Training

Mentoring as a tool for professional and personal growth

Mentoring favours the transmission of know-how and the creation of meaningful relationships. However, it is important to observe a few rules in order to obtain maximum benefits from this practice

17 October 2024

5' min read

Mentoring is an incredibly powerful tool. More and more often in companies we hear about mentoring courses organised to foster the growth of individuals' skills and ensure the transfer of know-how between internal figures.

In fact, mentoring is a process aimed at supporting the learning or development path of a growing colleague. It is based on a professional relationship in which an experienced person - the Mentor - assists another - the Mentee - in developing specific skills and knowledge to enhance his or her professional and personal growth.

But mentoring is not only a way to transfer know-how: it is an important means of cohesion, relationship building and inclusion that offers both figures, Mentor and Mentee, opportunities for personal enrichment.

On the Mentor's side, there is the opportunity to reflect and reconstruct the important steps of one's own path; to reason about one's own successes and failures, to focus on what has made him the person he is. Being a Mentor also means reinforcing one's relational skills, training oneself to ask questions, not to pass judgement, to put oneself out there in a direct and transparent way, learning to tell one's examples and also one's mistakes, in order to make the totality of one's experience available to the Mentee.

On the Mentee's side, it means having a person with whom they can open up without fear of judgement on performance. A person whose purpose is to help her/him focus on growth objectives and whose task is to offer cues and stimuli to achieve them, without forcing any behaviour. It means having the opportunity to question oneself in a protected situation, to be able to confront one's ideas or doubts in a serene manner with a person who can act as a mirror and guide, without judging.

In my experience, I consider the mentoring process a gift that is given to the two roles. A kind of gift package that once opened can reveal several pearls inside, some small and some large, but certainly all of great value to each of the two protagonists.

As long as certain rules are respected.

From the Mentor's point of view:

1. Do not mix this role with other roles held.

When being a Mentor and during mentoring interviews, the Mentor must only be a Mentor. If he/she holds a managerial role in the company, in the mentoring process he/she must be able to take off the manager's hat and with his/her Mentee (who does not have to be one of his/her co-workers) act in a manner consistent with the role assigned in that relationship. The manager is accustomed to assigning performance and qualitative objectives and evaluating by referring to work and results; the Mentor, on the other hand, works on objectives defined and proposed by the Mentee and, when evaluating, in fact merely verifies his Mentee's path by offering him an outside view of the experiences and growth made.

2. Do not fall into the trap of the positive example.

Being a Mentor involves passing on examples and experiences and making oneself, as a person, available by telling how one has acted in similar situations, in order to give possible cues for action to the Mentee. The Mentor brings experiences and examples, he/she is not 'the Example'. Therefore, he/she should not only use successful examples: failure is a learning experience. It has been so in the Mentor's life and will therefore also be so when told to the Mentee.

Using difficult experiences, mistakes and/or failures as opportunities for reflection can also be very important to increase the Mentee's sense of trust and reduce the distance in the relationship.

3. Avoiding the clone effect

Being a Mentor does not mean trying to mould the Mentee into a version of himself. The path taken by the Mentor serves as a stimulus and should not be replicated as such by the Mentee. The Mentor is in the relationship to ask open, stimulating questions that offer different and useful points of view, to make suggestions and offer examples and experience, but it is the Mentee who must define what he/she wants to do and how. The Mentor is expected to give his or her point of view on the Mentee's choices: a point of view that must arise from the aim of helping, not judging or evaluating. With this in mind, the Mentor must remember that for the Mentee the path is new and unique and therefore avoid taking for granted difficulties or actions already faced in everyday life.

From the Mentee's point of view:

1. Taking responsibility for one's own development

It is up to the Mentee to define the goals to be worked on. Asking for advice or help is also in the Mentee's hands. The Mentor supports in bringing the objectives into focus and facilitates the Mentee in evaluating the effectiveness of what he/she is doing, possibly helping him/her to understand the relevance of what he/she wants to develop with respect to his/her needs or role. But he remains a facilitator of development, not the manager.

2. Do not expect the Mentor to act instead.

The Mentor is a resource who works to facilitate and accelerate the development of the Mentee, but is not in charge of acting on the Mentee's behalf and solving problems the Mentee may have in his or her work.

Between the two, it is the Mentee who has to pace the process. If there is a roadmap, calendar of appointments, logbook or anything else to keep track of the process, it must remain in the hands of the Mentee, who uses it to confront the Mentor from time to time.

3. Experiencing and processing the advice he receives

Mentoring aims to increase the knowledge and skills of a less experienced person. The Mentor's aim is therefore to foster learning: he/she will ask questions, stimulate behaviour, relate his/her experiences and possible ways that might sometimes seem far from what the Mentee feels able to do or has ever done. While maintaining respect for himself and his own ideas, the Mentee must be able to challenge himself and find ways to make the suggestions he receives his own and personalise them. And he/she also has the task of reporting back to his/her Mentor, transparently and honestly, how he/she used or modified the received suggestion and whether it helped him/her.

Finally, a rule for both:

- Do not be in a hurry and take time to get to know each other and to tell each other.

Mentoring is a process but it is also and above all a relationship. Professional, but still a relationship. And as such it must include aspects of honesty, mutual respect and trust. Taking time, especially at the first meeting, to tell each other, exchange information, find points of contact, create confidentiality is essential.

Stopping during interviews when there is some misunderstanding or when there is a need to better understand a state of mind or a need is part of the process. It is not an extra.

*Partner bbsette - Consulting, Training and Professional Games.