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All of warrenjordan's Comments + Replies

Where are the EA-aligned financial advisors for major donors?

warrenjordan6mo1

Please share! Looking for resources as well.

Where are the EA-aligned financial advisors for major donors?

warrenjordan6mo1

Late to the party. @Spencer Ericson Were you able to find a financial advisor?

My Mid-Career Transition into Biosecurity

warrenjordan6mo3

Thanks for the insight! I'm also considering a mid-career move but not sure if it's the right call or not as my primary path is ETG.

I'm a product manager who works in corporate tech at the moment. I've found that finding EA-aligned orgs that are looking for PMs is very difficult especially in this market.

Wondering if there's anywhere or any resources I should be looking at or any tips on how you find your role? I know you're not a PM but typically where's there is programmers, they could be hiring a PM.

Resources for helping make life/career decision?

warrenjordan6mo1

I think they're best for helping guide your career, while my decision mainly involves WLB that I'm trying to resolve.

How effective is sending a pre-interview project for a job you want?

warrenjordan2y1

Thanks for expanding! I know that some hiring processes in tech involve take home projects so I’m wondering how that played out if you had any of those despite doing a non-solicited project for them already?

aogara

Take-home projects are a great opportunity to show your skills. If possible, I would ask if there's a work trial before inventing your own non-solicited project.

How effective is sending a pre-interview project for a job you want?

warrenjordan2y1

Thanks for sharing your experience!

A couple of follow-up questions:

Did you send this unsolicited pre-interview project without talking to anyone at these companies? What were the responses like?
How did the results change between targeting small companies vs larger companies?
To clarify, you only sent an email with your pre-interview project without submitting an application?

aogara

Of course Warren, hope it’s helpful! I had a strong sense of what each company was looking for before investing time in a project. Usually this was from talking with them first, though in the case of AI Impacts it came from a public call for collaborators on the 80K podcast. I also always submit a normal job application, and usually I would only do a work project after speaking with someone and learning what they’re looking for, which usually comes from the application. (When I have a dream job that I know a ton about, then I’m more inclined to take the time to build a project before sending an application that would be otherwise unimpressive.) I have only ever successfully applied to organizations of <100 people. My best guess is that large organizations get far more applications per role, have more general purpose hiring needs, and look for more traditional skills and credentials in their applications. Smaller organizations are instead often hiring to fill a very particular need, far more specific than the job title would let on, and will be very impressed by direct proof that you can do exactly what they need you to do. (Also, I’ve mainly applied for part-time remote work, and several large organizations have told me that this was a dealbreaker for them.) But, an important counterpoint! I would also recommend sending out a bunch of really quick applications to places you’re not even sure you’d like to work. I’d say make these resume-only, no cover letter necessary. Over the course of a few hours you could send low effort applications to a dozen or more job postings, which could realistically lead to an interview. Perhaps you’d then want to invest more time learning about the organization and demonstrating your interest, but in general, EAs seem to be too averse to applying quickly rather than the opposite. Here’s a great recent post on the topic: https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/Fahv9knHhPi6pWPEB/don-t-think-just-apply-usually

What are your favourite ways to buy time?

warrenjordan2y2

I'm curious to hear more on an example of hiring an outsider, if you have one. I'm not sure I can see the value of it.

I've done therapy and it had immense value for me to work out through my issues. However, it seems like you're talking about a different scenario here. Perhaps more in the life coach realm?

Riikka Ajantaival

As a psychologist myself, I fully support anyone engaging in longer therapeutic work. My point for suggesting “lighter” options in this thread stems from the observation that many relatively healthy and functional people that might not be considering starting a full course of therapy would nevertheless benefit from discussing their practical, everyday challenges with an outsider. The topics, and therefore the most suitable person to discuss with, might vary. One of the latest personal examples is a discussion with a colleague about my career directions. After a brief standard intro of my current thoughts, she happened to ask a few very insightful questions that helped me to completely cross off a few suboptimal options out of my considerations. Please note that I had put quite a lot of time into considering options myself and talking to my closest friends about them. I’m quite sure this particular discussion saved me a lot of time as I didn’t need to consider those options further, let alone take steps that might have sidetracked me from things that I’m much more passionate about. It’s not a cure for all and here are some situations where such discussion might not be so beneficial: * the problems are more deep-rooted and require longer therapy * there are just too many interrelated things to be meaningfully considered in a short session * the person we’ve chosen to discuss with is not a very great fit to support us in a very useful way * using the available time for self-reflection, meditation or other private self-reflective practices might provide more value, especially if time otherwise spent in them is scarce However, the more general point is to invest in your own self-development, in any way that one considers to have the best expected value in terms of future well-being and efficacy. [End note: despite being a psychologist with a clinical background, I'm not currently providing nor planning to provide such coaching or therapy in private practice. So

As a small donor, should I donate with an ecosystem approach or focus on one organization?

warrenjordan4y1

It's pretty straightforward: donate to wherever your money can do the most good at the moment. If this month it's Org A then you donate to Org A, and if next month it's Org B then you should switch

The problem for me is how do I know which organization is doing the most good in a cause area? And how do I keep tabs on that?

For global health, GiveWell provides all of that, so I defer to them by donating to their discretionary fund every month.

With criminal justice reform and x-risk, the seemingly best deferral option is Open Phil - which is ... (read more)

kbog

Hmm, I don't think you can read into the tea leaves of Open Phil's donations like that. They will donate to fill funding gaps, a large donation doesn't mean that ADDITIONAL money will be more or less valuable to that organization. And how recently they donated might be due to how recently they were discovered, or some other unimportant consideration. (But if an org hasn't received Open Phil money in many years, perhaps they are not effective or funding-constrained anymore.) Out of all the Open Phil grantees, just try to pick the recent one that seems most important or most neglected. For criminal justice, I think this is straightforward. These causes are getting a lot of attention from liberals and Black Lives Matter, especially given the current surge in interest. So a charity which is a little less appealing to these people will probably be more neglected these days. Looking at a glance, the American Conservative Union's Center for Criminal Justice Reform seems like one that will be more neglected - liberals and BLM won't want to donate to a conservative foundation. I'm not saying this is necessarily the right choice, but it's an example of how I would think about the matter. Yes it is very hard to fully estimate the cost-effectiveness of an organization, but if you have a good suspicion that other donors are biased in a certain way, you can go in the opposite direction to find the more neglected charities. If you have no idea which charities might be best, you can always just pick at random, or split your donation, or donate to whichever one you like best for small reasons (e.g. you personally appreciate their research or something like that).

What are some good charities to donate to regarding systemic racial injustice?

warrenjordan4y1

CEA has a recommendation list for criminal justice reform? I can't seem to find it on their website.

What are some good charities to donate to regarding systemic racial injustice?

warrenjordan4y12

I agree with you everything you said regarding EAs focusing on the cause areas that are going to do the most good, and for those organizations to carry the burden of evidence / proof so that we are enabled to reduce the most suffering per dollar.

That being said, I’m unconvinced that EAs should be donating any money to charities focussing on systemic racial injustice right now.

I'm not trying to convince others that this is a top priority cause area. It's definitely not and wouldn't encourage people to donate if their singular goal is ... (read more)

thisisntrob

Thanks for posting such a considered reply. I think I understand where you're coming from much better now. I read the Julia Wise article you linked, and thought it made a lot of sense. I don't see any point in feeling bad when we spend our time or money on things that aren't optimised to reduce suffering. I'm certainly no perfect utilitarian robot myself, I just think that I should be. But I don't feel bad that I'm not, and I don't think I should feel bad. Reading it again, I think my original reply was too prescriptive, I was probably trying to answer a question that you weren't asking. At the same time, I still believe that you "shouldn't" donate to charities that aren't the most effective ones and that if you were to change your mind and put that money towards e.g. the Against Malaria Foundation, it would be the "right" thing to do, or a "better" thing to do. So yeah, sorry for seeming preachy. I 100% don't think you should ever feel bad for supporting a charitable cause, there's enough things to worry about without adding that one.

It's OK To Also Donate To Non-EA Causes

warrenjordan4y13

I'm new to EA and this was a great reminder. I've had this on-and-off internal conflict of donating to EA vs non-EA cause areas. From a personal finance framing, I have EA donations as one line item and "Random Acts of Kindness" as another line item in my monthly budget (e.g. ranging from paying for a friend's meal to donating to non-EA cause area such as criminal justice reform).

Side note: What was your decision-making process for choosing to donate to Campaign Zero? I'm trying assess where my donations would have the most i... (read more)

curiousepic

I'm not sure why I didn't receive that letter/email from Chloe, but I feel like it bears more exposure here, at least as a reply to the other posts asking where to donate.

orthonormal

One of my friends mentioned it, and it also came up in this post. They look extremely legit. But I also could have gone with one of Chloe Cockburn's recommendations, had I seen them before I donated.

What are some good charities to donate to regarding systemic racial injustice?

warrenjordan4y30

As a person still new to EA, it was disheartening to see the downvotes. You can see in my post history that I rely on this community to be educated and engaged on EA, including how I can apply it to my life.

After I saw the downvotes, it gave me the perception of exclusivity in this community. I'm glad I was made aware that there was a duplicate question, which I apologize for missing. Yet, I'm a little apprehensive now of posting anything that doesn't seem to fit the bucket of EA cause areas.

The purpose of my post wasn't to give more ... (read more)

MaxDalton4y13

I think that applying EA principles and concepts to different areas is really valuable, even if they’re areas that EA hasn’t focused on a lot up to this point. I’m glad you asked this question!

Will Bradshaw4y20

Just to point out, at the time of writing, that this question is now at 41 karma, which is pretty good. So whoever was downvoting it at the beginning appears to have been outvoted. :-)

As I said in my other comment, I think this is a good question, well-phrased and thoughtful, and I'd be happy to see more like it on the Forum. Thank you for contributing here.

What are some good charities to donate to regarding systemic racial injustice?

warrenjordan4y28

I wanted to share this document which Chloe Cockburn, the person who runs strategy on criminal justice reform at Open Phil, posted this in response to donors asking for advice.

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1GGgEZ8ebFd6--C4wLeJV9XrX1OPPg40NL6F1QDo53Bs/edit

Thanks for sharing Campaign Zero! Reading about their organization, it feels similar or analogous to donating to an EA longtermist organization. It's great that they are data-informed and backed by research on their strategic initiatives. Yet, as I feel with any longtermist organization (EA or n... (read more)

Direct work vs. earn-to-give

warrenjordan4y1

It sounds like you might have a comparative advantage in health tech though that would enable you to do a lot of good working for a health tech organization that produces technology that benefits the global poor

Yeah, that's another option I can build career capital for. Most of the health tech jobs in the market is towards US healthcare problems, which is what my experience is in. A goal, one day, would be to work for or start a global health non-profit leveraging technology to scale a validated health intervention (e.g tech-enabled AMF).

But to build... (read more)

When speaking with non-EAs, talk about cost of intervention or cost of averting a death?

warrenjordan4y4

Those are really good points! The hardest thing about this is trying to simplify it without losing them in the details/statistics/numbers - but also not oversimplifying it that people don't believe you or are skeptical.

What's interesting is if the $2300 to save a life would resonate with the average person. I know when I first read about this, I didn't think much of it. But then when I saw it in comparison to the $50k guide dog for blind person in the US, that really drove home the point for me.

Audience Targeting for EA communities

Answer by warrenjordanApr 13, 20205

Raising for Effective Giving targets the poker industry. The co-founders are poker players themselves and found that players embody the 'E' in EA. They propose that this audience tends to be more rational and logic than the general population. Their initial outreach strategy was to target players who have a pre-existing altruistic tendency, and get them to donate to more effective charities.

Not sure if that constitutes as data for your purposes, but they are an example of how they've targeted an audience that has seen some success in converting to EA.

Asaf Ifergan

That's pretty good for personal outreach, and I would agree that these assumptions can be helpful when trying to reach to people who will have a positive tendency towards EA. Having said that, it's pretty unclear to me how you would translate that into ad targeting considering: 1. It's difficult to clearly target "rational and logical" people when you're trying not to approach a specific audience. I can obviously target engineers, mathematicians, and philosophy students, but that is excluding everybody else that is logical and rational and assuming others don't possess these characters. This can also decrease the variety of opinions and talents in our community even more. I might be more sensitive about this because i'm not that typical EA character (no academic background, not much of a technology guy). 2. The goal is to build the community, not necessarily finding people who will donate. This means that a lot of different people can be relevant for us and i'd like to open our reach but still keep it within a reasonable and logical audience. Than again, sometimes you just can't win everything. Maybe it will be a good idea to target specific audiences with different posts, targeting each audience with content that is more palatable and interesting for them.

Is COVID an opportunity for non-EAs to give effectively?

warrenjordan4y2

But you could try to first suggest what the best donation opportunities that are COVID/pandemic-related are, and then point out in a very non-pushy way how other things may be especially neglected right now, and thus especially valuable to donate to. Sort of like an intellectual point that they can take or leave, with you having first accepted and respected their starting point of interest in COVID specifically.

That's sounds like a good approach. I'm the only EA I know of so just spreading the ideas / principles that resonates with my peers is di... (read more)

The best places to donate for COVID-19

warrenjordan4y1

GiveDirectly has provided more information about their response. It looks like they'll expand beyond the US. If it does, how would that change your categorization? It'd probably depend on the country (e.g. sub-saharan Africa vs. Italy vs. China).

We also plan to respond internationally, and are finalizing those details. Will share shortly.

GiveDirectly plans a cash transfer response to COVID-19 in US

warrenjordan4y1

Thank you for the clarification.

If funding for different GiveDirectly projects are sufficiently separate, your donation would pretty much just increase the budgets of the programmes you wish to support, perhaps especially if you give via GiveWell.

Confused about this one as I have not donated directly to GiveDirectly - I thought that if I were to donate $100 for standard cash transfer, some % of that goes directly to recipients. They state 89% for specific African countries. I would hope there would be some comparable % for standard cash transfers to US re... (read more)

Kit

I would guess that the decision of which GiveDirectly programme to support† is dominated by the principle you noted, of Maybe GiveDirectly will, in this case, be able to serve people in the US who are in comparable need to people in extreme poverty. That seems unlikely to me, but it seems like the main thing to figure out. I think your 'criteria' question is most relevant to checking this. † Of course, I think the most important decision tends to be deciding which problem you aim to help solve, which would precede the question of whether and which cash transfers to fund.

Elevator pitch for EA and fundraising

warrenjordan4y1

Thanks!! This will be very helpful.

Is fundraising through my hobbies an effective use of my time?

warrenjordan4y2

My goal isn't to become a huge blogger or streamer. The purpose of them is for leisure and any money that I make, I donate to charity. I feel like this would increase the quality of my leisure time and give me more fulfillment and satisfaction - the warm fuzzies in that article. Meanwhile, my day job is optimized for utilons.

Thanks for sharing the article. It sounds like I was trying to optimize for both, while the best approach is to do separate.

Is fundraising through my hobbies an effective use of my time?

warrenjordan4y3

Maybe "effective" is the wrong word to describe my feelings about this.

To piggy off of aarongertler's comment - it seems like I have more than one goal of what I want out of my time. Through my day job, I want to save lives, have impact on the distant feature, build new skills and widen my professional network. I'm very fortunate that I get all those things and have a good time as well.

Whereas blogging and Twitch streaming, I want to have a good time doing it, but also make an impact so that I feel much more satisfied/fulfilled/motivated in doing it. Otherwise, my fear is that it would become a waste of time.

Is fundraising through my hobbies an effective use of my time?

warrenjordan4y3

I think you hit the nail on the head about being okay to have more than one goal. It'd definitely be more effective to just increase donations through my day job.

An added layer on this is that I've enjoyed gaming since I was young, but have had conflicting feelings about it now that I'm older: Does this give me fulfillment and satisfaction anymore? It's fun in the moment, yet it's fleeting.

Hence why I'm exploring Twitch and donating any profit from it. In hopes that I can make an impact through gaming, and feel fulfilled from it. Perhaps I just need to start and see how I feel as I go...

Aaron Gertler

As someone who returned to a game from childhood and then began to stream it, I recommend the strategy of "start and see how you feel". Feeling obligated to do something regularly can suck the joy out of it if you aren't careful, and it would be really sad for that to happen with, of all things, video games.