By Jack Perry
Wouldn’t it be great if someone offered to guide you along your career path, giving you the benefit of years of experience and wisdom, steering you away from pitfalls, and supporting and advising you along the way? Well, it’s unlikely anyone will just offer, but you can look for and find one of these wonderful assets: they’re known as mentors.
Anyone who has knowledge, skills, and experience in your field can be your mentor and help you on your journey. He or she can steer you in the right direction, showing you exactly what’s not working, and offer encouragement as you make new choices. Experience enables them to reveal undiscovered shortcuts to you and, if you choose your mentors wisely, perhaps they’ll even show you where the gold is hidden along those routes.
Mentors can be invaluable guides through political minefields as well, counseling you from their professional experience to help you avoid potential hazards you might not be able to foresee.
Mentors will help you make difficult but necessary decisions you might not really want to make. They can force you to clarify, to explore more deeply what is really on your mind or in your heart as you evaluate a tangled issue. In this way, a good mentor reflects your strengths and weaknesses and helps you enhance those qualities you like and eliminate those qualities you don’t.
In addition to advice, expect a mentor to listen, playing the role of an empathizer, but not a sympathizer. In other words, mentors won’t pity you when a situation gets rough, but can help you through a crisis by relating to what you’re going through, offering alternative choices and a hand up.
A mentor is an invaluable resource, one that saves you time, money, and effort. Like a superior coach, a mentor separates you from the crowd and uses his or her experience to give you a dose of reality, and then builds your self-confidence by taking some of the “maybes” out of life. In addition to teaching you the most direct route to success, a mentor gives you the opportunity to rub elbows with other successful people.
If you’d never been in a kitchen, would you rather struggle through baking a cake from scratch, or would you prefer a master chef right beside you: coaching and teaching you through every step, giving you the do’s and the don’ts as well as some of the personal stories of the disasters he or she had making cakes?
Ready, Willing, and Able
Now that you understand what a mentor is and how much you need one, how do you determine the qualities of a good mentor?
A good mentor has to be willing to give the time and energy to help you. Just because they have the knowledge you seek doesn’t mean they’re going to give it to you, or be available to you, or that you could relate to them comfortably.
Personalities have to work together, and you must be willing to accept what they have to say, because good mentors are timely and candid. They will challenge you and critique you and push you out of a warm, fuzzy comfort zone. Then you must be determined and capable of implementing their advice.
Getting a Mentor of Your Own
Mentoring is an under-utilized opportunity in life because many people are hesitant to ask, and they’re not sure who they should ask. How do you find the perfect mentor for you? Look around in your life. Who are some people you admire? Why do you admire them? Look for people who you believe have exhibited wisdom and good judgment, and who have life experience. They’re respected by their peers, and they’re generally consistent. They’ve “been there and done that.”
Then you simply go to the person and ask. You’ll be amazed at how flattered and responsive many people will be when you say, “I would like to have you be a mentor for my profession. I’ve seen your work, and I’ve met people you’ve counseled and helped along their journey. As my mentor, I won’t burden you or take too much time, but I’d like to be able to come to you as a sounding board and get advice from you from time to time. Would you help me with that?”
Nine out of ten people will say, “You bet I would!” They’ll be flattered that you asked them. In addition, remember the following:
Make an effort. A good way to find a mentor is to use the “six degrees of separation” concept. Everyone knows someone who knows someone…and the chain could end in the perfect mentor for you! If you want to find a mentor focused on a specific subject, start by asking people who they think would be the best person to talk about that topic. They might say, “I don’t know, but call this person,” and that next person might refer you to someone else and so forth until you find the perfect mentor on that subject. You will find very quickly an expert in that field and a potential mentor just by having the courage to ask questions.
Consider all options. You should not reject the possibility of a mentor relationship that is not face-to-face. Your mentor might be someone you never meet in person but whose advice comes to you via phone and e-mail conversations.
Have courage. If you’d like someone you don’t know to be your mentor, you’ll have to summon the courage to ask him or her. Do yourself a favor and don’t predetermine whether a particular person will be your mentor or not. Your fears might convince you that they won’t be interested and will reject you, but it’s important to remember, they can’t reject you or your ideas, they can only reject your request..
If your request for a mentor is rejected, don’t take it personally. Consider that they might not want the responsibility, or they might not believe that they have the ability to take on that role. They might not want to share their time, or they might not have the time at that point to share. Don’t be afraid to ask if there’s someone else they could recommend.
Keep it quiet. To ensure the longevity and mutual respect of your relationship with your mentor, keep it confidential. If that person wanted to be a professional mentor, she would hang a shingle outside the door!
A Mentor is in Your Future
Your relationship with your mentor should be a fluid one. At some point, a mentor might say, “You now need to find someone else who will bring you more knowledge and a different set of experiences than I have to give you. I’ve taken you as far as I can in our relationship. It’s time for you to reach a little higher and a little further.” You might find that you cultivate multiple mentors for various aspects of your career. Sometimes you need a mentor only in the early stages of your career and, by the later stages, you will find yourself mentoring others.
If you’re fortunate enough to find and have a relationship with a mentor, it’s incumbent upon you to be a fine mentor to somebody else someday. You must pay back what you’ve been given. When people have reached out and helped you along your path, you need to reach out and help someone in return. By both finding and being a mentor, your career will soar to new heights.
Mentor from The Respect Factor® Series
THE RESPECT FACTOR® is a trademark of Jack Perry in the United States and other countries. Used with permission.
©2009 Jack Perry. All rights reserved.
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