An experienced colleague, known as a mentor, can provide invaluable help to you as you begin your career and advance in it.
You’ll probably make a lot of mistakes and miss out on many opportunities, but you can limit how often this happens by finding a mentor.
You have a lot to gain by forming a relationship with a seasoned colleague who is willing to share his wisdom with someone less experienced (that would be you). A mentor can guide you through tricky situations and can provide helpful insight about growing your career. And don’t worry about this relationship being too one-sided. Your mentor will hone his leadership skills by helping you.
What Can Your Mentor Do for You?
- He can help you navigate tricky situations you may encounter at work and can give you advice on how to resolve them. Whatever you’re going through, there’s a good chance he has been through the same thing or knows someone who has.
- Your mentor can alert you on how to build and grow your career to which only those in his position may know.
- He will identify what skills will help you do your job better and can tell you how to acquire them.
- If your employer offers you a promotion or you get a job offer from another company, your mentor can help you decide whether to accept it.
- He can help you figure out when to ask for a raise and then give you advice on how to do it properly.
- He can help you score invitations to industry events and introduce you to people in your field.
Role of the Mentor:
The mentor primary role is to provide guidance and support to your mentee based on his or her unique developmental needs. At different points in the relationship, you will take on some or all of the following roles:
Coach/Advisor
- Give advice and guidance, share ideas, and provide feedback
- Share information on “unwritten rules for success” within the organization
Facilitator
- Act more as a facilitator for knowledge, experience, and personal development
- Allow the person to develop into the “who” they want to be
Source of Encouragement/Support
- Act as sounding board for ideas/concerns about career choices; provide insights into possible opportunities
- Provide support on personal issues if appropriate
Follower and engaged
- Relationships develop through on-going contact. Keep your commitments to engage on a regular basis. The golden standard is every other week for 1 to 1.5 hours. This gives the mentored the assurance that you are genuinely interested and that he or she can count on you.
Devil’s Advocate
- When appropriate, play devil’s advocate to help mentee think through important decisions and strategy.
Empower
- Because mentors are often in a managerial or leadership role, they are problem solvers. The tendency is to take this skill directly into the mentoring relationship. A mentor should be empowering the mentored to arrive at their own solutions.
Ask and check
- The best way to learn what you have contributed is to ask the person most directly affected-your mentored. Asking will do two things. First, it will provide you with valuable information about what you’ve given. Second, it will allow the mentored to be aware of this and to be appreciative.
Mentor not Coach
- Mentors certainly coach in areas of skill development and knowledge acquisition, but mentoring is more than that. It’s about having a personal relationship with a mentored that moves beyond coaching to discussing who the person is and what his or her dreams and aspirations are. Share the dreams. Share the journey. Don’t mistake the advice for the journey.
Report and Recommend
- Mentors should consistently and on monthly base report to the HR department the issues, findings and recommendations concerning the mentees status.
To know more about Q – Consulting Mentor program, please call us on:01099168000 or 01000858589
