Mentoring is a relationship in which one person (the mentor) – usually someone more experienced and often more senior in an organization – helps another (the learner) discover more about his or her personal qualities, capabilities, and potential. It can be an informal relationship, with the learner leaning on the mentor for guidance, support, help, and feedback, or a more formal arrangement between two people who respect and trust each other.
Mentoring need not bring together a trainer and a trainee or resemble line management with its attention to seniority and rank. Instead, the mentor’s role is to listen, ask questions, and probe for facts and career choices; the mentor is a channel for information, experience, and opportunities from various sources that can benefit the learner.
Mentors are there not to instruct but to provide learners with input to help them form their own views, develop different perspectives, and develop as people and as potential managers.
Advantages
As a development tool, mentoring has advantages for the mentor, the learner, and the organization. The organizational benefits of mentoring include:
- Support for planning managerial succession and maximizing human potential;
- The likelihood of improving staff retention levels and recruitment potential;
- Improved communication and exposure of employees to the culture of the company;
- Cost-effective, personalized staff development;
Mentoring offers the mentor:
- Corporate recognition, higher status, and stronger job satisfaction;
- The development of leadership qualities and managerial skills;
- An opportunity to help others develop their careers.
Mentoring offers the learner:
- A sense of being valued by the company;
- An objective, supportive, non-threatening source of support in developing new skills and exploring new directions;
- Access to someone who understands the company culture, personnel, and ways of working.
Disadvantages
Mentoring has few disadvantages, but some cautions are in order.
- Mentoring does require corporate resources: The process takes time for learner and mentor, and both may need to work on appropriate skills such as planning, reviewing and communication (particularly listening and constructive feedback).
- Mentoring is a complement to, not a substitute for, more formal training approaches.
- In the hands of an inappropriate mentor, a learner can develop in the wrong direction. You need to be very careful in selecting mentors and matching them to learners.
- A strong personal bond can develop between mentor and learner, to the detriment of both employees as well as the organization.
Mentoring Process
- Make certain the mentor has the right skills: It is essential that the mentor has:
- Good listening skills;
- Sophistication in using different forms of questions – open, closed, probing, etc.;
- The maturity to suspend personal judgment and prejudice so that the learner can choose from a variety of directions;
- Experience in giving constructive feedback, covering negative and positive aspects in a way that the learner can act on;
- Skill in helping to define objectives and plan ways of achieving them;
- The initiative to use other people’s skills and experiences to open up learning opportunities on the learner’s behalf.
Consider having the skills of a potential mentor evaluated by an objective party, ideally someone with experiences in mentoring. Individuals almost always either over-or underestimate their own competence (especially in communication, where most people believe they shine, even when they are barely adequate).
The mentor must be someone with authority in the organization, an experienced person who can open doors for the learner and other viewpoints from a valued perspective. If necessary, arrange training and development for the mentor to sharpen and refine appropriate skills.
2. Clarify the mentoring relationship: Make sure that both the learner and the mentor are clear on what the relationship is – and is not – about. Early clarification can help avoid any later confusing and disappointment. If appropriate, consider drafting a mentoring contract, specifying:
- The participants’ respective roles, responsibilities, and commitment;
- The planned number and frequency of meetings, to be reviewed and amended as necessary. The participants’ obligation of confidentiality within the relationship.
- Remember that the aim of the mentor is to help the learner develop, not adopt the mentor’s ideas. The relationship should never become one of dependency – watch out for signs that this might be happening.
3. Open the relationship: Recognize that in the early stages of the relationship the mentor needs to take a lead; later as the learner’s confidence and understanding grow, the balance shifts. Set objectives for what the mentoring process is to achieve; make the objective relevant, specific, achievable and time-limited.
4. Develop the relationship: At the start of each mentoring session, and each time learners reach a milestone, review not just their current performance, or success, but what lessons they learned about themselves and the process.
Ask:
- What happened?
- Why?
- What was learned from the experience?
Mentor and learner should jointly identify what needs to be explored in order to achieve each objective. Compare the desired outcome with the current situation, identify the gaps, and identify what need to happen to get from here to there.
Select and agree on a route to achieving each objective. Possible routes include learning experiences that can be provided or facilitated by the mentor, knowledge that can be passed from mentor to learner, and counseling and feedback to heighten the learner’s self-awareness.
It can be hard to identify specific approaches for achieving a knowledge-based or attitudinal objective. In this case, explore possible options, discuss experiences and leave the learner to decide on a plan of action. If the objective is skilled-based, break down the required action into milestones. Hold regular progress reviews, and recognize and celebrate interim successes.
At the end of each mentoring session, articulate achievements so far and specify what needs to happen before the next session, especially if the mentor is to arrange something on the learner’s behalf. Over the course of the mentoring, control of the learner’s development should pass increasingly from the mentor to the learner: the goal is for the learner to be able to stand alone when the mentoring process ends.
5. End of mentorship
Mentorship relationships between people outside work may flourish for years. Inside the workplace, however, mentoring ends when the objectives are achieved. Having reached this point, celebrate the success of the relationship with a final review of the learner’s progress.
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