Search for:

Start here
Guides
- Key ideas Understand what makes for a high-impact career.
  Read the full guide →
  Introduction
  Your most important decision
  Summary
  Foundations
  A definition of impact
  Future generations & their moral significance
  Effective altruism
  Global priorities
  Why problem selection is crucial
  The case for reducing existential risks
  This could be the most important century
  Our current list of pressing problems
  Contribution
  Which careers let you contribute most?
  Some solutions are far more effective than others
  Our list of high-impact careers
  Personal fit
  Fit is more important than you think
  Strategy
  What is career capital?
  How much to explore?
  Coordination and impact
  Balancing impact and doing what you love
  Aim higher: a rational case for dreaming big
  Three career stages
  Conclusion
  How much do careers differ in impact?
  Read the full guide →
- Problem profiles Find out about the world's biggest and most neglected problems.
  Go to problems hub →
  Top areas to work on
  Preventing an AI-related catastrophe
  Catastrophic pandemics
  Building effective altruism
  Global priorities research
  Nuclear war
  Epistemics and institutional decision making
  Climate change
  Great power conflict
  Other promising areas
  Promoting positive values
  Space governance
  See more →
  Go to problems hub →
- Career reviews Learn about high-impact career paths.
  See all our career reviews →
  Key categories of impactful careers
  Government and policy
  Organisation-building at effective nonprofits
  Research
  Applying an unusual strength to a needed niche
  Communication
  Earning to give
  List of top-recommended career paths
  AI safety technical research
  Long-term AI policy
  Founder of new projects
  Helping build the effective altruism community
  Grantmaker
  Operations management in high-impact organisations
  Research into global priorities
  Biorisk research, strategy, and policy
  China-related AI safety and governance
  Forecasting research and implementation
  Sometimes-recommended paths
  High-impact but especially competitive
  Promising but under-researched
  Impactful if you're an especially good fit
  Recommended career capital
  Steps to build your skills and network
  Making the most of your current job
  Doing good in any career
  How to invest in yourself
  See all our career reviews →
- Planning & decision making Use our tools to make concrete plans.
  See all planning resources →
  Create a high-impact career plan
  8-week career planning course
  Summary
  Career plan template
  Annual career check-up
  Make good career decisions
  Make an immediate decision
  Improve your decision-making skills
  See all planning resources →
- Browse all our content Pick a topic to explore or check out our most popular pieces.
  Selected topics
  Moral philosophy
  Career capital
  Job satisfaction
  Anonymous advice
  Unconventional advice
  Advice for undergraduates
  Advocacy
  Existential risk
  Top-recommended careers
  See all topics →
  Top articles from outside our guides
  What makes for a dream job?
  Best charities to donate to
  Misconceptions about effective altruism
  High-impact research questions
  What are your chances of getting elected to Congress, if you try?
  How many lives does a doctor save?
  What's the impact of voting?
  Advice for undergraduates
  All articles →
  
  2017 career guide
  All career guide pages →
Read the full guide →
Introduction
Your most important decision
Summary
Foundations
A definition of impact
Future generations & their moral significance
Effective altruism
Global priorities
Why problem selection is crucial
The case for reducing existential risks
This could be the most important century
Our current list of pressing problems
Contribution
Which careers let you contribute most?
Some solutions are far more effective than others
Our list of high-impact careers
Personal fit
Fit is more important than you think
Strategy
What is career capital?
How much to explore?
Coordination and impact
Balancing impact and doing what you love
Aim higher: a rational case for dreaming big
Three career stages
Conclusion
How much do careers differ in impact?
Read the full guide →
Go to problems hub →
Top areas to work on
Preventing an AI-related catastrophe
Catastrophic pandemics
Building effective altruism
Global priorities research
Nuclear war
Epistemics and institutional decision making
Climate change
Great power conflict
Other promising areas
Promoting positive values
Space governance
See more →
Go to problems hub →
See all our career reviews →
Key categories of impactful careers
Government and policy
Organisation-building at effective nonprofits
Research
Applying an unusual strength to a needed niche
Communication
Earning to give
List of top-recommended career paths
AI safety technical research
Long-term AI policy
Founder of new projects
Helping build the effective altruism community
Grantmaker
Operations management in high-impact organisations
Research into global priorities
Biorisk research, strategy, and policy
China-related AI safety and governance
Forecasting research and implementation
Sometimes-recommended paths
High-impact but especially competitive
Promising but under-researched
Impactful if you're an especially good fit
Recommended career capital
Steps to build your skills and network
Making the most of your current job
Doing good in any career
How to invest in yourself
See all our career reviews →
See all planning resources →
Create a high-impact career plan
8-week career planning course
Summary
Career plan template
Annual career check-up
Make good career decisions
Make an immediate decision
Improve your decision-making skills
See all planning resources →
Selected topics
Moral philosophy
Career capital
Job satisfaction
Anonymous advice
Unconventional advice
Advice for undergraduates
Advocacy
Existential risk
Top-recommended careers
See all topics →
Top articles from outside our guides
What makes for a dream job?
Best charities to donate to
Misconceptions about effective altruism
High-impact research questions
What are your chances of getting elected to Congress, if you try?
How many lives does a doctor save?
What's the impact of voting?
Advice for undergraduates
All articles →

2017 career guide
All career guide pages →
Job board
Podcast
- The 80,000 Hours Podcast
- 80k After Hours
- Effective Altruism: An Introduction
- Effective Altruism: Ten Global Problems
Get 1-1 advice
Newsletter
Book giveaway

New releases
All articles
Community
About

Home Authors Keiran Harris

Search for:

New releases
All articles
Community
About

Author archive: Keiran Harris

Filter by content type:
All37
Podcasts23
Podcasts (80k After Hours)8
Blog posts6

2023

March

#147 – Spencer Greenberg on stopping valueless papers from getting into top journals
Podcast
Luisa and Robert Long on how to make independent research more fun
Podcast (80k After Hours)
#146 – Robert Long on why large language models like GPT (probably) aren’t conscious
Podcast

February

#145 – Christopher Brown on why slavery abolition wasn’t inevitable
Podcast

January

#144 – Athena Aktipis on why cancer is actually one of the fundamental phenomena in our universe
Podcast

2022

December

#143 – Jeffrey Lewis on the most common misconceptions about nuclear weapons
Podcast
#142 – John McWhorter on key lessons from linguistics, the virtue of creoles, and language extinction
Podcast
#141 – Richard Ngo on large language models, OpenAI, and striving to make the future go well
Podcast
Marcus Davis on founding and leading Rethink Priorities
Podcast (80k After Hours)

November

#140 – Bear Braumoeller on the case that war isn’t in decline
Podcast

October

#139 – Alan Hájek on puzzles and paradoxes in probability and expected value
Podcast

September

#138 – Sharon Hewitt Rawlette on why pleasure and pain are the only things that intrinsically matter
Podcast
Kuhan Jeyapragasan on effective altruism university groups
Podcast (80k After Hours)
#137 – Andreas Mogensen on whether effective altruism is just for consequentialists
Podcast
Andrés Jiménez Zorrilla on the Shrimp Welfare Project
Podcast (80k After Hours)

August

#136 – Will MacAskill on what we owe the future
Podcast
#135 – Samuel Charap on key lessons from five months of war in Ukraine
Podcast

July

#134 – Ian Morris on what big picture history teaches us
Podcast
#133 – Max Tegmark on how a ‘put-up-or-shut-up’ resolution led him to work on AI and algorithmic news selection
Podcast

June

#132 – Nova DasSarma on why information security may be critical to the safe development of AI systems
Podcast
#131 – Lewis Dartnell on getting humanity to bounce back faster in a post-apocalyptic world
Podcast

February

Alex Lawsen on his advice for students
Podcast (80k After Hours)
Rob and Keiran on the philosophy of The 80,000 Hours Podcast
Podcast (80k After Hours)
Introducing 80k After Hours
Blog post

2021

October

Effective altruism in a nutshell
Blog post

May

#100 – Having a successful career with depression, anxiety, and imposter syndrome
Podcast

2020

June

#79 – A.J. Jacobs on radical honesty, following the whole Bible, and reframing global problems as puzzles
Podcast

2019

May

Rob Wiblin on human nature, new technology, and living a happy, healthy & ethical life
Blog post

Filter by content type:
All37
Podcasts23
Podcasts (80k After Hours)8
Blog posts6

Join our newsletter

Get regular updates featuring our latest research, events near you, and high-impact career opportunities.

Get 1-1 advice

Want to tackle a pressing global problem with your career?

Speak to an advisor

Our research

Overview: Key ideas
Especially pressing world problems
Effective altruism
Future generations
List of careers
Career guide (2017)
All our research

Take action

Plan your career
Find a job
Get 1-1 advice
Join our community

Follow us

Subscribe to our podcast
Join our newsletter
Follow us on Twitter
Join our LinkedIn group
Follow us on Facebook
Follow us on YouTube

About us

Why 80,000 Hours?
Meet the team
Our donors
Media coverage
Our mistakes

80,000 Hours is a project of the Effective Ventures group, the umbrella term for Effective Ventures Foundation (England and Wales registered charity number 1149828 and registered company number 07962181, and also a Netherlands registered tax-deductible entity ANBI 825776867) and Effective Ventures Foundation USA, Inc. (a section 501(c)(3) public charity in the USA, EIN 47-1988398).

Please contact us to suggest ideas, improvements, or corrections.

We do our best to provide useful information, but how you use the information is up to you. We don’t take responsibility for any loss that results from the use of information on the site. Please consult our full legal disclaimer and privacy policy.

© 2023 – all rights reserved. Please contact us if you wish to redistribute, translate, or adapt this work.