Staff

Dr Michael Plant
Founder and Director

Michael is a Research Fellow at the Wellbeing Research Centre (University of Oxford), where he completed his DPhil on philosophical issues related to effective altruism. His main research interests are whether and how to make people happier. Michael is a former Research Assistant to Peter Singer and founded Hippo, a happiness-tracking app. 

Twitter: @MichaelDPlant

Joel McGuire
Research Analyst

Joel has a Masters in Economics and Data Science from the University of Oklahoma, graduating top of his class. In his previous social science research he studied goal-achievement using novel datasets, structurally modelled migration within the US labour market, and mapped the geography of prospective language across the US. 

Twitter:  @JoelMcGuire12​​

Samuel Dupret
Research Analyst

Samuel joined HLI in October 2021 to conduct cost-effectiveness analyses of promising interventions. He has a Masters in Cognitive and Decision Sciences from University College London, gaining a distinction. His research interests include the strengths and flaws of different research methodologies, causality, morality, decision-making, and whistleblowing.

Joy Bittner
Operations Manager

Joy joined HLI in August 2021 after 13 years of working in operations for small non-profits and social businesses in Latin America. Originally from the United States, she has been living in Ecuador for the past eight years. In addition to her work with HLI, Joy is setting up a program to provide mental health services to low-income populations in South America. 

Barry Grimes
Communications Manager

Barry has provided communications support to HLI since our foundation in 2018. He joined the team as a full employee in August 2021. Before that, he was an Events Associate at the Centre for Effective Altruism, helping to produce EA Global and EAGx conferences. He has worked in communication and stakeholder engagement roles across the public, private and non-profit sector for over 12 years.

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Trustees

Peter Brietbart (Chair)

Peter is the CEO of the anxiety management app Mind Ease. He is a veteran of the effective altruism community with a background in philosophy, entrepreneurship, and project management. 

Dr Samantha Bernecker

Sam is a Clinical Research Scientist at Happify Health. She earned her PhD in Clinical Psychology from the University of Massachusetts Amherst in 2017 and completed a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University. Before joining the team at Happify Health, Sam worked as a management consultant at Boston Consulting Group.

Dr Caspar Kaiser

Caspar is a Research Fellow at the Wellbeing Research Centre and a Research Officer at the Institute for New Economic Thinking (Oxford University) where he completed his DPhil in Social Policy in December 2020. His research focuses on the measurement and determinants of wellbeing.

Twitter: ​ @caspar_kaiser​

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Advisors

Prof Julian Jamison ​

Julian is a behavioural development economist with a particular focus on health and welfare analysis. He is currently Professor of Economics at the University of Exeter and works with the World Bank and multiple governments around the world.

Karolina Sarek

Karolina is the co-founder and Director of Research at Charity Entrepreneurship. She also serves as a fund manager for the Effective Altruism Animal Welfare Fund, a mentor at WANBAM, and a consultant for various effective altruism non-profits. 

Prof Peter Singer

Peter is the Ira W. DeCamp Professor of Bioethics at Princeton University. He works on practical ethics, and is best known for the book Animal Liberation and his writings about global poverty.

Dr Tatjana Višak

Tatjana is a philosopher specialising in ethics and political philosophy. She is currently based in the Department of Philosophy and Economics at the University of Bayreuth.

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We'd also like to express our gratitude to the following people who have supported our work:

Kaleem Ahmid | Jide Alaga | Justus Baumann | Ethan Bialick | Matt Coleman | Lucia Coulter | Carmen Csilla Medina | Clare Donaldson |  Brendan Eappen | Derek Foster | Frank Hong | Tom Houlden | Chihiro Ito | Ulf Johansson | Florian Kuhlmeier | Marcin Kowrygo | Niall Maher | Fin Moorhouse | Nikita Patel | Teis Rasmussen | Vanessa See | Sid Sharma |  Jasper Synowski​ | Alan Taylor | Eemaan Thind | Sonia Vallentin | Amarins Veringa | Caitlin Walker | Akash Wasil