Bull Series - Grunt Work & Growth: Will AI Help Wall Street’s Juniors or Hold Them Back?
“Don’t boil the ocean — let’s just get this done ASAP.”
Ask any junior investment banker how often they hear this from senior management, and they'll probably say, "Every day." It encapsulates Wall Street’s ethos: avoid reinventing the wheel, use existing processes, and prioritize speed above all else.
As a former investment banker, I understand this mentality. On the surface, sticking to familiar methods feels logical. When you're facing tight deadlines and overwhelming workloads, who has the luxury to pause and wonder, "Is there a better way?" Often, the quickest and safest route seems to be using tried-and-tested legacy systems, even if they’re outdated, manual, or inefficient.
But there’s an irony here: in pursuing immediate efficiency, Wall Street inadvertently reinforces outdated processes that ultimately cost more time and energy in the long run. And it’s usually the junior bankers who bear the consequences of this paradox.
"Grunt work" — the repetitive, time-consuming, yet necessary tasks inevitably handed down to juniors — is common across any organization. But in banking, where legacy systems often mean manual execution, grunt work can quickly spiral out of control, pushing juniors toward 100-hour weeks. These extreme hours aren't healthy or sustainable, and yet they're largely accepted as the norm.
So, when I recently came across this Bloomberg article describing junior bankers' resistance to adopting AI tools, tools which could theoretically alleviate some of this burden, I was surprised. The article explained how juniors feared that relying on AI might deprive them of critical foundational skills traditionally developed through manual grunt work. Similar concerns echo among some senior managers as well.
But this prompted a deeper question for me: Is Wall Street genuinely worried about AI compromising skill development or is the industry simply hesitant to disrupt what’s familiar? In other words, is this fear truly about losing critical skills, or is it rooted more deeply in comfort with the status quo?
Navigating the AI Dilemma
The answer is likely a combination of both: a genuine concern about skill development, mixed with resistance to disrupting comfortable routines. But in today’s rapidly changing landscape, Wall Street simply can’t afford to remain comfortable. The industry must become more open to change, particularly with AI.
The fear of losing essential skills by using AI is understandable, but it’s also misguided. AI utilization itself is rapidly becoming an essential skill. The solution isn’t to reject AI outright; rather, it's to intentionally incorporate AI into banking workflows, revamping outdated processes to improve efficiency and morale while still maintaining foundational training.
To achieve this, banks must actively foster environments that encourage AI use, thoughtfully integrating it into training programs so employees gain AI fluency without compromising core skillsets. And the very first step to doing this is by reexamining the idea of “grunt work.”
Not All Grunt Work is Created Equal
When it comes to grunt work, there’s a critical distinction to be made: some tasks genuinely build core skills, while others simply drain productivity and morale.
Here’s an example from my analyst days:
One Friday afternoon, my team handed me nearly 100 excel files, each containing dozens of tabs. My task? “Sanitize” each file ahead of a deal launch the following Monday. This meant manually reviewing every tab and every cell for formatting errors like stray punctuation, incorrect font colors, or misaligned tables. My weekend disappeared into a tedious, repetitive exercise of scanning spreadsheet after spreadsheet for formatting inconsistencies.
Did I develop stronger attention to detail through this process? Sure. But was spending two days on this task genuinely valuable for my professional growth? Probably not.
Performing repetitive, low-value tasks manually doesn't meaningfully teach — it exhausts. In reality, I could’ve gained the same meticulousness and attention to detail from almost any other project typically assigned to junior bankers.
Instead, imagine if I'd had an AI assistant. A simple instruction (“Sanitize these excel files for errors, inconsistencies, or formatting mistakes”) could have transformed that weekend-long ordeal into mere hours of thoughtful oversight. Not only would I have still learned crucial skills, like effectively instructing, supervising, and validating AI-generated outputs, I would have also freed up time and mental capacity to focus more intentionally on each file’s core content, thinking through how they supported our strategic thesis and positioning for the deal. Time spent doing that kind of “grunt work” is genuinely valuable: it encourages critical thinking, builds perspective and helps junior team members see the connection between their daily tasks and the bigger picture of the project.
The reality in banking, though, is that too much grunt work involves tasks like aligning text boxes, formatting tables, or endlessly searching for higher-quality logos and images for pitch decks. These types of tasks consume hours of junior bankers’ time, providing minimal skill development but maximum stress. When juniors become overwhelmed by these menial tasks, they quickly lose sight of their contributions to the bigger picture, begin questioning the value of their work, and ultimately burn out.
These are precisely the types of grunt work that banks should delegate to AI tools immediately. But for effective AI integration, banks must intentionally identify which grunt works genuinely matter and which can, and should, be automated.
Creating an AI-Friendly Culture: Open Dialogue and Protected Trainings
When it comes to distinguishing valuable grunt work from tasks better suited for AI, the most effective starting point is fostering open dialogue across all levels. Each role, from analyst up to senior management, has unique insights on where AI could be beneficial. Analysts, closest to day-to-day tasks, often recognize inefficiencies first, while associates and vice presidents can offer valuable, experience-driven perspectives.
To facilitate this dialogue effectively, banks should establish dedicated AI Discussion Committees, structured separately for junior and senior employees. For juniors, this could mean holding sessions without senior management present, creating an environment where junior bankers can speak freely and honestly about their workloads and challenges without fear of judgement.
In these committee sessions, junior team members could bring specific examples of tasks they handle manually, highlighting opportunities for potential automation. The junior-level discussions themselves would then serve as an important check-and-balance: for example, an analyst might propose automating a particular task using AI, while associates, having previously performed similar tasks themselves, can help evaluate whether manual execution might still offer meaningful skill-building value in the long run. The committee, benefiting from collective insights, would then assess holistically whether each suggested task truly warrants AI automation or is better executed manually to preserve foundational skill development.
Yet, identifying tasks is only the first step. Banks must also proactively implement regularly scheduled AI Innovation Sessions, following feedback from these committees. These sessions would encourage junior bankers to bring forward repetitive tasks they've identified from Discussion Committees and encourage discussions around how to automate those tasks with the rest of the junior bankers across the organization.
Importantly, the goal of these sessions isn't simply to prescribe specific AI processes; AI technology evolves far too quickly for rigid approaches. Instead, these sessions should create an environment focused on continuous exploration, experimentation, and practical application of AI tools. Banks must intentionally shift the culture from seeing AI as a threat to embracing it as a new core skill. When Excel replaced manual, hand-calculated valuations done decades ago, bankers didn’t lose core valuation skills. Instead, they adapted and proficiency in Excel became essential.
Moreover, its important that these AI Innovation Sessions occur during protected time for juniors. Without clear, protected schedules, daily workloads and urgent meetings inevitably will take priority, preventing meaningful participation and creating skillset disparities across junior employees. Currently, most banks rely heavily on informal mentorship and ad-hoc, team-specific training, often leaving junior development to chance. You might luck into a supportive mentor, or you might not. To cultivate the next generation of Wall Street leaders effectively, banks need a consistent, structured, and intentional approach to training, especially as AI increasingly defines the future of finance.
Bottom Line: Don't Just Get It Done — Do It Smarter
Every organization is facing a critical moment as they navigate the rise of AI tools. Much of the focus globally has been on enhancing the technical capabilities of AI, which is undeniably essential. But what’s equally crucial is developing a workforce skilled in effectively using these AI tools.
Wall Street is no exception. Ultimately, the industry’s future success depends on nurturing a new generation of talent comfortable and competent with AI without sacrificing essential foundational skills. Banks that commit to intentional AI training now will see gains in productivity, employee engagement, and retention, as well as long-term advantages in innovation, leadership, and market competitiveness.
And at the end of the day, AI won’t replace bankers, but AI-savvy bankers will replace those who aren’t.
What are your thoughts? I’d love to hear how your organization or industry is approaching AI. Are you embracing it, resisting it, or somewhere in between?