About

Rethink Wellbeing (RW) offers proven, engaging, and affordable programs to nurture mental wellbeing and resilience at scale. Rethink Wellbeing acts as an impact multiplier: their programs are specially designed to help individuals who are dedicated to improving the world feel and perform better, supercharging their work.

History

Rethink Wellbeing was founded in early 2022 by Dr Inga Grossman^[1] with the support of a team of four. It outperformed two other mental health-related pilot projects that the team tested, one of which also received seed funding from the EAIF.^[2] In its first year, Rethink Wellbeing successfully piloted its first flagship program, the CBT Lab, indicating effectiveness and demand within the target group. They are now focused on scaling their services to reach more ambitious altruists and further increase their cost-effectiveness. 

As of October 2024, Rethink Wellbeing has supported over 200 ambitious altruists. They still have four employees in the core team and a network of 50+ volunteers and advisors.^[3]

Activities

Rethink Wellbeing facilitates 8-week guided online mental health programs for ambitious altruists, including The CBT Lab and The IFS Lab – both group-based peer support formats guided by trained laypeople. In each program, participants learn to apply evidence-based psychotherapeutic and behaviour change methods to improve their mental wellbeing and thereby their productivity.

Theory of Change

An estimated 1 in 3 ambitious altruists experience poor mental health^[4] which likely drives a significant and linear loss in productivity.^[5] Rethink Wellbeing’s goal is to foster mental wellbeing at scale within the altruistic community and contribute to a culture of sustainable high performance. In 2025, Rethink Wellbeing aims to support over 150 effective altruists via their standardized program, and deliver at least one additional pilot to test ideas to increase cost-effectiveness. Their latest effectiveness evaluation suggests that achieving this goal would unlock productivity benefits equivalent to increasing the EA workforce by 30 full-time positions.^[6]

Evaluation

Rethink Wellbeing publishes its research into the effectiveness of each program on its website on a rolling basis. If you would like to use Rethink Wellbeing’s data to independently verify the results, or for your own research please reach out.

Key outcomes of the 2024 CBT Lab Peer Support program included productivity gains equivalent to 8 additional weekly working hours and a greater wellbeing increase than from becoming partnered or finding employment.

Effectiveness research using standardized self-assessments is run for every cohort to:

1. Assess the effectiveness of the different program versions by measuring and comparing aspects of wellbeing before and after implementation
2. Estimate cost-effectiveness, and benchmark against other mental health programs

The research is longitudinal and employs gold-standard methods used in clinical trials where possible. Evaluation of the IFS Lab and CBT Lab Minimum Guidance programs is underway; a summary of the results of each will be shared on the EA Forum. 

Further Reading

• Our World in Data, Mental Health research
• EA Mental Health and Productivity Survey 2023, RW & MHN.

External Links

• Rethink Wellbeing (official website)
• Donate to Rethink Wellbeing

1. ^{^}

   Inga is also the Co-Founder and Team Lead for High Impact Psychology

2. ^{^}

   High Impact Psychology

3. ^{^}

   Our Team — Rethink Wellbeing

4. ^{^}

   Our World in Data, 2021; Slate Star Codex, 2020, EA Mental Health and productivity Survey 2023

5. ^{^}

   Beck et al., 2011 (example for depression)

6. ^{^}

   8 hr weekly productivity gain (indicated by our 2023 and 2024 results) * 150 individuals / 40 hr working week