Expression of interest: writer

By · Published March 9th, 2022

80,000 Hours is considering hiring a writer.

  • As a writer at 80,000 Hours, you’d research and write articles read by thousands of people trying to do good with their careers.
  • We’re looking for someone with a preexisting understanding of our organisation’s priorities (including longtermism and effective altruism), plus great communication skills, an aptitude for research and writing, and the ability to learn quickly.
  • This is a full-time, London-based role, with a starting salary of around £58,000–£68,000.

Note: This announcement is an expression of interest, rather than a formal hiring round. We’ll likely launch a formal round soon, but aren’t sure exactly when. We think learning more about who might be interested in this role will help us better plan and expedite our hiring round when we do run it. Because of this, we have a high bar for considering enquiries, and won’t be able to respond to everyone who reaches out.

If you don’t hear back from us, please don’t take it as a rejection! You should feel very welcome to respond to future ads for 80,000 Hours positions (which we’ll list here and on our job board).

Why 80,000 Hours?

80,000 Hours’ mission is to get talented people working on the world’s most pressing problems. The effective altruism community, of which we are a part, is growing in reach and now includes funding bodies with over $40 billion to allocate in total. But how do we make sure people are pursuing the right kinds of work in order to turn all those resources into long-term impact? This is the problem 80,000 Hours is trying to solve.

We’ve had over eight million visitors to our website (with over 100,000 hours of reading time per year), and more than 3,000 people have now told us that they’ve significantly changed their career plans due to our work. 80,000 Hours is also the largest single source of people getting involved in the effective altruism community, according to the most recent EA Survey.

If you join us as a writer, you’d likely be one of the most widely read writers in effective altruism.

The role

As a writer at 80,000 Hours, your work would involve:

  • Framing, researching, outlining, and writing articles
  • Generating ideas for additional articles
  • Helping with others’ writing by providing comments
  • Generally helping grow the impact of the site

Some of the types of pieces you’d help work on include:

Who we’re looking for

We’d be most excited to hear from people with:

  • Strong knowledge of and commitment to the ideals, philosophical arguments, and values of effective altruism
  • High conscientiousness, and the ability to learn quickly and independently
  • A track record of producing high-quality writing (which can include blog posts, articles, reports, etc.) — especially for broad audiences, and especially on topics related to effective altruism and longtermism. (Don’t have this, but think you have the potential to produce writing for a broad audience? We’d still like to hear from you!)

We’re aware that factors like gender, race, and socioeconomic background can affect people’s willingness to apply for roles for which they meet many but not all the suggested attributes. We’d especially like to encourage people from underrepresented backgrounds to express interest.

The details

This is a full-time role based in London, though you can work remotely for up to three months of the year if needed. If that won’t work for you, please reach out anyway (and let us know in your email). We can sponsor visas.

The salary will vary based on your skills and experience, but to give a rough sense, the starting full-time salary would likely be between £58,000 and £68,000 per year.

The start date of the role is flexible, but we would expect you to start during 2022 and prefer you to start as soon as you’re able to.

Our benefits include:

  • The option to use 10% of your work time for self development
  • 25 days of paid holiday, plus bank holidays
  • Standard UK pension, with 3% contribution from employer
  • Private medical insurance and long-term disability insurance
  • Gym, shower facilities, and free food provided at our London office

Interested? Get in touch.

If you’re a writer with a track record and an interest in 80,000 Hours’ mission, please submit the following materials:

  • A brief explanation (under 2,000 characters) of your interest in 80,000 Hours’ mission
  • One research writeup (broadly defined) written to be accessible to a non-expert (can be unpublished)
  • One writing sample written for a broad audience (can be research-based, or not)

Submit materials

While there’s no hard deadline for getting in touch, we encourage you to submit your materials before mid-April. We’ll reach out to discuss a potential role if we think you’re a particularly great fit.

Check out other positions at 80,000 Hours