3 Ways to Start the Mentoring Others

Mentoring others should be an important part of a leader’s plan to develop his or her people. Here are some brief thoughts on how you can begin:

Focus on character development; not skills. As Jim Collins wrote, “The good-to-great companies placed greater weight on character attributes than on specific educational background, practical skills, specialized knowledge, or work experience.” People grow and keep jobs as a result of their character, not their skill levels.
Develop boundaries and expectations. I’ve seen many mentoring attempts fail because the participants do not sit down together to discuss boundaries and expectations. It’s critical for participants (on both sides) take time to understand each other’s goals, needs and approaches than if they take a laid-back, let’s get together approach. A mentoring program should be constructed by both individuals.
Use scheduled and unscheduled opportunities. I strongly endorse the notion of mentoring spontaneously, using the concept of “teachable moments,” however, the best method is using a combination of scheduled and unscheduled opportunities to learn, develop and grow the person whom you are mentoring.

Mentoring other people is not only highly valued by the individual employee, it gives the leader the opportunity to develop and grow his or her people. If you are not formally mentoring people, start today. If you are, make sure you use these three basic mentoring tips to get the most out of your time.