Mentoring vs. Coaching

Since we are the Global Mentor Network, I have to ask you about mentoring as well.

Yeah.

How do you promote mentoring within your team? And what about within the organization as a whole?

Yeah, I mean, I think... And again, I think it’s really interesting right? Because with all of the work that we do in coaching, it’s there is some overlap between coaching and mentoring, but there actually are also differences.
And so I think with us, obviously our entire team is working with coaches. But from the mentorship side of it, it’s really, as leaders, part of what I do and part of what my leaders do are recognize like, oh, when we have team members that would really, you know, they seem to be on this path, or they’re working through some things like, where can we actually, one, encourage them to work with a mentor and sometimes find mentors. And sometimes those people aren’t even within the company. It’s oftentimes external perspectives, and bringing that in is so important.
But I think also one of the important things about mentoring is understanding that it can also happen at the peer level. And it’s about just really having those conversations and asking those questions and getting that perspective and talking to someone who also has maybe gone through similar challenges. And sometimes that happens from like a peer set and you don’t even realize it.
So I think for us, it’s really about—and what I work with my team on is just making sure that they recognize that they’re not alone. That’s, I think, one of the most important parts of it, is understanding that people are happy to talk and people are happy to share their experience and people also want to dig in and ask you questions in that process too.

And I find that having a good mentoring relationship does require—it doesn’t have to just happen by itself—it does require commitment and effort. What do you think is the most challenging factor in a mentoring relationship and how can that be overcome?

Yeah, I think one of the most challenging parts, I mean, you think time is always a thing for people, right? And so to your point on that commitment, it’s just really making sure that you’re establishing like, hey, can we meet regularly?
Or how do we actually set up these processes? Or how do we set up regular times to check in. And so even if it’s not like, oh, I’ve got a burning thing that I have to talk with you about, but it’s just having that ongoing relationship. So much of mentorship is building that relationship.
And again, we see this with our coaches as well. Part of it, what we encourage is for people to really have that standing time to meet with someone and to hold that space for themselves and commit to themselves, but it’s okay to create that space to do that work so that they can then actually, you know, sometimes it will be addressing something that’s very cute and sometimes it will just be sort of sussing out what’s happening in general.