Changing the Way We Think About Giving

June 19, 2026 Staff Reporter

This week's PBA Changemaker is Grace Adams, Chief Executive Officer of Effective Altruism Australia. Grace has dedicated her career to exploring one deceptively simple question: how can we do the most good with the resources we have available? After beginning her career in the corporate sector, she found her way to the effective altruism movement, where evidence, impact and long-term thinking guide decisions about giving, careers and social change.

Today, Grace leads Effective Altruism Australia, helping Australians direct their time, money and careers towards causes that can create the greatest positive impact. A passionate advocate for evidence-based giving, sustainable work practices and building a culture of lifelong contribution, Grace is challenging conventional thinking about what it means to live a meaningful life and create lasting change.

Describe your career trajectory and how you got to your current position?

I started my career in the corporate world, always with the sense that I wanted to eventually do something that felt more directly meaningful.

My shift came when a friend invited me to a talk about effective altruism, which I like to define as trying to answer the question of how to do as much good as we can with the limited resources we have.

The speakers pointed out that we could do a lot more good with our giving and careers if we focused on problems that were big, solvable and neglected, and they used global health as an example. It can cost 100 times less to prevent a death in a low-income country compared to in Australia. This fact absolutely floored me.

It also connected with something I hadn't expected. I've lived with chronic migraine throughout my adult life, and that experience has deeply shaped my conviction that everyone deserves access to healthcare that reduces suffering.

When millions of children are contracting easily preventable diseases that only cost a few dollars to prevent, it stops feeling abstract — it feels urgent.

I took the 10% Pledge to give at least 10% of my lifetime income to effective charities, and that decision led me to apply to Giving What We Can, the organisation promoting it, where I served as Head of Marketing.

Being part of a community of more than 10,000 people across 100 countries — teachers, accountants, chefs and tech employees — all committed to giving meaningfully over their lifetimes has filled me with a lot of hope and motivation.

Close to a year ago, I became CEO of Effective Altruism Australia.

It feels very much like the role I was working towards without quite knowing it — leading a team focused on fundraising for effective global health and development and climate change programs, while building a community of Australians who want to do as much good as they can.

What drives you to do the work that you do?

At the deepest level, I want to live in a world where no-one experiences unnecessary suffering — where everyone can flourish.

And I mean everyone: people alive today, animals and future generations.

It's a lofty goal, but I genuinely believe we can get there.

What drives me day to day is the conviction that culture change is how we get there.

If we can develop a culture of people who commit to helping others over their lifetimes — through their careers, their giving or both — the cumulative effect of that is enormous.

That's what excites me about this work.

The other thing that keeps me going is the belief that how we help matters as much as that we help.

Where our resources are limited, thinking carefully about where they'll do the most good isn't a cold or clinical exercise — it's an act of care.

Helping people think more strategically about doing good, in a way that's honest to their own values, is one of the most meaningful things I think I can do.

If you could go back in time, what piece of advice would you give yourself as you first embarked on your career?

Slow down, and absorb what you can at each stage.

Trust that you will get where you want to go — and look after yourself in the process.

It sounds simple, but it's advice I really needed.

As a high achiever navigating both a demanding career and chronic illness, I spent a lot of energy pushing through when I should have been paying attention to what I needed.

I've come to understand that slowing down isn't in tension with having a big impact — it's part of how you sustain one.

I think that's true for a lot of us, not just those managing health challenges.

The pressure to move fast and do more is everywhere.

But some of the most important growth happens when you give yourself permission to pause.

Any words you live by every day?

Honestly, no.

I try to meet each day with the accumulation of knowledge and wisdom I have, and an openness to learn and change.

What are you currently watching, reading or listening to?

I've been enjoying listening to the back catalogue of the podcast If Books Could Kill.

The hosts debunk popular science and self-help books, and have helped me realise that the evidence many popular ideas are based on isn't always as strong as we might think.

I'm also enjoying a new novel, Cast Away by Francesca de Tores.

It's historical fiction about Alexander Selkirk, who was stranded on a remote island for a number of years. It's beautifully written, thought-provoking and incredibly engaging.