Category: Blog

Recruiting mentors is one of the biggest challenges organizations face when starting a mentoring program, so here are our top 10 ideas to help you out.

How effective your mentoring program is entirely dependent on the participants you recruit. Mentoring within an organization is becoming increasingly significant with 67% of businesses reporting an increase in productivity and 55% stating an increase in profits due to mentoring programs. Starting a program within your company is the start of truly exciting times ahead and a chance for real transformation.

Over the years, mentoring has proven extremely beneficial to organizations with the benefits outweighing any costs involved. However, one of the most frequent challenges faced is actually how to recruit effective mentors within your organization. You should be considering these ideas when it comes to recruiting and retaining your mentors:

1. Having a target audience and key objectives
The first step and arguably the most important factor in promoting your program and recruiting mentors is to understand your target audience and key objectives. You need to work together with your team to fully comprehend why you need a program and who it is targeted at. Are you looking to improve employee engagement? Is there a barrier between departments? Is employee retention low? These are just some of the more common reasons people implement a mentoring program in their organization. Once you’ve identified your key objectives and audience, you can begin acting on ideas to promote the program company-wide.

2. Get senior leadership involved
Creating a successful mentoring culture and program within your organization begins with senior leadership. You need to ensure the senior members of your business are advocates of the program and efficiently convey the importance of mentoring to their colleagues, their success stories, and positive experience. This will improve the visibility of the program and how it’s received across your organization. By engaging with senior team members and having them on board as mentors (or reverse mentees) is highly impactful on how the organization as a whole embraces mentoring and inspires your employees.

3. Success stories
When trying to relate with your staff members, personalized messages work great. Personal stories from participants of your mentoring program are the ideal way to showcase the influence and success of mentoring within your organization. Video testimonials and quotes about things such as how the mentoring program has allowed for promotions to be made, the new skills learned by the mentees/mentors, and the personal goals met are some of the things you should be convincing when trying to attract people to the program.

4. Case studies
Although considered similar to success stories, case studies also show the challenges faced and how the individual was able to overcome any obstacles. Case studies are a great way to showcase the success of the program within your organization. You can share the case studies with your organization through the use of emails, articles, and social posts.

5. Host mentoring events
With the lockdown being lifted, people are more eager than ever to attend real-life events, however, these events can also be hosted online. Hosting a mentoring program kick-off launch or ongoing events can be a powerful way of drawing people’s attention to the mentoring scheme you have in place at your organization. Hosting an event where an inspiring mentor can speak to your employees, a place where they can have the opportunity to network with other mentoring members and discuss their stories is highly impactful.

6. Be clear on commitments
It’s essential that you’re clear on the commitments and expectations of mentors, not only to recruit them but to retain them. Provide your employees with transparent and realistic guidelines of what’s expected, including things such as time commitments and how they can help. Some of your employees may not have sufficient free time outside of work due to other personal life responsibilities and need to ensure they have enough time left in their schedule to help mentees before signing up.

7. Email communication
The use of email is a popular communication technique used by companies worldwide. This popular method of communicating with employees is a great way to get the message out there, without taking up too many resources. To recruit mentors to your program you can send a company-wide email outlining more about the program, what’s involved and the value it adds for the individual. However, as it’s easy for employees to miss or ignore their emails, there are factors you need to think about such as the time you send the email or the subject line.

8. Instant messenger channels
Besides email, since the beginning of last year, more companies are using other means of communication such as Slack, Zoom, or teams. If your organization has any of these in place it would be advised to also communicate about the program via these channels by sending out a mass message to all the members of your organization.

9. Team meetings
Have the managers at your organization host team meetings to discuss the implementation of the new program. Your managers know and work with their team members and know exactly who would be a great fit for the program. Your team leaders can also be advocates of the program, conveying its significance.

10. Portray the value
The main factor in recruiting and retaining mentors is ensuring your company can express the value mentoring brings to the table. As mentoring is a voluntary experience, it’s crucial to showcase the impression it can have not only on them as an individual but the business in general. To illustrate the value, you need to have a plan in place to fully understand how you’re going to reach these members and what methods you’re going to use. Examples of this could be utilizing email, and producing videos and internal blog posts.

Final thoughts
When recruiting mentors for your program, it’s important to strategically plan your methods and truly understand how as an organization you’re able to demonstrate the value and impact the program brings to your staff members. Don’t wait until the last moment and leave the mentors to come to you, utilise these ideas to guarantee your mentoring program is as effective and thriving as possible.

Source: pushfar.com ~ Image: Canva Pro

A survey of more than 200 small businesses sheds light on the importance of mentorship among entrepreneurs.

Kabbage, Inc., a global financial services, technology and data platform serving small businesses, surveyed more than 200 small businesses throughout the US to understand the importance of mentorship to small business owners. The findings show:

Only 22 percent of small businesses had mentors when they started business. Another 17 percent indicated they have an advisor, which suggests a paid relationship for consulting and advice. This leaves a wide percentage of business owners, 63 percent, not pursuing professional guidance at the onset of their business.

92 percent of small businesses agree mentors have a direct impact on the growth and the survival of their business. A separate Kabbage report revealed that 84 percent of small businesses reach profitability in the first four years of their business, with 68 percent attaining profitability in the first year. The early years of any business is a crucial make-or-break period and most small businesses agree mentors are vital to success.

The study shows that 61 percent of small business owners mentor others, and 58 percent specifically mentor younger entrepreneurs. This shows that small business owners are taking the time and finding value in giving their time to mentor, and younger entrepreneurs are seeking mentors to help in their careers. This was most prevalent in industries such as real estate, property management, and construction.

Of all respondents, 89 percent of small business owners that don’t have a mentor wish they did. This represents the 63 percent of businesses that do not currently have a mentor, highlighting a need among the entrepreneurship community to easily find and connect with others that can deliver actionable advice and value to a business.

“A great mentor is someone who provides objective advice, provides counsel from a fresh perspective, is willing to collaborate, listen and learn, as well as remind you of your goals, your purpose, and what you’re working so hard to achieve,” said Head of People Operations at Kabbage, Amy Zimmerman. “Businesses have a great opportunity to provide everyone in a company the benefit of mentors—from the founders to the interns—as the data shows it’s critical for success. We began offering this perk at Kabbage and have seen great success as it can be an affordable benefit that businesses can easily leverage.”

Source: kabbage.com ~ Image: Canva Pro

Many successful people attribute part of their professional success to having a mentor.

Mentors provide a wealth of knowledge and experience to us, they guide us through challenges and increase our likelihood of success, they lift us up and take our success personally.

They are invaluable.

So why do only 37% of professionals have one?

Olivet Nazarene University wondered why too. They recently surveyed 3,000 people about professional mentor-mentee relationships to see what they look like in 2019.

Here’s what they found:

1. 76% of people think mentors are important, however, only 37% of people currently have one.
2. Most people opt for same-sex mentors (69% women, 82% men)
3. People with mentors are happier at their current jobs than those without.
4. Only 14% of mentor relationships started by asking someone to be their mentor. 61% of those relationships developed naturally.

Would a mentor be beneficial for you? Ask yourself these questions to find out:

1. Would you like to have a trusted and more experienced person to bounce ideas off, to discuss challenges with?
2. Are you entering a new industry and would like access to an expert in this new field?
3. Are you in a new role and would like access to a seasoned executive that has held the same/similar role for many years?
4. Are you a CEO or at the top of your field and feel isolated because you don’t have peers to share problems/brainstorm with?
5. Are you considering launching a new venture and are seeking expertise you don’t yet have?

If you answered “yes!” to any of the above questions, you’re ripe for mentorship. First, read my blog on networking. Now using that advice and a bit more below, you’ll be all set to meet the mentor of your dreams!

Here’s how to get one:

1. The “friendly stalker” approach: Here’s how I got some time and advice from Steve Jobs. The relationship lasted for many years. Follow this approach as it works every time!
2. The “met on a plane” approach: talk to whomever you meet on a plane, even just a little bit. People are interesting. Become curious about them! A month ago I struck up a conversation with a man on a plane. He has become an informal mentor and has already saved me tens of thousands of dollars due to the tax planning advice I received from him.
3. The “friend of a friend” approach: one of our clients needed a board member with public company CFO experience, as he’s preparing for his IPO. I connected him with a CFO client of ours with this expertise. The CFO has now joined our client’s Board of Directors and is adding great value.
4. The “prepared, then random meeting” approach: I was intrigued by Jerry Jampolsky and wanted to volunteer with his organization. I read all I could, reached out to them, and didn’t hear back. I was getting discouraged when, as fate would have it, I bumped into him at a restaurant. He’s been a mentor of mine now for over 20 years. Sure glad I studied up on him before we bumped into each other!
5. The “I care about what you care about” approach: Countless times in my career I’ve reached out to total strangers offering to help them solve a problem. This is how I got my job at Microsoft (as a self-taught engineer without the required college degree), Lotus (remember them?), Apple (yep, before I stalked Steve), and more. Oh, and this is how I met Stephen Hawking (and got invited to the White House).

The Net-Net

• Mentors can profoundly boost your career success and trajectory
• There are a variety of ways to meet them that work
• Be creative and curious, as you’ll be surprised where you can meet mentors

Source: Forbes.com ~ By: Christine Comaford ~ Image: Unsplash

Updated for 2022: We’ve compiled the ultimate list of the mentoring statistics, from employee engagement and inclusion to learning, career progression, and development.