If you’ve already come across these materials before, please skim them so that you are familiar. We will assume this knowledge during the workshop.
Movement-Building Strategy
The following are to give you a starting point and hopefully to help us discuss movement building within a common framework:
- Classic CEA models: Funnel model, ThreeFactor model, Concentric Circles model. Note that CEA’s thinking on this has changed over time but there aren’t any publicly available resources on their current thinking.
- Notes on CEA’s strategy 2020 from group organiser Q&A sessions.
- LCAN Theory of Change - Stages of an EA’s journey & the mechanisms of change in their behavior at each stage.
- A Framework for Assessing the Potential of EA Development in Emerging Locations. This is a great exercise to do for your local group, and evaluate what the best strategy for your group may be.
Reference Links
- Compilation of Models of Movement Building on the EA Hub
- Some models of less common forms of movement building.
- EA London's Theory of Change
Open Questions
- What model is most appropriate to think about members overall?
- What model is most useful when thinking about careers strategy?
- How should you evaluate what strategy is best for your group when there is limited information?
- Failing fast to learn more rapidly & build a model of your local environment in your mind.
- How to think about career planning and coaching in the broader context of the EA community?
- From Naomi (EA Geneva): The whole idea of ‘community building’.
- 80,000 Hours mentions capacity building, but what does that mean?
- Which timelines should group organisers operate on?
Cause & Career Paths Knowledge
To improve your knowledge of careers advice for non-US/UK countries:
1. Create a list of priority causes & paths.
It might be helpful to create a cause area list (see one list of causes here) and rank them in terms of your knowledge levels of each cause and/or path. You could also have a column for relevance to your local community (either because your country has a comparative advantage in this cause, or because of interest from your group members). You could then prioritise the top 3-5 causes you want to learn more about.
2. Strengthen your general EA cause area & career paths knowledge
To do career 1-1s, it’s important to have a strong foundational knowledge of different EA cause areas and recommended career paths. Strengthening your knowledge of cause areas is an ongoing process, but take some time before the workshop to evaluate which causes you have the least knowledge of and research them.
Important Note: You will likely not have enough time to resolve all your uncertainties, but hopefully this exercise will help you be more aware of them so you are better able to communicate these uncertainties to your advisees and reduce the chances of misleading them.
Start researching the top causes
You can see the following resources as starting points:
- Read what 80,000 Hours has written on the topic. See this Compilation of (mostly) 80K advice, or search their website.
- For animal welfare, see Animal Advocacy Careers advice.
- Annotated List of EA Career Advice Resources
- Skim through this list of EA organisations and see if there are organisations you are unfamiliar with.
- Annotated List of EA Career Frameworks & Theories
Revisit keystone 80,000 Hours articles
It’s important to know what 80K has said on a topic, both because you might learn something, and also because many of your members will have read articles from them. Knowing what’s being said and how (ir)relevant it might be to your members is very valuable.
Review your knowledge of these articles and note down any information which is new to you or which you have doubts or questions about (especially as they might apply to your region):
- 80,000 Hours Key Ideas
- 80,000 Hours Career Guide
- Some promising career ideas beyond 80,000 Hours' priority paths
- Problem areas beyond 80,000 Hours' current priorities
3. Solidify your local career knowledge and network
Learn what the important sectors are in your city or country for doing good, and point people to relevant resources. It can be useful to act as a connector and build up lists of potentially impactful organisations, individuals, and resources in a location in addition to being an advisor (sometimes it may be more valuable, especially if you have limited capacity for advising). That can include EA organisations if they exist, but they are far from the only impactful roles, as has been the topic of much discussion in the EA community in the last few years.
Conduct local priorities research.
You can refer to this Guide to Local Priorities Research Folder. In particular, see 2. Domain Expert Research. If you are interested in doing local careers research, reach out to me (Vaidehi) and I can connect you to others.
Open Questions
Please add suggestions to the open questions, or offer answers/further thinking or resources.
- What is the role of your network?
- How can you build your network and connections?
- What kind of connections should you have and with whom?
- When should you introduce members to your connections?
4. Summarise the information you’ve gathered
Try to keep notes & lists of resources, so that future group organisers can benefit from your hard work :). It can be especially useful to note down names of important contacts & references in whatever CRM (Customer Relationship Management) system you are using, and note down their expertise.
Overall open questions
Please add suggestions to the open questions, or offer answers/further thinking or resources.
- How much practical knowledge do you need to know to give good careers advice?
- How valuable is local careers research? Are there diminishing returns?
- How does the location in the funnel your member is change the information you need to know to help them the best? What are the trade-offs that need to be made?
- When should you start local careers advice? How long should you devote to it?