Ways to Improve Your Mentoring
There is a ton of guidance available to help aspiring leaders succeed. But what about the methods for mentoring people? There are steps you can do to make sure the experience for your mentee is as positive as possible, whether you are in a professional or personal mentoring relationship.
You can improve as a mentor by doing the following five things, according to a Kellogg Insight’s article. Going beyond just simply imparting knowledge, letting mentees "own" the relationship, encouraging them to look beyond their current position, being willing to have difficult talks, and taking organizational career development into account are all examples of going above and beyond simply teaching skills.
1. Go beyond simply imparting knowledge
A study by Kellogg professor Brian Uzzi found that mentors who have the most positive effect on their mentees' success tend to be very skilled and successful themselves. They looked at the careers of more than 37,000 scientist mentors and mentees and found that having a mentor who is at the top of their field increases a mentee's chances of becoming a superstar by almost six times.
The study also shows that the most successful mentees go on to work in a different field and establish their own way. Uzzi says that students still do well when they learn this "special sauce" and try to be like their mentors in small ways. But if they employ it something new and different, they do even better.
Researchers say that this "special sauce" is more than just technical skills or knowledge of a subject. It also includes "tacit knowledge" of how groundbreaking work is thought up and produced. This shows how important it is for mentors and mentees to spend time together and work through problems, instead of just making sure that skills are mastered.
2. Let mentees “own” the relationship
A good mentor lets their mentee know that they are in charge of their own career. Meeting plans should be created by the individuals who are being mentored. Diane Brink, a senior fellow at Kellogg and former Chief Marketing Officer at IBM, says that making the mentee's agenda a priority keeps them from being pushed into a career path they may not be interested in. And it relieves the mentor of the pressure to be an all-knowing guru.
Being a mentor is less about telling mentees what to do and more about being there for them, listening to them, and giving them support without judging them.
Brink adds that as a mentor, it's your job to help that person figure out how to solve a problem or take advantage of an opportunity. You're asking questions and giving background information to make things clearer. You're not the one who's going to know everything.
3. Encourage mentees to look beyond their current position
Another thing that a mentorship is not is finding a job for your mentee. "That's not your role," says Brink. It's a common misunderstanding that can put a relationship on the wrong track. Mentors should be clear about what they can't do or won't do, like help with a promotion that's coming up. Instead, you should encourage your mentee to think about their careers in a broader way than they might have thought. What are their possibilities? What are their best qualities and weak parts?
“One of the things that I will do throughout my mentoring relationships is to encourage the individual to think about where they see themselves four or five jobs from now. I think it forces the person to think more broadly about their development plan and the types of challenges and potential assignments that they should consider so that they can get there,” Brink says.
4. Be willing to have difficult talks
Good managers often have to manage the performance of an employee in their current role while also preparing them for future roles. This is a job that requires a lot of mentoring.
Carter Cast, a clinical professor of entrepreneurship at Kellogg, says, "Think of yourself as a coach who’s there to unlock the potential of the person." "You work with the talents and gifts of each person so they can do more of what they do well."
He says it's important to tell an employee they're doing a bad job if the feedback is constructive and will help them in the future, even if they're doing a good job right now. This can sometimes mean having several hard, direct conversations.
If the mentor didn't care about their mentee's growth, they wouldn't put up with the pain. The mentee is not a hopeless case; they may just be missing one lesson and need to go discover it.
5. Take organizational career development into account
Most of the time, mentoring happens between one mentor and one mentee. But organizations that want to help their employees get the most out of their careers (and, in turn, grow their own pool of future leaders) should think about making the benefits of career development available to as many people as possible.
Bernard Banks, who teaches leadership and is an associate dean, likes to bet on everyone. This doesn't mean that you can't give different chances to different people. But it does mean that no one should be left behind to stay stuck or find their own way. People can learn a lot from informal training sessions, new on-the-job experiences, and being encouraged to build mentor-mentee relationships. These things can be done on a budget, but they are still important.
Banks says that this method not only helps build leadership throughout the organization, but also keeps good people there. Banks says that you’ll hear a lot of people say, 'I left the company because I didn't feel like anyone was really interested in my growth. Sometimes people believe that to mean, 'They just didn't send me to this course,' but it's more than that.
Further reading: Good Leadership Strategies to Replace Bad Leadership
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