EA - Introducing the EA Good Governance Project by Grayden

Link to original articleWelcome to The Nonlinear Library, where we use Text-to-Speech software to convert the best writing from the Rationalist and EA communities into audio. This is: Introducing the EA Good Governance Project, published by Grayden on October 8, 2022 on The Effective Altruism Forum. Writing in a personal capacity. Thank you to Sanjay, Joey, Devon, Jack and David for very helpful comments prior to publication and for the highly impactful work they are doing when not being distracted by me. TL;DR I believe good governance is important and often underrated within EA. I'm launching the EA Good Governance Project. Its first initiative will be a directory of EA Board candidates. If you have skills and experience to offer to an EA Board, please add your profile. Good Governance is Important My career as an investor has exposed me to a large variety of companies, CEOs and Boards. A good idea, a good team and a good environment don't necessarily mean success. Execution is vitally important and it's easy to go off track. Holden Karnofsky says that "the board's #1 and most fundamental job is evaluating the CEO's performance". I do not disagree with that, but I think it is not quite as binary as he (likely accidentally) implies. Successful governance that I have seen normally means: There is an alignment of interest between the shareholders (equivalent to beneficiaries) and the CEO, which cascades down the organisation. On the other hand, I know many public company CEOs that are very good at growing their company (and often their pay) in value-destructive ways, e.g. through overpriced acquisitions. The right CEO is in place for the right stage of the organisation's journey. While there are notable exceptions, start-up CEOs aren’t often good at running large organisations. When the size of the organisation changes, often the CEO needs to change. Likewise, when the external environment changes and the key success factors for the organisation change, it sometimes requires a new skillset or personality type. The CEO has the right team around them. I've met more than 100 large company CEOs and not one of them has it all. Good CEOs recognise their own weaknesses. The best CEOs empower people very different from them to plug the gaps. However, perfect introspection is difficult and this is one of the key areas where the Board can work closely with the CEO to ensure there are no blind spots. The CEO is focused on what really matters. Strategy and execution are very different. If the strategy is well defined, it should be clear what you are trying to achieve, but day-to-day matters are much more mundane. Achieving a big visions requires a lot of little choices and the CEO is often brought in to resolve the toughest of those little choices. Even if you think you are good at the bigger picture, it is always helpful to report back to people who are solely focused on the North Star. Good Governance is Often Underrated within EA The contribution of Boards is rarely discussed in EA circles. On the EA Forum, there are only 2 posts before this one tagged "non-profit governance" and few posts talk about the role of Board Members. Only a handful of organisations recruit widely for new Board members. Why is this? Here are my hypotheses: EA is entrepreneurial. When there are 100 reasons the organisation can fail, then governance is not top of the list. Governance is often perceived to be legalistic and risk-averse. It is true that there is a certain legal minimum in most jurisdictions. However, if they are occupying the majority of the Board's time, then I would argue that the Board is not spending enough time on its core functions (unless that is fulfilled by another body). Many EA organisations have very concentrated sources of funding. Donors therefore often fulfil the accountability and governance functions. Donors are analogous to customers, which can wield significant influence in for-profits. EA can be too academic. The world is a lot more complex in reali...