What is Mentoring?
Mentoring describes a relationship between two people that develops as a way of providing support in a work-related context. A mentor could work for the same organisation as their mentee but not always; the key aspect of the relationship is experience. The mentor usually has a level of experience (perhaps number of years or in a particular skill) that the mentee does not have but feels they want to develop. In this way, mentoring is a mixture of advising, training, teaching, supporting and coaching.
The MemberWise Mentoring Programme
As part of our long-term commitment to continuing professional development (CPD) and the professionalisation of the Membership and Association Sector MemberWise offers its own Mentoring Programme for members on our online professional community, MemberWise Connect.
The MemberWise Connect Platform has mentoring functionality that allows users to set up mentor and mentee profiles and search for one another, making the process of finding the right mentor/mentee pairing much easier.
How to become a MemberWise Mentor
We are looking for experienced members of the membership community to register as mentors. We are looking for those that would like to give their time to support other members of the membership community with their career development. It’s a great additional activity to put on your CV to show your commitment to the sector and to give something back. The membership sector is already a sharing and supportive community but we want to channel that energy into helping membership professionals on a one on one basis.
You can sign up as a mentor and complete your profile by logging into the Connect Community and selecting Mentoring in the top-level navigation. You will need to be a member of the Connect Community in order to take part. (www.memberwise.org.uk/connect)
Why is it beneficial for your career development?
Having a mentor enables you to develop skills that you don’t currently have that can benefit your career. You get the benefit of someone else’s experience and skills. Your mentor is able to provide advice and guidance at a distance and with no other agenda than to help you solve problems in the short term or to develop your career in the long term. In many ways, a mentor is like an ideal line manager relationship but with the added bonus of not being attached to the outcome of the relationship.
How does it work?
Mentors and mentees decide between themselves how they want to work together. Many meet face to face but others prefer to exchange emails or telephone calls especially if they are at a distance. How often they talk are also discussed in advance: will it be a regularly once a month chat or ad hoc when a question arises? It’s important that both people are happy with the level of input and effort required in order to maintain the mentoring relationship.
The best mentoring relationships happen with someone that does not work for the same company as you as they can provide an objective viewpoint. A mentor that works in at a level above you, for example, can also give you an oversight of skills that you don’t already have. A mentor that has the job level or is working in a sector that you want to move into can help you pick up guidance to get promoted or another role.
Choosing a mentor that has the right skills and experience that will benefit you is important so take some time to think about whether you want a mentor that can help with short term challenges or longer-term career development. Or both!
As Chief Executive of the Royal Society of Chemistry (an Influence 100 membership body) I know first-hand how important it is for the next generation of association leaders to have the right knowledge, skills and insight. Mentoring is a great way to ‘tool up’ at pace and I am pleased to participate as a MemberWise Network Mentor.
Robert Parker, Chief Executive, Royal Society of ChemistryI always found MemberWise to be a great place for membership information and knowledge so it made sense to look at the Mentoring Scheme via Connect for a mentor with membership sector knowledge and experience.