Program Officer
GiveWell
| Company | GiveWell |
| Category | Operations & Admin |
| Location | United States + International (Remote) |
| Remote | Remote |
| Employment | Not stated |
| Level | Not stated |
| Salary | Not stated by the employer |
| Posted | 16 Jun 2026 |
| Last verified | 30 Jul 2026 |
| Source | Employer career page (greenhouse) |
Description
GiveWell’s mission is to help people in need as much as we can by researching the most cost‑effective ways to save and improve lives, sharing our work openly, and directing donations to the programs we believe will do the most good. Our work, which focuses on global health and well-being, is funded by tens of thousands of donors who rely on our research to inform their giving. We’ve grown from directing $1.5 million in 2010 to directing more than $400 million in 2025. We anticipate our total grantmaking is likely to approach or even exceed $1 billion this year, and we are working toward a future that could be several times that scale. Through years of deliberate groundwork, we’ve been growing our research capacity and scope in order to direct substantially more funding to the most impactful opportunities we can find. Summary
GiveWell is seeking exceptional Program Officers to help us direct hundreds of millions of dollars annually to the most cost-effective global health and poverty alleviation programs. As part of our lean research team, you will have an outsized influence on our funding decisions and help us save and improve lives on a global scale.
You'll own grant investigations and help manage a portfolio of grants, evaluating the best funding opportunities and helping shape new ones. You will answer hard questions and make funding recommendations by combining rigorous evidence review, cost-effectiveness modeling, grantee relationships, and thoughtful judgment.
The role
You'll join a small grantmaking team to own grant investigations and help manage a portfolio of grants, sifting through the many opportunities we could fund and honing in on those that matter most—and, when the best opportunity doesn't yet exist, helping bring a better one into being. Your decisions will inform the allocation of hundreds of millions of dollars to dozens of grantees.
Your practical work will combine empirical evidence review, cost-effectiveness modeling, grantee engagement, ground-truthing of how programs are delivered, discussions with subject matter experts, and developing your own judgment. In the course of your work, you might approach questions like these:
Should we make this grant, and how should we structure it (e.g., conditions, milestones, or gates)?
When a promising intervention has no clear implementer, what would it take to help one get off the ground?
Is this grant on track, and if not, why?
Do a grantee's reported outputs reflect real coverage, quality, and adherence to evidence-based practices on the ground?
What should we believe about the cost-effectiveness of an intervention in our portfolio, and what would change our minds?
How should we monitor a grant's progress, and what would tell us to course-correct?
How should we account for high levels of uncertainty in our cost-effectiveness estimates?
How should we weigh empirical evidence against qualitative factors, like a grantee's organizational track record?
Responsibilities include:
Investigating and recommending grants. We receive and solicit requests for funding on an ongoing basis, and you'll own investigations into these opportunities from scoping through recommendation. You'll discuss each opportunity with the potential grantee, consider its plans and assess the likelihood of achieving them, estimate the cost-effectiveness of the grant and forecast its likelihood of success, and recommend how to structure it (e.g., whether to include conditions, milestones, or gates). When necessary, you'll solicit feedback from outside experts (e.g., academics, government officials) about the opportunity.
Managing a portfolio of grants. Once a grant is made, you'll maintain a current view of whether it's on track and why. This includes collaborating with grantees to assess whether reported outputs reflect real coverage, quality, and adherence to evidence-based practices, and ground-truthing how programs are delivered—through
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