Mentor or mentee, two winning roles

Mentorship has been around since the beginning of time. An experienced person takes an apprentice under their wing in order to offer them all their acquired wisdom and expertise. Socrates was surely Plato’s mentor. With its origins based on the transmission of knowledge, mentoring will never go out of fashion. This technique is even booming as a professional development activity.

January is ‘mentoring month’. As we set our personal and professional goals, mentoring deeply benefits both the mentor and mentee. “Mentoring is a support method that we can rely on to face the turmoil we are all experiencing at the moment, whether as individuals or organizations. More than ever, its use is relevant ”[1], underlines Mrs. Marianne Lefebvre, President of Mentorat Québec.

How to go about it?

Several options are available to businesses and individuals. The agreement can be formal (a program that includes a structured approach, supported by an organization) or informal (based on a natural relationship and spontaneous association).

A mentoring program set up within a company offers many advantages for the mentee:

1. Facilitates professional integration
2. Reduces stress related to integration into a new position
3. Improves skills, self-confidence and increases productivity

For the mentor:

1. The relationship increases the feeling of worth
2. Develops communication skills
3. Helps hone skills

And the company:

1. Activates a lever in terms of loyalty, mobilization and motivation
2. Facilitates succession planning
3. Allows the preservation of company knowledge

Online options

If your organization does not have the ability to implement such a program, those who know will testify that multiple options exist. For example, the Ordre des conseillers en ressources humaines agréés offers an online mentoring platform that allows members to be matched according to areas of common interest. Mentorat Québec also offers many resources and leads on the subject. If the prospect of a mentoring relationship seems too longitudinal, the concept of online “speed-mentoring” might interest you as well.

As Steven Spielberg says: “The delicate balance of mentoring is not to create them in your own image, but to give them the opportunity to create themselves.” If you have a desire to give back to others, mentoring might be even more beneficial than you think.

By Caroline Thomson, CRHA

[1] LEAGAULT-ROY, ÉLIANE. (2021). « Le Mois du mentorat 2021 : c’est parti ! », Mentorat Québec, Récupéré de https://mentoratquebec.org/le-mois-du-mentorat-2021-cest-parti/