"Seek out the grunt work"

I was chatting with a young man this morning who is headed off this summer to do a research internship. Our discussion led me to a principle that I have followed all of my adult life. I encouraged him to aspire to do everything that no one else wanted to do, to "seek out the grunt work."

In 1969 I got a summer job working in the computer section of the State of Ala Highway Dept. I had never seen a computer before but I was a Math major and computers were the up and coming thing. I show up and they have no idea what to do with me. I said, "I'll do whatever no one else wants to do." So they gave me a rag and cleaner and said, "wash all of the computers." I did this for several days and got very familiar with computers. After that i went to the computer programmers and asked them to let me help them do what they do in anyway I could. The long and short of this story was after two summers and it was time for me to graduate college, I had learned as much about computers and how to program them than most anyone around. This experience served me very well for the 28 years of my career as an IT/IS professional.

30 years later I leave that profession and enter graduate school as a Ph D freshman. Although I entered with a distinguished career behind me, I was starting anew. So i asked my professors, "what is it that I can do for you that you really don't want to do?" From this level of willingness I got all kinds of experience and data for my research and finished the program in 3 years (5 was normal). Plus, I got a very robust research stream that has served me well as a scholar.

I have made many mistakes in my life and many bad choices (I was not good at delayed gratification), but one thing I did right was to "seek out the grunt work." No matter how smart or successful (or old) you are, doing what others do not want to do will strengthen you in many ways.

From a professional looking back for professionals looking forward - "seek out the grunt work!!"