科技行業(yè)的人士都喜歡討論 如何成就一番事業(yè) 。但怎樣才能讓你的職業(yè)生涯更有意義呢？如果你真的想對(duì)這個(gè)世界帶來(lái)積極影響，你究竟是該為創(chuàng)業(yè)公司工作呢，還是說(shuō)為非營(yíng)利機(jī)構(gòu)服務(wù)呢？抑或是遠(yuǎn)離創(chuàng)業(yè)公司和非營(yíng)利組織？
80000 Hours 便是一個(gè)幫助你做出上述決定的組織。這是一家非營(yíng)利組織，成員包括當(dāng)前孵化自 Y Combinator 的一批創(chuàng)業(yè)公司，由本·托德（Ben Todd）和威爾·麥克斯基爾（Will MacAskill）創(chuàng)建于 2011 年。托德目前擔(dān)任 80,000 Hours 的執(zhí)行董事，而麥克斯基爾則擔(dān)任總裁。
麥克斯基爾是英國(guó)牛津大學(xué)研究哲學(xué)的副教授，他說(shuō)在遇到托德時(shí)，后者還是一個(gè)學(xué)生，正面臨事業(yè)上的艱難選擇。他倆最終成立了一個(gè)討論組， 講授有關(guān)這個(gè)話題的
課程 ，直至最終創(chuàng)建 80000 Hours，用以傳播他們的想法（這一組織的名稱是指一個(gè)人職業(yè)生涯的全部工作時(shí)間）。
80000 Hours 的工作涉及一對(duì)一職業(yè)培訓(xùn)，但重點(diǎn)已轉(zhuǎn)向 80000 Hours 網(wǎng)站上的文章和其他相關(guān)內(nèi)容——畢竟，這樣一來(lái)，他們可以覆蓋更多的受眾。托德表示，80000 Hours 的內(nèi)容更具交互性和個(gè)性化，比如包含一些小測(cè)驗(yàn)，現(xiàn)在它上面還有 職業(yè)規(guī)劃指導(dǎo) 和 大量相關(guān)文章 ，（更新： 這就是 80000 Hours 上面的一個(gè)測(cè)驗(yàn) ，最終建議我應(yīng)該參考智庫(kù)研究。）80000 Hours 目前還在圍繞此類內(nèi)容打造一個(gè)社區(qū)。
80000 Hours 的目標(biāo)不是向所有人都推薦相同的職業(yè)，而是確保他們擁有做出正確職業(yè)決定的理想框架——他們要問(wèn)自己一些合適的問(wèn)題。
順便說(shuō)一句，80000 Hours 的建議有時(shí)與我們的直覺(jué)完全相反。例如，它明確反對(duì)盲目遵從托德所說(shuō)的“常見(jiàn)的職業(yè)規(guī)劃建議”，即追隨你的內(nèi)心。
相反，80,000 Hours 會(huì)告訴讀者，“ 不要追隨內(nèi)心 ”——這是讓人相當(dāng)吃驚的做法。“追隨內(nèi)心”不會(huì)讓你變得更具上進(jìn)心，從而更成功嗎？
托德反駁說(shuō)，熱情“并不是成功的保證，也不能確保你一定就可以對(duì)社會(huì)做出積極貢獻(xiàn)。”他還指出，大多數(shù)人都說(shuō)他們對(duì)體育、藝術(shù)等領(lǐng)域充滿熱情，但這些領(lǐng)域的職業(yè)機(jī)遇十分有限。
托德指出，最為重要的是，研究表明追隨內(nèi)心只會(huì)“讓事情出現(xiàn)倒退”，相反，你應(yīng)該把精力放在“熟悉有意義的事情上，然后再慢慢形成對(duì)這些事情的興趣。”
麥克斯基爾（他寫(xiě)了一本有關(guān)“有效的利他主義”的書(shū)）還懷疑另一個(gè)看似顯而易見(jiàn)的情況——要為非營(yíng)利機(jī)構(gòu)工作，尤其是將它作為你大學(xué)畢業(yè)后的第一份工作。他并沒(méi)有輕視所有這些機(jī)構(gòu)的意思，他說(shuō)只有少數(shù)非營(yíng)利機(jī)構(gòu)會(huì)真正起作用。此外，如果某個(gè)非營(yíng)利機(jī)構(gòu)沒(méi)有提供幫助你發(fā)展專業(yè)技能的資源，那么為它服務(wù)可能會(huì)限制你今后的工作能力。
所以，為什么 80000 Hours 本身是一個(gè)非營(yíng)利機(jī)構(gòu)？麥克斯基爾表示，“我們有必要避免利益沖突，有必要避免對(duì)‘給出幫我們賺錢(qián)的建議’而有壓力。”
“如果我們認(rèn)為我們可以克服那個(gè)困難，我們就要解放思想，朝著營(yíng)利性的模式發(fā)展，”他補(bǔ)充道。無(wú)論如何，關(guān)鍵是“專注于擁有盡可能最大的社會(huì)影響，”既為了讀者，也為了 80000 Hours 自己。
Want To Make An Impact With Your Work? Try Some Advice From 80,000 Hours
People in the tech world like to talk about doing great things. But what does that actually mean for your career? If you’re serious about making a positive impact on the world, should you go work for a startup? A nonprofit? Or none of the above?
80,000 Hours is an organization aiming to help with those decisions. It’s a nonprofit in the current class of startups incubated by doing great things, but it was founded back in 2011 by Ben Todd (the organization’s executive director) and Will MacAskill (its president).
MacAskill is an associate professor of philosophy at Oxford University, and he said that when they met, Todd was a student wrestling with many of these questions. They ended up forming a discussion group and giving lectures on the topic, then eventually creating 80,000 Hours to spread their ideas. (The name refers to the number of hours in your career)
Part of their work involves one-on-one career coaching, but the focus has shifted toward articles and other content on the 80,000 Hours site — which, after all, can reach a broader audience. Todd said the content should get more interactive and personalized through things like quizzes, but for now, there’s already a career guide and plenty of articles. (Update: Here’s one of those quizzes, which suggested that I look into think tank research.) 80,000 Hours is also working to build a community around that content.
The point isn’t to just direct everyone to the same type of career, but rather to make sure they’ve got the right framework for making their decisions — that they’re asking themselves the right questions.
The advice, by the way, can be pretty counter-intuitive. For example, it pushes back against what Todd calls “the paradigm career advice of our time,” namely following your passion.
In contrast, 80,000 Hours tells readers, “Don’t follow your passion” — which is pretty surprising. Isn’t following your passion supposed to make you more motivated, and therefore more successful?
Todd countered that passion is “not anywhere close to a guarantee of being successful or having an impact.” He also noted that most people say their passion is in areas like sports and the arts, which offer very limited career opportunities.
Most importantly, he said that research suggests that following your passion “gets things backwards.” Instead, you should focus on “getting good at something that’s meaningful, and then passion develops from that later on.”
MacAskill (who wrote a book about “effective altruism”) was also skeptical of another seemingly obvious track — going to work for a nonprofit, especially as your first job out of college. He didn’t dismiss all such organizations, but he said only a small number of them have a real impact. In addition, working for a nonprofit might limit your ability to do good later on, if the organization doesn’t have the resources to help you develop your professional skills.
So why is 80,000 Hours a nonprofit itself? MacAskill said it’s necessary to avoid conflicts of interest and feeling pressured to “give the sorts of recommendations that make us money.”
“We’d be open to the idea of moving to a for-profit model if we think we could overcome that difficulty,” he added. Either way, the key is being “laser-focused on having the biggest social impact,” both for individual readers, and for 80,000 Hours itself.
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2015-08-06 09:08:37