Last updated: October 2021
Our research process involves talking with nonprofit representatives and subject matter experts to learn more about potentially promising programs and funding opportunities. We publish notes summarizing the main points from these conversations to be transparent about our work.1
All of the notes in the table below have been approved for public posting by the people involved. Some notes have been edited after the conversation to correct errors, remove confidential information, or add additional information.2
You can receive updates when notes from our research conversations are published by subscribing here.
How to use this table
Here are a few key pointers for how you can engage with the table of conversation notes:
- To filter by topic: You can use the "Filter" button to view different subsets of the notes in the table. To see notes on a specific topic (e.g. malaria, vaccines, salt iodization), click on "Filter," change the first dropdown menu to "Topics," and select topics of interest from the third dropdown menu.
- To filter by GiveWell's recognition for an organization: You can use a similar "Filter" process to see notes from conversations with GiveWell Incubation Grant recipients as well as current and former top charities and organizations we listed as standout charities before we stopped offering that designation. To do that, click on "Filter," change the first dropdown menu to "GiveWell Recognition," and select the category of organization you'd like to see from the third dropdown menu. Note that, as of about 2018, we no longer typically publish notes from our calls with top charities; instead, we incorporate what we learn from our calls directly into our top charity reviews.
- To apply multiple filters: You can apply multiple filters simultaneously by clicking "+ Add filter" under the "Filter" menu.
- To sort by conversation date: To see the notes from the most recent conversations, click on "Sort," select "Date" from the first dropdown menu, and click on "9 → 1."
- To see a full view of this table: For a full view of this table, see here.
A previous version of this page is available here.
- 1. Note that as of June 2021, we are shifting toward writing shorter summary notes rather than fully detailed notes. Our goal is to make our review process less burdensome on the people we talk to (who review all notes before we post them publicly) while continuing to meet our high standards for transparency about our work.
- 2. Previously, conversations related to our work on the Open Philanthropy Project were available on this page. Open Philanthropy is now a separate entity from GiveWell and these conversations are now available on the Open Philanthropy website.