If you’ve never had a horrible job, I highly recommend giving it a shot at some point in your career. Seriously...let me explain.

Once a month, I get together with a group of ambitious, career-driven women as part of our Lean In Circle and one of our traditions is that we share our career journeys. I had the opportunity to share mine last week, and as I was telling the group about where I’ve been, I realized I’ve had some horrible* jobs along the way. What surprised me was that I don’t regret having worked in any of them. Here’s why:

You pick up unexpected skills

One of the first jobs I had out of college was in education, or so I thought when I accepted the offer. It turned out to be a sales job. If I had known I’d be making cold calls and carrying strangers’ groceries to their car so I could sell them our services, I never would have accepted the job. But because I had taken the job, I picked up valuable sales skills that I use in my career to this day. After all, every professional has to sell their ideas both internally and externally every single day.



You’re challenged to take on surprising projects

I'm a marketing and communications professional, not an office mover, IT gal, phone system specialist, or copy machine technician. In one of my jobs, I had to wear all of these hats and more. It was a challenge because none of it came naturally to me, but this experience taught me that no matter what project someone threw my way, I’d figure it out and get it done.



You clarify your values

Each one of the horrible jobs I held helped me clarify what mattered to me most in my career: purpose drives me, new challenges excite me, relationships matter above all else. Once you crystallize your values, you'll carry them with you for the rest of your career.



You appreciate good jobs (heck, even average jobs!)

Everything is relative. If you've never had a horrible job, you don’t realize just how good you have it when you’re working in a good job or even just an average job. Horrible jobs help you look at the positive, manage negative energy and be grateful for what you have.



You learn to get out of it

This is the most important lesson of all. You learn that your situation is temporary, and that you can and will get out of it. In fact, horrible jobs motivated me to take some of the most game-changing steps in my career.



I realize that I can write this now because I have an incredible job. When you’re stuck in a horrible job, it’s hard to look beyond the day to day and to have a long term perspective. Take comfort in knowing that it’s all a part of your unique career journey, that you’ll learn more than a few things along the way if you try to make the most of it, and most importantly, it doesn’t last forever.



Now I’d love to hear from you. What was the worst job you’ve ever had? What valuable lessons did you learn? And how did you get out of it?



*"Horrible" is obviously very subjective. My horrible jobs were horrible to me because they didn't leverage my talents or tap into my passions which means that my horrible jobs could very well be other people's dream jobs, and vice versa.

Photo Credit: Flickr/theshadowknows