Finding a mentor
Roman has a good recent post on how to find a mentor at work. There’s a comment on the post that hints that it isn’t possible to recruit a mentor and that they must find you rather than the other way around. The post also hints that if your mentor didn’t seek you as a mentee, then they are simply an advisor rather than a mentor. I don’t know about that. My dictionary says advisor/adviser and mentor are synonymous. But maybe my dictionary is wrong.
Roman’s says all the right things. I’d only add that when seeking a mentor you should have courage and humility. It’s not often easy to ask for help, and that’s essentially what you’re doing when you seek a mentor. You’re looking for someone who can serve as an occasional sounding board at work and who can help you work through thorny issues that you may not want to discuss with your boss or colleagues.
I’ve had a few mentors along my path, and I’ve connected with them both intentionally and unintentionally. I’ve done as Roman advises and sought a specific individual when I needed to learn how to acclimate to a new work environment. I’ve also stumbled into a couple of other mentors where we ran into each other enough and had sufficient mutual respect that our relationship evolved into a mentor/mentee rather than straight acquaintances.
In my career, I’ve never had a long term mentor. My longest mentor relationship has been about two years, after which my responsibilities moved me farther away, both physically and organizationally, from that mentor. I’ve been a mentor a couple of times too, but both times those have been relatively short–one year or less.
On the whole, I think entering into a mentor/mentee relationship is a worthwhile career building activity. I also think it’s wise to do as Roman suggests, and go looking for a mentor yourself. Few organizations do a good job of supporting “official” mentor/mentee relationships. Also, few potential mentors ever consider themselves true mentor material and so they don’t intentionally seek mentees. So take a deep breath and go looking. Don’t be discouraged if you get “no, thanks” for an answer. But you can reduce your chances for a “no, thanks” by being very clear about your expectations for your mentor (especially time commitment), and by being sure, as Roman notes, to focus on learning from them rather than expecting them to solve some problem you might have.
Thanks, Bren, for bringing up my blog here. I’d add to your point about setting the expectations that becoming a mentor yourself can give you an idea on how this role can be played from the other side. The dual view on the situation can help you deeper understand the mentor/mentee relationships, besides the fact that you’ll grow your managerial qualities, skills, and reputation.
Sorry to be off-topic, but just wanted to congratulate you on the (re)launch of your site… from a fellow b5 business blogger. It’s been great discovering good sites like yours. I expect my slacking skills will improve immensely now that I’m visiting here…
All the best… sean
I think it’s mentor and protege.
I’m not sure protege quite gets the nuance for, say, the person who is a very experienced, mature CEO of a listed enterprise and still being mentored by someone even more mature and experienced. But I find it more agreeable than the dreaded “mentee” – which in Australia is much too close to the name of a well known chewy candy.
I see what you mean. I only object to mentee because it is not a word, but perhaps it should be!
Marianne…just out of curiosity, I Googled ‘mentee.’ Lots of results from reliable places. Still doesn’t mean it’s a word but, like google, maybe it will be soon… :-)
Now you made me look! Mentee is not in some dictionaries, but it is in Merriam-Webster Online. Google is also in Merriam-Webster Online. My mistake!
I am very glad to see this conversation on mentoring. We at navAgility believe in it enough to build a mentor matching platform.
We have research that indicates that many mentors would be more effective if the mentee (or potential mentee) would provide some background about them self and clearly state their objectives and desired outcome for being mentored. Likewise for the mentor, if they kept their information on their accomplishments and indicate the areas that their expertise would be beneficial to those seeking mentoring, we have the basis for a mentor/mentee match.
Our service, available at http://www.navagility.com allows anyone to capture detailed career experience in an easily understood visual web page that is searchable by experience and skills. Each individuals unique experience is then presented in an anonymous way so that a brokered match can be easily accomplished by either party.
Here’s to all success in Mentoring!
Irwin Glenn
I attended a workshop on mentoring in big companies. In some big companies, mentor gives you advice and also facilitate you in dealing with your objectives and projects. In this companies a mentor is more than an advisor.