animal advocacy (EAA), some might think that EAA is all about considering the quantitative short-term impacts of interventions, overlooking the importance of good management practices, and other factors that can indirectly affect the effectiveness of interventions. However, we believe that effective animal advocacy goes beyond a quantitative analysis of effects; it also consists of following good management practices and creating a healthy culture.

We published a blog post a few years ago where we outline some common misconceptions about effective animal advocacy, here is the link if you are interested in reading it.

Rescinding charity recommendations is not something that we take lightly. We have only done this in the case of serious issues that were brought to our attention, and because of this reason, I find it hard to recommend one universal course of action. In some cases, we have recommended that previous donors continue supporting a charity at a lower level in order to prevent the issue you described. In other cases, we have not done so.

In general, we feel that supporting our Top or Standout Charities, Recommended Charity Fund, and Effective Animal Advocacy Fund offer the greatest amount of impact, and that is the advice that I would give to donors who ask.

I’d like to see more organizations focus on developing their management, leadership, and governance capacities. I know that your research at Animal Advocacy Careers on skill gaps in the movement identified this as a priority, and it’s something I hear repeatedly from other funders in the movement as well.

The reason this has become such a priority is a side effect of a great problem to have—our movement’s funding has grown significantly in the past several years, and organizations are growing larger than ever and able to take on more ambitious goals than ever before.

I predict you're going to see a lot more about this in the coming weeks and months.

This is answered here

While I’ve been working in this space long enough that many of our ethical stances don’t feel counterintuitive to me anymore, I’m sure some of our stances come across that way to mainstream audiences. Farmed animal advocacy is still considered a very niche topic in society at large, even though it’s the primary focus of our work at ACE. Wild animal welfare is another topic that we find challenging to communicate about to mainstream audiences, even though it’s a high priority for many of us in the EAA community (I remember when it felt counterintuitive to me!). We adjust to that by being mindful in our communications to meet our different audiences where they are at, and not assume that everyone has the full context that we do from having been steeped in this topic for years.

Hi Matt! Thanks for this question. I answered it in the Q&A video recording.