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 In brief: 

Our 2015 goals revolved mostly around building our staff capacity, and particularly around hiring. Broadly speaking, we mostly accomplished our goals, though we significantly scaled back our goals for scientific research at mid-year. Our team has roughly doubled in size compared to a year ago. We’re now in a much better position to recommend a significant amount of grantmaking. We also feel much better positioned to identify outstanding causes. This year, we have a general goal of focusing on making grants in the most outstanding causes we’ve found. This is a departure from past years’ goals, which revolved around building knowledge and staff capacity. We expect to prioritize building knowledge and staff capacity again in the future, but we think this is a good year to focus on increasing our grantmaking. We currently are bottlenecked in terms of management capacity, and we believe that focusing on grantmaking will likely lead to a lot of learning that will inform future hiring and capacity building. Potential risks from advanced artificial intelligence will be a major priority for 2016. Not only will Daniel Dewey be working on this cause full-time, but Nick Beckstead and I will both be putting significant time into it as well. Some other staff will be contributing smaller amounts of time as appropriate. Other major focus areas where we expect significant grantmaking include criminal justice reform, farm animal welfare, and biosecurity. We expect to recommend at least $10 million in grants in each of these areas. We have a variety of other goals, including completing the separation of the Open Philanthropy Project as an independent organization from GiveWell, with its own employees and financials, though some individuals will continue to do work for both organizations.      Open Philanthropy Project Updates       Holden Karnofsky's blog 1 comment Add new comment           Hits-based Giving   by Holden Karnofsky Published April 04, 2016       One of our core values is our tolerance for philanthropic “risk.” Our overarching goal is to do as much good as we can, and as part of that, we’re open to supporting work that has a high risk of failing to accomplish its goals. We’re even open to supporting work that is more than 90% likely to fail, as long as the overall expected value is high enough. 

 And we suspect that, in fact, much of the best philanthropy is likely to fail. We suspect that high-risk, high-reward philanthropy could be described as a “hits business,” where a small number of enormous successes account for a large share of the total impact — and compensate for a large number of failed projects. 

        Holden Karnofsky's blog 25 comments Add new comment                 Stay Updated   Email me new blog posts Blog RSS feed More information     Recent blog posts        Explaining Our Bet on Sherlock Biosciences' Innovations in Viral Diagnostics    Our Progress in 2018 and Plans for 2019    New Staff in Operations, Programs, and Research    History of Philanthropy Literature Review: Pugwash Conferences on Science and World Affairs    Reflections on Our 2018 Generalist Research Analyst Recruiting        Archives    2019 June 2019    June 2019   April 2019    April 2019    April 2019    April 2019   March 2019    March 2019   February 2019    February 2019  2018 December 2018    December 2018    December 2018    December 2018   October 2018    October 2018   September 2018    September 2018   May 2018    May 2018   April 2018    April 2018   March 2018    March 2018    March 2018    March 2018   February 2018    February 2018    February 2018   January 2018    January 2018    January 2018    January 2018  2017 December 2017    December 2017    December 2017    December 2017   November 2017    November 2017   October 2017    October 2017   September 2017    September 2017    September 2017    September 2017    September 2017    September 2017   June 2017    June 2017    June 2017    June 2017    June 2017   April 2017    April 2017    April 2017   March 2017    March 2017    March 2017    March 2017   February 2017    February 2017    February 2017  2016 December 2016    December 2016    December 2016    December 2016   October 2016    October 2016   September 2016    September 2016    September 2016    September 2016    September 2016   July 2016    July 2016   June 2016    June 2016    June 2016   May 2016    May 2016    May 2016    May 2016   April 2016    April 2016    April 2016   March 2016    March 2016    March 2016   February 2016    February 2016    February 2016    February 2016    February 2016  2015 December 2015    December 2015   November 2015    November 2015   October 2015    October 2015   September 2015    September 2015    September 2015    September 2015    September 2015    September 2015   August 2015    August 2015    August 2015    August 2015   July 2015    July 2015    July 2015    July 2015    July 2015    July 2015   June 2015    June 2015    June 2015    June 2015   May 2015    May 2015    May 2015    May 2015   April 2015    April 2015    April 2015    April 2015    April 2015    April 2015   March 2015    March 2015    March 2015    March 2015    March 2015   February 2015    February 2015    February 2015    February 2015  2014 October 2014    October 2014    October 2014   September 2014    September 2014    September 2014   August 2014    August 2014   July 2014    July 2014    July 2014   June 2014    June 2014   May 2014    May 2014    May 2014    May 2014    May 2014   April 2014    April 2014    April 2014   March 2014    March 2014    March 2014   January 2014    January 2014    January 2014  2013 December 2013    December 2013   November 2013    November 2013    November 2013   October 2013    October 2013    October 2013    October 2013    October 2013   September 2013    September 2013   July 2013    July 2013    July 2013    July 2013   June 2013    June 2013    June 2013   May 2013    May 2013    May 2013   April 2013    April 2013    April 2013    April 2013   March 2013    March 2013   February 2013    February 2013  2012 September 2012    September 2012    September 2012   July 2012    July 2012   June 2012    June 2012    June 2012    June 2012   May 2012    May 2012    May 2012    May 2012   March 2012    March 2012   February 2012    February 2012    February 2012    February 2012   January 2012    January 2012  2011 October 2011    October 2011   September 2011    September 2011    September 2011    September 2011                contact us jobs press kit  facebook twitter rss © Open Philanthropy Project. Except as otherwise noted, this work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-ShareAlike 3.0 United States License. Some images may be copyrighted by others and not licensed for re-use: see image captions or footnotes. Privacy policy         try { clicky.init(100914494); }catch(e){}