In-depth Onboarding

Section 6: Engagement Level

People in our EA Switzerland Community tend to fall into roughly three different levels of engagement, and for each of these levels, we offer targeted opportunities.

Exploring:
These are people with a loose interest in Effective Altruism. The basic ideas resonate with them, and they occasionally attend events to stay informed about major developments. Our Newsletter and LinkedIn channel are designed to meet their needs by keeping them updated.

Engaging:
People (like you) who want to dig deeper into the EA Switzerland Community and activley want to participate in the events and resources we provide. They enter our communication Channels (the WhatsApp Community), regularly try to attend events and (global) conferences, aim to get in touch with local EAs in their region and - most central - are eager to deep dive and learn about the philosophy of Effective Altruism, Problem Evaluation and current global challenges.

Contributing:
At its core, Effective Altruism isn’t just about talking about “doing good” but implementing the outcomes of our learning and thoughtful reasoning into our lives. This often manifests in three key areas: career (planning), effective giving, and volunteering. These individuals actively work to turn their ambitions of doing good into action, bringing their ideas and visions for a better future to life.

Our flagship program for highly motivated and engaged individuals is the Impact Cohort 2025. Participants are also invited to join our Slack channel, where in-depth discussions and a more professional atmosphere thrive.

Section 7: Communication

How - Our Guidelines:
First and most importantly, we emphasize and remind everyone of the how we communicate, which is outlined in our Community Guidelines (Section 2).

Where - Our Channels:
To chat with EA Switzerland (= the Co-Directors Erik & Marcel), you can reach us via WhatsApp, Signal, or Telegram at +41 78 444 06 88, or via email at hello@effectivealtruism.ch. Feel free to ask us anything EA-related or bring up any issues or concerns you might have about our community!

Our main group chat for all engaged EA Switzerland Community Members is the WhatsApp Community. You will find several subgroups with channel descriptions explaining their purpose—make sure to read them.

In-depth cause area-specific chats are outsourced to other WhatsApp groups, as we (Marcel and Erik) cannot manage to provide high-quality content for multiple cause areas simultaneously. In the WhatsApp Community, you will find a list of cause area-specific channels that you might want to join.

For highly engaged members who are actively planning to use their career, donations, or volunteering capacity to turn their ambitions into action, we have a Slack community.

Why Slack?
Many EA organizations use Slack as their primary communication tool—you’ll meet key community members there! Additionally, Slack offers features like “threads,” which make it much easier to discuss topics in depth.

Section 8: Events

You can find all our (public) events on Luma. Luma is a platform that allows you to easily discover, register for, and join events. It’s very simple—just click, register, and join!

There are a few non-public events that you will hear about in the WhatsApp Community.

Let’s kick things off by saving the dates for our three biggest community events of the year! The more people join, the more fun we’ll have—so mark your calendars and indicate your interest now! 🙌

1. May 9–11: EA Switzerland Community Weekend
This is the highlight of the year for our national community—don’t miss it! 🎊
📅 Indicate your interest: https://lu.ma/a6hojtsu

2. June 6–8: EA Global London
Switzerland goes international! 🌍 Join us at Europe’s biggest EA conference, with over 1,500 participants from all around the world!
📅 Show your interest: https://lu.ma/h1n7u9xc

3. October 3–5: EAGx Berlin
Switzerland goes international—again! Let’s visit our German EA friends for their annual conference with over 500 participants. Oh, and fun fact: they throw the best after-parties!
📅 Show your interest: https://lu.ma/fwy0w87p

Let’s be honest—when it comes to most things in life, we’ve rarely taken an hour to truly think about them, even though they might be really important questions. Let’s consider a few simple ones:

  • What kind of world do I want to live in?

  • What is good, and what is bad?

  • What are the most critical problems in the world that can be addressed most effectively?

  • Which factors are important in determining whether a problem is worth working on?

  • How can an individual make a difference?

  • What are the main obstacles to solving the world’s biggest problems?

  • How can we compare the impact of different career paths?

  • What role does uncertainty play in making those decisions?

Your involvement in Effective Altruism Switzerland is largely about learning more about the world and systematically trying to answer these and similar questions. It’s a commitment to improving decision-making by seeking better information, recognizing and trying to avoid common flaws in human judgment—such as cognitive biases and noise—and forming a well-reasoned personal perspective on the most crucial topics.

There are thousands of ways to learn and reflect on “the world,” which can often lead to decision paralysis (the inability to decide or act due to overwhelming choices). To avoid this, we at EA Switzerland are currently developing structured step-by-step courses to provide guidance in this jungle of information and to ensure a common ground for fruitful discussions through a shared vocabulary. As we are still building this (as of February 10, 2025), we are currently linking to our colleagues at Non-Trivial, who have already set something up!

Section 9: Learning & Reflecting

Section 10: No EA Sorting Hat

Question: How do you figure out how to do the most good with your career?
Answer: Find an EA sorting hat (like in Harry Potter). Place it on your head. Let it read your mind. Listen carefully as it assigns you your chosen career track, or better yet, a specific role at a specific organisation. Well done. Work hard at your designated job and watch as the impact rolls in.
Wrinkle: There is no EA sorting hat. There is no omniscient individual or entity that will hear about your degree, your skills, your preferences, and your context, and spit out an ideal career.

You are motivated to do good, and it would be amazing if EA Switzerland had the resources to support you step by step—1-on-1, in-depth discussions on all the key concepts, help with job or grant applications. But we don’t. We are two people with an 8-hour workday and many responsibilities. No one will bring the “impact” to you. You have to do most of the work yourself. That’s not how it should be—but that’s how it is.

From our perspective, the key factor preventing people from acting on their core values is not making time to think about all of this. It takes motivation (“I want to learn about topic X”), time (“I’ll schedule 90 minutes on Friday…”), and a clear next step (“… to read this article/watch that video”).

You don’t have to do this alone. There are people who feel exactly the same way you do. And you don’t need hundreds of them. Start with one impact buddy—grab a coffee and commit to learning together.

Or do you want to go even deeper? Then join our Impact Cohort 2025, where you’ll be surrounded by the most motivated and engaged people in the community!

Find more information and sign up here:

Section 11: Meet the Team

If you have any questions or things you want to discuss, please don’t hesitate to reach out!
Email: hello@effectivealtruism.ch
Phone & Messengers: +41 78 444 06 88

  • Co-director

    Marcel studied mechanical engineering focusing on Renewable Energy Technologies at RWTH Aachen, aiming to do good in this way. Through his involvement with Effective Altruism over five years, in a local group and beyond, he updated towards doing good by supporting the EA movement as a Community Builder. He moved to Zurich in November '22 to further build and support the Effective Altruism groups in Switzerland.

  • Co-Director

    Erik is a medical doctor. Before joining EA Switzerland, he focused on public health and pandemic preparedness. Other areas of interest include well-being measurement and improving global mental health.
    He writes a blog on Substack and provides coaching focused on the intersection of “doing good” and personal well-being.