My first job was as an analyst at Lehman Brothers. I was bottom rung in the team but being an IIT and IIM grad, I had this grand view of my capabilities and how I should be spending my time. So I used to get very irritated when the VPs and MDs in the team would ask me to pull out and collate data for their deals. This was pure grunt work.
One day, I was pulling out comps (financial data on companies comparable to the one we were evaluating) for one of the VPs with a sullen expression on my face when Ashish, my mentor in the team, pulled me aside and asked me what was going on. I complained about how people kept asking me to do grunt work all the time. I still remember his response clearly. He said, “This work is part of your role here. You can look at it as grunt work. Or you can learn from it. Spend a few minutes looking at the data. What are the growth rates and financial characteristics of the industry? How does the company we are evaluating stack up against competitors? Is it worth investing in this company? You have the opportunity to quickly build knowledge about a sector this way.”
I’ve taken that lesson to heart. No work is grunt work if you decide to find a learning opportunity in it.