(Senior) Program Officer, Neglected Animals

Application Deadline: 11 October 2026

Department: Animal Welfare

Employment Type: Flexible

Location: Remote

Compensation: $79,000 - $98,500 / year

Description

Key responsibilities and the types of tasks involved in the role

• Run a shallow intervention review: go from a loosely specified idea to a defensible recommendation on whether it is worth pursuing, within a fixed time budget.
• Identify and interview experts on questions that academic and gray literature cannot answer.
• Conduct analysis of a production system — its economics, cost, and whether it can plausibly be commercially viable at scale — or write the specification for a contractor to build one and quality-assure what they deliver.
• Analyze published financial disclosures to understand a company's or a sector's trajectory, rather than relying on media reports or press releases.

• Scope, commission and manage an external contractor or consultancy, including in a region where we currently have no in-house presence — and decide when to stop work that isn't delivering.

• Help organize a coordination event that brings together the organizations working on a shared problem, and follow through on what was agreed.
• Write and present an update for a funder on what a project has achieved, what it has not, and what you would do differently.
• Present your work at a conference and build relationships with others working in the field.

• Take an idea that someone has floated, evaluate it honestly, and either run with it or kill it.
• Exercise judgment about information sensitivity — some of this program's work requires discretion about what is shared, with whom, and when.

• Investments into insect farming
• Can black soldier fly larvae (BSFL) producers displace fishmeal?
• Database of near-term interventions for wild animals
• Forecasting farmed animal numbers in 2033

• Autonomy — running projects with minimal oversight, and taking the initiative to learn tasks you have not done before.
• Judgment we lean on — program leadership consulting you on which projects are worth taking on at all, not just how to execute them.
• A track record of moving decision-makers — analysis aimed at changing what someone outside your own organization actually does, where you elicited their needs early and shaped the output around them.
• Independent stakeholder relationships — being trusted as a counterpart in your own right by people outside RP.

What We Are Looking For

• Analytical judgment under time pressure. You can take a vague but important question, scope it sensibly, identify critical assumptions, choose a defensible method, and reach a usable answer by a deadline — rather than an exhaustive answer late.
• Getting work done through other people. You have specified a piece of work for someone else to deliver — a contractor, consultant, agency, or a team outside your own — held them to it, and formed your own view about whether what came back was good enough to act on.
• Quantitative reasoning. You are comfortable building, interrogating and explaining simple models. You can produce quick back-of-the-envelope calculations, and you are comfortable articulating confidence in assumptions or beliefs using numbers as well as words.
• Clear written communication for decision-makers. You can explain a chain of reasoning — premises, inferences, and where it might be wrong — to an intelligent reader who is not a specialist and who does not have much time.
• Comfort with deep uncertainty. You can give a caveated but genuinely decision-useful answer with transparent reasoning, instead of waiting for evidence that will not arrive.
• Sound judgment about sensitive information. You can be trusted to hold information carefully and to work out for yourself what should and should not be shared.
• Pragmatism and flexibility. The program's priorities move. You are comfortable being redeployed onto a different problem, and comfortable abandoning your own idea when the evidence turns.
• Truthseeking and research ethics. A steadfast commitment to following the evidence, including when it undercuts a conclusion you or we would prefer.
• Commitment to the mission — you care about improving the welfare of animals who are neglected relative to their numbers, and you are open to focusing your career on terrestrial invertebrates, building expertise and networks in the field.

• Techno-economic analysis, unit-economics modeling, or industry / market analysis — in any sector.
• Reading and interpreting company financial statements, statutory accounts, or investor disclosures.
• Knowledge of invertebrate biology or entomology, in either a production or an ecological context.
• Knowledge of agricultural production systems, animal feed, crop protection, or waste management.
• Working experience in low- and middle-income country contexts, particularly Sub-Saharan Africa or Southeast Asia.
• Grantmaking, due diligence, procurement, or contract management experience.
• Reporting to funders, grant-makers, or a board.
• Convening or facilitating processes involving several organizations with differing interests.
• Skill with strategic decision-making tools (stakeholder mapping, scenario analysis, SWOT).
• Proficiency with R or Python.
• Experience working in or volunteering for the animal advocacy movement.
• Working proficiency in a language other than English, particularly one spoken in a major agricultural producing region.
• Working constructively with external parties whose interests and priorities do not fully align with your own.
• Overseeing a project from conception to delivery in a remote, distributed team.
• Comfortable working in an AI-forward workplace

What We Offer

• $79,000 – $98,500 USD pre-tax
• £61,000 – £76,600 GBP pre-tax
• €71,000 – €89,350 EUR pre-tax

• Opportunity to contribute to a fast-growing, high-impact organization — our research is used by key decision makers who influence the distribution of hundreds of millions of charitable dollars.
• Remote-first environment, including flexible work hours and schedule.
• Comprehensive global benefits program, including statutory benefits as required by local law, and supplemental benefits specific to each country (varies by location).
• Generous paid time off (PTO) and unpaid leave, including:
  • Unlimited vacation with a minimum number of required statutory days off
  • "Mandated" 3 weeks total mid- and end-year organization-wide breaks
  • Unlimited (within reason) personal and sick paid and unpaid leave
  • Parental leave — at least 4–9 months of a combination of paid and unpaid leave, available prior to and/or during the first 2 years after a child's birth or adoption
  • Other paid and unpaid leave (e.g., bereavement)
• Technology stipend of $2,000 USD equivalent every 3 years for work and office equipment.
• AI tools budget of $40 USD equivalent monthly.
• Learning opportunities, including workshops/training sessions and 10% of work time dedicated to professional and personal development.
• Paid work trips, including one annual all-staff Mega Team Retreat and relevant conferences.
• Virtual co-working spaces, including a private Rethink Priorities Focusmate group.
• RP Peer Support Program for New Employees.
• Other benefits at the discretion of RP Leadership.
• A caring team that values respectful work relations and a healthy work-life balance.
• Low administrative bureaucracy.
• We don't provide snacks, but we could mail you a box of Oreos if you want!

• Work Environment and Visa Sponsorship: This role is fully remote and we are able to legally hire in many countries. In certain cases, we may be able to provide visa sponsorship to the US or UK and help candidates relocate. If you have questions about whether we can hire or provide visa sponsorship in another country and if this will influence your decision about applying, please contact [email protected] before submitting your application.
• Time Zones and Working Hours: While we welcome applicants from all time zones, most of the Animal Welfare Department works between US Eastern Time and Central European Time. Your regular working schedule should ideally overlap with 14:00–16:00 UTC on weekdays.
• Full time position preferred: We have a preference for candidates able to work on a full-time basis, but are open to candidates who can work at least 30 hours a week.
• Travel: Travel to work-related events is likely to be important for having impact in this role. We would ideally like candidates to be able to attend 4–6 events per year — a mix of RP staff retreats, conferences, coordination events and industry events — usually requiring international flights. 

• Language: Professional level of English language is required for all roles at Rethink Priorities.
• Extension requests: We will try to accommodate extension requests that are made before the deadline and are up to three (3) days. We generally cannot accommodate extension requests made after the application deadline, or are longer than 3 days, and cannot accept late submissions to ensure fairness to other applicants.
• Application materials: All application materials must be submitted in English language; otherwise, we will not be able to evaluate your candidacy.
• Inclusivity and fairness: RP is committed to building an inclusive, equitable, and supportive community for you to thrive and do your best work. Please don't hesitate to apply for a role regardless of your age, gender identity/expression, political identity, personal preferences, physical abilities, veteran status, neurodiversity or any other background. We provide reasonable accommodations and benefits, including, for example, flexible work schedules and locations, mental health coverage through medical benefits (as available), as well as technology budgets and professional development time that can be used, for example, to purchase assistive technology or engage in job coaching.
• Accessibility: We're committed to running an inclusive and accessible hiring process. We warmly invite you to reach out to [email protected] with any questions or accessibility requests such as chat box use during interviews.
• Hiring Software: We use Pinpoint for our recruitment and hiring processes and all of the email correspondence is done via Pinpoint. We encourage you to add the Pinpoint domain (@pinpoint.email and @pinpointhq.com) ) to your trusted contacts and/or check your 'spam', 'promotions' and 'updates' folders, if you don't hear from us within the expected timeframe.
• Past applicant policy: We may be able to accelerate your job application if you have applied to the same or a similar role within RP or a similar institution and advanced within the last two years. Please get in touch stating which role you applied to, when, and to which stage you were advanced at which organization if you would like to be considered for this possibility.
• Consideration for other roles: We sometimes identify strong candidates in one hiring round whose skills are well matched to other roles within the department. If you are not selected for this position, we may contact you to ask whether you would like to be considered for a related opening, should one arise. You do not need to indicate interest at the application stage.
• Other: Visit our Career webpage if you'd like to know more about our hiring process, culture, and what working at RP is like.

1. A consultancy doing commissioned work in response to demands from organizations doing high-impact work
2. A research institute driven by research agendas we set according to our own priorities.
3. A think tank aiming to inform public policy to improve the world.
4. An accelerator, incubator, and base for priority projects.

• Bringing attention to neglected issues, such as lead exposure, fungal diseases, and shrimp welfare.
• Increasing the collective impact of advocates across each field in which we work through strategic coordination.
• Investigating potential interventions and identifying the most cost-effective options. In 2025, our research influenced tens of millions of dollars in foundation grants.
• Creating practical tools for philanthropists to compare resource allocations across different species and cause areas and to build giving portfolios despite uncertainties.
• Providing organizations with data to inform their decisions. For example, we have conducted surveys on perceptions of existential risks, AI, effective giving, and other topics.
• Providing fiscal sponsorship and operational support to ensure that high-impact initiatives in areas like AI safety and animal welfare can launch and grow effectively.
• Donor Compass — a cross-cause fund tool to guide philanthropic giving.