Thanks for writing this, Grace! I have also noticed that people underestimate how much people talk informally about others, no matter how much power those other people have. For example, if someone was hard to work with, both as an employee and an employer (even in a volunteer capacity), these things will come out eventually via informal channels, and future collaborators/employers will triangulate those thoughts when making a decision about whether to hire you or work for you. You usually won't even know it was said, because people rarely say it to your face. What's more challenging is that people are generally disincentivised to give constructive criticism like this because this may carry social cost.

The more varied the comments about you are from different people, the more confident people will be that they are true, whether good or bad, especially if they come from someone with a strong reputation. Overall, the conclusion is to always do your best work, even in a volunteer capacity; treat people well no matter how much power they have; be easy to work with; and handle challenges with care, knowing others will be interested to hear how you handled it. 

Even the smallest interactions matter. For example, I know about an occasion when a person volunteered at a conference for one charity, and they were applying for a job for another, and because of one thing they said to their conference manager, the hiring manager at another charity took this into account and didn't hire them because it wasn't acceptable in their culture. This also applies online, so I encourage people to be careful about what they write and comment publicly because hiring managers and funders usually do deep research before making decisions, and even a small comment can affect whether you advance to the next stage. The rule of thumb is to follow community guidelines at all times: treat everyone with respect, be kind and constructive, open and curious, etc. I love Cate Hall's concept mentioned in her recent book: "You are always auditioning for a bigger role". 

You touched upon a really good point, I have also spoken to/mentored a few people who have had a hard time getting jobs but had an easier time getting grants to start new charities (they also had experience, so not fresh grads). We noted at the time that it's somewhat ironic that you have to start a charity to get a job in it, because getting jobs can be so competitive in EA. I am also of the opinion that creating your own opportunity is easier from that perspective, especially if you're up for the difficulties that come with entrepreneurship, because you don't need anyone's permission, apart from getting funding for it (which can be hard in itself, but still not quite the same as getting a job with many other applicants, and with the increase in funding could be somewhat easier). 
I think this blog is aimed more at people who have both options, or who are considering both and want to see which option is best for them before they invest a lot of time in either. 

Thanks for reading closely, and welcome to the Forum! You're right that the title overreaches: three of the nine entries aren't technically incubators, and I say so in each of their sections. A better title would have used "Founding pathways", but people tend to recognise "incubator" better, so that's why I chose it.

On why they're included: the scope I set was programs whose goal (or likely outcome) is launching new organisations for animals. If you're a would-be founder, RP's funded runway or an SMA fellowship can get you there just as much as a classic cohort incubator, and I'd rather you see the full set of routes than only the ones with "incubator" in their name. Deliberately not covered: the rest of the talent system (courses, fellowships without a founding angle, job boards), which would be a different and much longer post.

One correction to your read: the bucketing you're describing was mine, not the AI's. I chose to include those three because I think excluding them would leave founding options out. 

hey Leonie, many thanks for reading and your comment! Glad it resonated. 

I'm happy to hear you've found unemployment useful to your progress! Good luck with your role search! And many thanks for the kind sabbatical wishes :) 

Love this! I think speed of deployment is a really big issue in current funding in the space, with projects often waiting for 3-12 months before a funder can make a decision (plus many only have RFPs running once or twice a year, and it can take another month of so to receive funding), and given how urgent AIxAnimals projects are, we really need faster decisions and implementation. Thanks for starting this! 

Cool work! So happy our post on Building Impactful communities was useful to you folks! Good luck with your endevours! 

Happy birthday Mitchell! Sorry about the existential dread. I promise the next 10,000 hours include cake!

Hey Richie, many thanks for reading and your comment! Appreciate it. I basically agree with you on most of the points. 

Really like the additional detail on how engagement should be clearly for the engagement’s sake and not advertised as leading to employment, if it’s increasingly rarely the case, or in the future, when we use it as a tool to keep people in the movement without employment.

Re: management and mentorship: I think I mostly agree with you, but I may be using “management” in a slightly broader sense.

I agree that high-performing, motivated people usually need much less direction and oversight, and that hiring for autonomy matters a lot. In that sense, great people absolutely reduce the need for micromanagement.

Where I still think management remains important, even with very strong people and very advanced AI, is around coordination, prioritisation, decision-making under uncertainty, and looking after the human side of work. Once you have more than a handful of people, someone still needs to hold the whole picture, notice misalignment early, make trade-offs explicit, and ensure people aren’t burning out or duplicating effort.

I also think mentoring and management can blur a bit. Helping people understand context, giving feedback, supporting growth, and creating the conditions for good work are often framed as mentoring, but they’re also core parts of good management.

So I’m less convinced that we’ll “need less management” so much as we’ll need a different kind of management: lighter-touch, more relational, more focused on sense-making and coordination rather than task assignment. AI may reduce some parts of the job, but I’m not sure it replaces the human judgment and care elements that show up as soon as teams scale beyond a few people.

Very much enjoying thinking through this topic and grateful to you for starting the conversation! 

How much of a post are you comfortable for AI to write?

Seconding what @huw wrote: I’d be happy for an AI to write a draft, but (at this time) I will never publish something without a thorough review and strong work to put it in my own voice. I will never let a single AI-written word go unreviewed.

Also I usually also ask humans to review my drafts even after I have a first/final pass, and the ideas that I input into the prompt are mine, not just something I asked AI to create. Also, my AI tools know my voice quite well at this point and I'm constantly tweaking the instructions. 

thanks a lot Shanil, appreciate you reading! Founder/Ed distinction is quite useful as not all founders should be EDs and not all EDs should be founders. They are definitely very different roles and have different personal fit and skills requirements, even though they often seem to appear together on someone's job title.