What is Mentoring All About
- Mar 6
- 3 min read
By Doug Lawrence
When I listen to all that is going on globally there is even more reason to be concerned and wonder where we are going to end up. You wake up every morning and are thankful that we can put our feet on the floor and move ahead to take on more challenges. How assured are we that we can do this with any sort of confidence? We have some days that it feels like three steps forward and two backwards. Certainly not a great confidence building position to be in. One thing that I am thankful for is knowing that mentoring can provide me the tools that I need to meet those challenges head on. I have had a couple of people reach out to me for the guidance that I share that helps them move forward with some degree of confidence. We talk about mentoring as a “two-way, trusted relationship” where both the mentor and mentee are going to learn and grow on a personal and professional basis. I stress the importance of building a trusted relationship and caring and nurturing that relationship to get all the value from mentoring that you can.
Building a trusted relationship is one thing, contributing to the relationship is another. I have had a number of people that see asking for help from someone that you would like to be mentored by as an entitlement and it is not. The relationship goes along a lot smoother if you can add value to it. I think of when I engage with a client who wants mentoring, I always want to take sure that I bring value and if not then we are not a good fit or match to be working together and we need to find some that is. This applies to one-on-one mentoring as well as working for an organization.
One of the approaches/techniques that I use is at the end of every mentoring session I always ask what was the value that you got from the time we spend together today. This helps with my reflection by asking what went well, what didn’t go well and what do we need to do differently next time.
I encourage my mentee to do much the same thing. Reflection is a two-way approach that can and does bring value to the relationship. Remember that the key is to use all the tools that you can to create a deeper, richer mentoring experience for the mentee and the mentor.
One of the things that I look for in my mentee is guidance on what they are looking for from me as their mentor. If I am working with an entrepreneur that changes my approach and focus on what we will be doing. One of the thinking outside the box approaches I have used is to address their mental health and if there are concerns, we need to make sure they have things in place to address that. Remember that we are not a counselor or other professional provider. Our function is to walk beside them and provide the support that they need.
My approach changes if I am doing leadership mentoring. One thing that I stress is that I have a lot of lived experience and as such can mentor people in the majority of industries. I have had great success using the mentoring process and techniques that I have in place. I do learn from each mentoring experience and that has helped with the value I bring to any relationship.
One of the things that you need to be aware of going forward is working with a mentee who is struggling with their mental health and the healing journey.
I had one mentee who had been diagnosed with four different mental health conditions and it had an impact on our relationship. I needed to build a real strong trusting relationship in order to move forward and provide the value that was needed.
As is always the case my role was that of support – nothing more – nothing less. Listening and hearing are two skills that are very much needed. Organizations today are developing a place for mentoring as a key part of their succession planning and succession development process. The loss of corporate knowledge in a highly competitive corporate work place is increasing.
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