(highlight:: The scope of your career search is the range of plausible career options you’ll look further into. When considering it, it’s a good idea to not only think about specific roles or organizations, but also about general job characteristics or types.
For instance, maybe your scope is limited to jobs within a specific location. Or maybe, you will only consider nontechnical roles or careers within the social sciences. You might also limit your scope to a specific cause area, focusing on jobs that work on a particular issue like climate change or mental health. Once you have an understanding of the scope in terms of general characteristics, it becomes much easier to search for specific roles within it.)
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- career trajectory, career, career search scope,

(highlight:: Some brainstorming questions to ask yourself might be:
• What are all your possible options for doing good with your career or for gaining career capital to do more good in the future?
• What would career options look like across different sectors – for example, private, government, nonprofit, or academia?
• What are some interesting options that you haven’t seriously considered because you don’t know if you’d be any good at it?
• Can you think of a specific cause area or issue that you don’t currently know much about but might want to further investigate?)
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- questions/career,

One way to help brainstorm a wider range of possibilities is to find people with experience or skills similar to yours (whether colleagues, friends, or fellow students) on LinkedIn and see if their career has taken a direction you didn’t expect. It may be helpful to expose yourself to the range of ways that you could use your skill set or it could be worth reaching out to chat more about how they got into their job.
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(highlight:: Are you set on a specific role or is there flexibility? Would you potentially take a less senior role in order to eventually have more impact? Is there a chance you’ll be accepted to a more senior role that you are aiming for and achieve much more? If you are completely sure you’re unfit for a role, it might also be out of scope.
Later, we’ll look for the highest impact opportunities within our scope. For now, areas that don’t have any potential to make an impact can be set aside. Is there a chance that this path could have a great opportunity for impact? Or, is there a chance that this path could provide career capital that prepares you to make a bigger impact in the future?
How long a commute is so long that you’d need to move? Can you and would you potentially move cities/countries for a great opportunity to do good at a job you love? Are you comfortable working remotely? Do you require or strongly prefer a remote job?
Many people have lifestyle needs that aren’t flexible: Taking care of family, needing job security, limitations or disabilities that constrain your options, etc. Options that contradict your needs can be set out of your scope.)
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(highlight:: Figure out if there are other crucial factors that make some roles impossible for you – for example:
• Are there types of work you find boring enough that you know you’ll burn out very quickly?
• Are you so dedicated to work in a particular cause area that you wouldn’t consider roles working on other problems?
• Are there cultural or religious reasons that steer you away from specific career paths?)
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First, try to think of examples of roles that are definitely out of scope for you and see if you understand why. If something feels irrelevant for you, but you’re not sure why, then it might warrant a little more thought. It could be relevant (and your gut reaction is misleading) or irrelevant (and you need to improve your understanding of the factors important to you.
Then, try to differentiate between what is actually in your scope and what you’d like to think (perhaps unrealistically) is in your scope. Do you enjoy the idea that you could’ve been an influential writer but have never actually enjoyed writing? Do you not want to take a more junior role than your current one but would actually consider it if the right opportunity arose? Try to think of the decisions you would actually make rather than those that you enjoy thinking about making.)
- View Highlight
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(highlight:: If you’re following along with the guide and currently have a decision to make, this would be a good point to set your scope.

1. Write down a wide range of possibilities. These could be specific jobs that you might be suited for, general fields, or broad career paths. This should include any relevant option you can think of – even if it doesn’t seem like you’ll end up choosing it.
2. Decide what factors and considerations would make something in or out of of your scope. These can be things like location, compensation, the particular cause or problem you want to work on, the day-to-day tasks. Do your possible options fit within these considerations? Can you decipher which possibilities are irrelevant?
3. Review your scope to see if there’s something you missed. Are there other possible options that you didn’t initially think of? Are there any other considerations that would change whether or not you consider an option?)
   - View Highlight
   -

(highlight:: The scope of your career search is the range of plausible career options you’ll look further into. When considering it, it’s a good idea to not only think about specific roles or organizations, but also about general job characteristics or types.
For instance, maybe your scope is limited to jobs within a specific location. Or maybe, you will only consider nontechnical roles or careers within the social sciences. You might also limit your scope to a specific cause area, focusing on jobs that work on a particular issue like climate change or mental health. Once you have an understanding of the scope in terms of general characteristics, it becomes much easier to search for specific roles within it.)
- View Highlight
- career trajectory, career, career search scope,

(highlight:: Some brainstorming questions to ask yourself might be:
• What are all your possible options for doing good with your career or for gaining career capital to do more good in the future?
• What would career options look like across different sectors – for example, private, government, nonprofit, or academia?
• What are some interesting options that you haven’t seriously considered because you don’t know if you’d be any good at it?
• Can you think of a specific cause area or issue that you don’t currently know much about but might want to further investigate?)
- View Highlight
- questions/career,

One way to help brainstorm a wider range of possibilities is to find people with experience or skills similar to yours (whether colleagues, friends, or fellow students) on LinkedIn and see if their career has taken a direction you didn’t expect. It may be helpful to expose yourself to the range of ways that you could use your skill set or it could be worth reaching out to chat more about how they got into their job.
- View Highlight
-

(highlight:: Are you set on a specific role or is there flexibility? Would you potentially take a less senior role in order to eventually have more impact? Is there a chance you’ll be accepted to a more senior role that you are aiming for and achieve much more? If you are completely sure you’re unfit for a role, it might also be out of scope.
Later, we’ll look for the highest impact opportunities within our scope. For now, areas that don’t have any potential to make an impact can be set aside. Is there a chance that this path could have a great opportunity for impact? Or, is there a chance that this path could provide career capital that prepares you to make a bigger impact in the future?
How long a commute is so long that you’d need to move? Can you and would you potentially move cities/countries for a great opportunity to do good at a job you love? Are you comfortable working remotely? Do you require or strongly prefer a remote job?
Many people have lifestyle needs that aren’t flexible: Taking care of family, needing job security, limitations or disabilities that constrain your options, etc. Options that contradict your needs can be set out of your scope.)
- View Highlight
-

(highlight:: Figure out if there are other crucial factors that make some roles impossible for you – for example:
• Are there types of work you find boring enough that you know you’ll burn out very quickly?
• Are you so dedicated to work in a particular cause area that you wouldn’t consider roles working on other problems?
• Are there cultural or religious reasons that steer you away from specific career paths?)
- View Highlight
-

First, try to think of examples of roles that are definitely out of scope for you and see if you understand why. If something feels irrelevant for you, but you’re not sure why, then it might warrant a little more thought. It could be relevant (and your gut reaction is misleading) or irrelevant (and you need to improve your understanding of the factors important to you.
Then, try to differentiate between what is actually in your scope and what you’d like to think (perhaps unrealistically) is in your scope. Do you enjoy the idea that you could’ve been an influential writer but have never actually enjoyed writing? Do you not want to take a more junior role than your current one but would actually consider it if the right opportunity arose? Try to think of the decisions you would actually make rather than those that you enjoy thinking about making.)
- View Highlight
-

(highlight:: If you’re following along with the guide and currently have a decision to make, this would be a good point to set your scope.

1. Write down a wide range of possibilities. These could be specific jobs that you might be suited for, general fields, or broad career paths. This should include any relevant option you can think of – even if it doesn’t seem like you’ll end up choosing it.
2. Decide what factors and considerations would make something in or out of of your scope. These can be things like location, compensation, the particular cause or problem you want to work on, the day-to-day tasks. Do your possible options fit within these considerations? Can you decipher which possibilities are irrelevant?
3. Review your scope to see if there’s something you missed. Are there other possible options that you didn’t initially think of? Are there any other considerations that would change whether or not you consider an option?)
   - View Highlight
   -