“Reflections and lessons from Effective Ventures” by Zachary Robinson🔸

I became the CEO of EV US in January 2023. I worked alongside the EV US and UK teams, former EV UK CEO Howie Lempel, and current EV UK CEO Rob Gledhill to recover and reform Effective Ventures and improve the robustness of the EA ecosystem in the aftermath of FTX's collapse. Amidst these efforts, I and others learned or fortified lessons that I think aren’t unique to EV and could be valuable to the wider EA community. Being able to look at hard problems, discuss them with candor, and update based on what we learn are values that I admire, and I see them as a positive and necessary mechanism for doing good. I want to act on those values here.

Goals of this post

• Provide an update to create communal knowledge: Clarify what reforms have taken place at EV in recent years and the reasoning behind [...]

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Outline:

(00:50) Goals of this post

(01:48) Some high-level notes on FTX-related reflection

(06:04) Scope of this post

(11:53) Summary of reforms and actions taken at EV

(14:54) Background on EV

(18:42) Reforms and other actions taken

(18:46) Hiring CEOs (and other non-board personnel) for EV US and EV UK

(24:00) Changes to EV US and EV UK board

(30:04) FTX-related investigations

(38:43) Instituting financial reforms

(41:23) Improving donor due diligence

(45:36) Adopting a restrictive communications policy

(57:19) Streamlining whistleblowing policies

(59:44) Updating anti-harassment and misconduct policies

(01:03:04) Improving the COI policy

(01:06:22) Clarifying the level of separation between the EV US and EV UK entities

(01:10:44) Initiating EV shut down

(01:15:11) Some of the lessons EA can learn from the EV experience

(01:15:31) Brief summary of these lessons

(01:16:10) The lessons

(01:16:14) Organizational governance and compliance can have serious implications

(01:17:08) It's important to carefully think through and explicitly communicate your organizational risk strategy, and pay attention to it as your organization develops. This is particularly true for a fiscal sponsor

(01:19:10) EA organizations often underrate experience relative to “intelligence” and “value alignment”

(01:22:09) Vetting external counsel is important

(01:23:02) Crisis prep is underrated relative to crisis response

(01:24:43) Invest in capacity building early

(01:26:34) Communicate early (and have the resources to do so)

(01:27:31) Acknowledgments

(01:29:12) Appendix: other content about and reflections on FTX on the EA Forum

(01:29:47) Information

(01:31:24) Reflections

(01:33:18) Investigation-related

(01:33:55) Statements

The original text contained 12 footnotes which were omitted from this narration.

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First published:
October 28th, 2024

Source:
https://forum.effectivealtruism.org/posts/AuSah98NtR5qv8zQA/reflections-and-lessons-from-effective-ventures-1

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Narrated by TYPE III AUDIO.

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