“Building an EA-aligned career from an LMIC” by Rika Gabriel

“Building an EA-aligned career from an LMIC” by Rika Gabriel

This is Part 1 of a multi-part series, shared as part of Career Conversations Week. The views expressed here are my own and don't reflect those of my employer.

TL;DR:

Building an EA-aligned career starting from an LMIC comes with specific challenges that shaped how I think about career planning, especially around constraints:

  • Everyone has their own "passport"—some structural limitation that affects their career more than their abilities. Reframing these from unfair barriers to data about my specific career path has helped me a lot.
  • When pursuing an ideal career path, it's easy to fixate on what should be possible rather than what actually is. But those idealized paths often require circumstances you don't have—whether personal (e.g., visa status, financial safety net) or external (e.g., your dream org hiring, or a stable funding landscape). It might be helpful to view the paths that work within your actual constraints [...]

---

Outline:

(00:21) TL;DR:

(01:27) Introduction

(02:25) My EA journey so far

(03:18) Sometimes my passport mattered more than my competencies, and thats okay

(04:43) Everyone has their own passport

(06:19) Realistic opportunities often outweigh idealistic ones

(08:04) Importance of a fail-safe

(08:37) Playing the long game

(09:44) Adversity quotient seems underrated

(10:13) Building resilience through adversity

(11:22) Pivot into recruiting

(12:11) Building AQ over time

(14:02) Why AQ matters in EA-aligned work

(15:01) Closing thoughts

---

First published:
July 28th, 2025

Source:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/3Hh839MaiWCPzyB3M/building-an-ea-aligned-career-from-an-lmic

---

Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

---

Images from the article:

Apple Podcasts and Spotify do not show images in the episode description. Try Pocket Casts, or another podcast app.

Episoder(250)

[Linkpost] “Starfish” by Aaron Gertler 🔸

[Linkpost] “Starfish” by Aaron Gertler 🔸

This is a link post. By Alexander Wales Thousands of starfish had washed up on the beach, and a little girl was diligently throwing them back into the water, one at a time. A man came up to the girl a...

1 Mai 4min

“Time Sensitive Urgent Animal Welfare Action” by Bentham’s Bulldog

“Time Sensitive Urgent Animal Welfare Action” by Bentham’s Bulldog

The EATS act—now called the save our bacon act—would make it illegal for states to pass animal welfare laws that apply to products produced out of state. This would gut most state level animal protect...

29 Apr 1min

“Forecasting is Way Overrated, and We Should Stop Funding It” by Marcus Abramovitch 🔸

“Forecasting is Way Overrated, and We Should Stop Funding It” by Marcus Abramovitch 🔸

Summary EA and rationalists got enamoured with forecasting and prediction markets and made them part of the culture, but this hasn’t proven very useful, yet it continues to receive substantial EA fun...

26 Apr 8min

“My lover, effective altruism” by Natalie_Cargill

“My lover, effective altruism” by Natalie_Cargill

Crossposted from Substack. This post is part of a 30-posts-in-30-days ordeal at Inkhaven. All suboptimalities are the result of that. This is part 2, here is part 1 in my EA mini series! On my way to ...

26 Apr 8min

“A Database of Near-Term Interventions for Wild Animals” by Bob Fischer

“A Database of Near-Term Interventions for Wild Animals” by Bob Fischer

The Animal Welfare Department (AWD) at Rethink Priorities supports high-impact strategies to help animals, especially where suffering is vast and largely neglected. Therefore, one of our focus areas i...

24 Apr 17min

“The AI people have been right a lot” by Dylan Matthews

“The AI people have been right a lot” by Dylan Matthews

This post was crossposted from Dylan Matthew's blog by the EA Forum team. The author may not see or reply to comments. Subtitle: Try to keep an open mind as the world gets increasingly wild.The crowd ...

20 Apr 10min

[Linkpost] “The Anthropic IPO Is Coming. We Aren’t Ready for It.” by Sophie Kim

[Linkpost] “The Anthropic IPO Is Coming. We Aren’t Ready for It.” by Sophie Kim

This is a link post. More money is coming than AI safety has ever seen. The capacity to deploy it doesn't exist yet.Image Source: Fortune.com This week, Anthropic announced Claude Mythos Preview– a mo...

17 Apr 15min

“AI Safety’s Biggest Talent Gap Isn’t Researchers. It’s Generalists.” by Topaz, Agustín Covarrubias 🔸, Alexandra Bates, Parv Mahajan, Kairos

“AI Safety’s Biggest Talent Gap Isn’t Researchers. It’s Generalists.” by Topaz, Agustín Covarrubias 🔸, Alexandra Bates, Parv Mahajan, Kairos

This post was cross posted to LessWrong TL;DR: One of the largest talent gaps in AI safety is competent generalists: program managers, fieldbuilders, operators, org leaders, chiefs of staff, founders....

16 Apr 13min

Populært innen Samfunn

rss-spartsklubben
giver-og-gjengen-vg
aftenpodden
alt-fortalt
konspirasjonspodden
aftenpodden-usa
popradet
rss-nesten-hele-uka-med-lepperod
rss-henlagt-andy-larsgaard
lydartikler-fra-aftenposten
wolfgang-wee-uncut
grenselos
intervjuet
rss-espen-lee-usensurert
synnve-og-vanessa
rss-dette-ma-aldri-skje-igjen
rss-dannet-uten-piano
min-barneoppdragelse
fladseth
frokostshowet-pa-p5