By Matthew Chiu
As the School’s administration consistently emphasises, LSE students are changemakers. Some want to start the next fintech unicorn. Others hope to research the inner motivations of human behaviour in academia. Still others aspire to fight poverty at the United Nations. The winds of fate do not lead us astray: we determine our fates, live out our “main character” lives, and create our destinies. Starting from this corner of Houghton Street, where we learn to understand the causes of things, we want to improve the world using that knowledge.
But our ambitions to serve the world with our talents occasionally hits a brick wall. We may be rejected even after multiple interviews and job tests. We may miss deadlines. Even worse, we may not even hit that brick wall, not because we fall short, but because the world blocks us from our ambitions.
There are two forms of pressure at LSE. The first is the mutual feeling known universally to LSE students – I call it “the panic.” Most students are intimately familiar with the social pressure to rush into conventionally safe and well-regarded career paths such as banking. “LSE enforces a very pre-professional atmosphere,” says Siddharth Kataria, President of the LSESU Economics Society, and the fear of missing out on the smooth banking path when friends around you are landing spring weeks, especially when the media are consistently blasting about about the tyranny of inflation or the significant problem of youth unemployment, can induce extreme stress. In this light, “don’t worry too much in your first year” – one of the bland mottos lining Houghton Street – seems akin to a meaningless hodge-podge. When everyone around you is rushing to put themselves out there, joining the crowd feels like “fulfilling your moral imperative that you came here for a reason,” Siddharth says.
The second form of pressure, however, is more rueful. These are pressures from the world that block ambitious students from achieving their dreams. These pressures include UK and US visa requirements, which stipulate minimum salary requirements for staying in the UK. These pressures include the necessity to provide for family or children. These pressures include the prohibitive costs of further education or simply living in a world-class city like London. I spoke to an ambitious third-year international student studying Politics and International Relations, who reported difficulty navigating the London job market for opportunities outside of banking. Think tanks were impossible as most do not sponsor visas. Equally, the costs of a further degree in the UK are staggering: LSE’s MSc Economics programme, for instance, costs £33,480 for home students. Thus, many students who were promised a better life by coming to university feel awkwardly trapped.
Facing these external constraints, what should ambitious and altruistic LSE students do?
A dreary November evening offered a rare opportunity to reflect on this question. LSE’s Effective Altruism Society recently organised an event examining the link between ambition and altruism. Speaking at this event were Celine Mano, an ex-Goldman Sachs trader turned development economist, Peter Wallich, ex-Boston Consulting Group consultant currently working on AI policy in the UK government, and Lorenzo Fong Ponce, operations analyst at Amazon and a Giving What We Can pledger. Beyond their impressive CVs, the speakers shared a desire to channel their ambition towards improving the world. The speakers emphasised career flexibility, mentioning that one’s first choice does not define the rest of their life. They encouraged students to develop their leadership skills.
According to Eugene Shcherbinin, President of the LSESU Effective Altruism Society and chair of the event, one of the most insightful nuggets of career wisdom was to “maintain and guard your values through your career”. The importance of cultivating tolerance, care, and virtue is often unsaid but should never be forgotten. In the era of COVID-19 and ChatGPT, we are in a constantly changing world. These challenging times underscore the importance of introspecting about yourself and your relationship with wider society. Your values shape you and your downstream decisions, and maintaining humanity against the tides will drive you forward and press you to seize the moment to change the world when it comes.
The value of humility often feels understated by students and professionals alike. Professionals brag about their achievements and pontificate about the world on LinkedIn. LSE students can feel like they’re on top of the world after securing the coveted entrance ticket into the prestigious internship. But in allowing yourself to celebrate, exhorted Siddharth, remember that this is just the beginning. “Stay humble and you’ll do great.”
Another piece of advice that Eugene found insightful was to “broaden your knowledge so that you can pivot into high(er)-impact roles”. More knowledge, especially across different fields, inherently helps open up opportunities. Eugene recalled an acquaintance who completed a PhD and then worked at a startup, and another young professional who pivoted from venture capital to AI safety. Careers are flexible and long: LSE academics often bridge into journalism, fiction-writing, or government advisory. Industry CEOs are also mentors, non-profit organisers, and deejays. What’s important is to tap into the spirit of exploration and to find that community or cause that makes you a better person.
While opportunities to broaden one’s scope and range may seem rare at LSE, a closer look reveals the existence of many paths. Whether learning about important world issues, Afro-Caribbean literature, or how to box, opportunities abound – one just has to be aware of them.
This past term, I organised a fellowship programme for LSE students interested in effective altruism, a research area and community that investigates and implements the best ways to help others. What I’ve learned most from organising the fellowship are the many ways in which one can do good. Altruism isn’t limited to joining an NGO or the Civil Service: everyone on the fellowship brought different experiences and ambitions. Some are interested in conventional career paths and join the fellowship to learn about donating effectively, while others hope to learn about better ways of improving NGO governance.
The fellows echoed this sentiment: “I was able to learn a lot about impact,” said Justin Cheng, a first-year participant. Mihika Chechi, another first-year student, agreed, saying that she participated in “really interesting and important discussions”. Both felt they gained increased clarity into the many pathways for doing good.
At LSE, I’m grateful to meet people who inspire me with their ambition, curiosity, humility, and kindness. Some may be succeeding in their careers and pursuing lofty dreams. Others may realise that there are some dreams that they can’t pursue immediately. But the core character trait is to feel the full force of the moral obligation to help your fellow citizens and never stop questioning what you can do.
For aspiring changemakers who may not be able to follow their preferred path today or are afraid of being driven astray, don’t forget to be driven by your humanity and curiosity. Everyone has a role to play, and even if your role today isn’t perfect or not the one that best matches your ambitions, keep chugging along with the realisation that what you are doing matters.
It starts here at LSE, where one can work towards developing an insatiable and unquenchable curiosity about ideas and individuals, meeting people who inspire, exploring the diverse societies on offer, and participating in the causes that are fighting for a better world here on campus. Let our humanity guide us as we chug along to save the world. In the everlasting words of Dylan Thomas: “Rage, rage against the dying of the light.”
