Developing & Mentoring Your Junior Sales Force

Courtesy of Pixabay

“The best players do not always make the best coaches or mentors,” said a Commercial Real Estate HR leader Stephen* on the phone recently.

“I am leaving the company because they just handed me a phone book, a quota and want me to sink or swim. There has been almost no training, they get irritated when I ask questions and don’t even let me attend the meetings I set up,” said Rachel* who is in the Insurance business.

“Our senior brokers, the ones who are making 700k, a million+ a year. They don’t mentor. They give a new associate $20 and say ‘buy yourself a cup of coffee too.’ That’s the extent of it, but they think they are mentoring,” says Mitchell* a veteran executive who manages operations. “They are entrepreneurs and we barely see them in the office.”

We know that baby boomer sales rockstars are close to retiring and that our younger workforce needs more training and development to feel they can be successful (or they leave).

The proverbial old boy’s network exists yet Linkedin and other networking platforms are reducing social interactions as people Link-off the golf course and isolate behind the blue screens.

It’s time to double down on mentoring to prepare, engage, retain, diversify our company’s future rainmakers but how do we do it?

“My associate gets 30% (commission) on my deals now,” says SVP Jared.* It used to be 20%, but he has doubled the number of sales calls we go on and does the big research. “I mentored him when he started and now that our financial success is linked, I guess I am his sponsor as well,” states Jared. (We discussed that a mentor speaks with you and a sponsor speaks about you, champions you to others).

Jared, a people person who is in his 40’s meets regularly with three junior associates that do not report to him directly and often discusses:

1] How he and his associates set up and manage their pipeline.

2] Moves management.

3] How to deal with the “death valley” (rejection and no sales for a period of time) and his many failures.

4] How and where to best network + cold call.

5] Closing-the-deal strategies and breakthroughs.

6] Financial projections.

7] Where the best Greek food is near the office and more.

Linda*, Adrian* and Sara* started coming to him more and more for mentoring over the past six months as he was one of the few senior salespeople who would stop the world for them. Jared is generous with his time and shares that he gets a lot out of supporting them as well. People mentored him early on and he wants to pay-it-forward.

So what do you do to boost the development of your junior executives?

Well, to get started, we recommend the following three steps:

1] If you are in HR/learning/diversity do some speed/flash mentoring at lunch or a happy hour to break down the barriers and help people better recognize the value proposition of both helping others and asking for help. If you are a sales rainmaker, reach out and schedule coffee/lunch today with 1 – 3 people you can help. Don’t wait. In fact, pause from reading this article, send three texts. Your time = money and your investment of time in them = 10x.

2] Have people from session #1 (senior execs and non-reporting junior execs) agree to meet with each other three times over the next 6-8 weeks (or 6x over 6 months) to discuss:

Sample topics: Best deal, worst deal, last deal, skill(s) that I need the most to be successful, how to close, where to network, sales funnel, overcoming challenges, use of Linkedin, volunteer/board service, falling and then getting back up, and more.

Extra credit if the junior exec can attend or observe the senior exec on a sales call or two. When we run these Flash sessions for clients, we love to give out lunch cards or Starbucks cards to boost these 1:1 connections and illustrate the company values mentoring.

3] Provide mentor + mentee training (we can help) via webinar or in person. We also recommend co-sponsor training for mid-level to senior executives (how do people from different industries champion each other for opportunities with a WIN/WIN mindset).

“My associate just found in his research that a transaction happened that we didn’t know about,” said Jared. “We need to send them an invoice right away.” When he told me the dollar amount, well, my eyes bugged out that his associate caught that one.

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Julie Kantor is CEO of Twomentor, LLC a high impact company that provides mentor strategy, execution, mentor and mentee trainings, flash mentoring, business case keynotes and more. We’d love to connect and discuss your needs. To schedule, contact, Sophia@twomentor.com

Beyond The Giving Tree: Building a Professional Orchard of Support

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“… and she loved a boy very, very much — even more than she loved herself.” … Shel Silverstein

They all pile into her office. She is their rock. Girlfriend problems, the kids are sick, the raise didn’t come through, the project has been delayed again. She welcomes them in. She knows the names of their grandkids, and that Lisabeth is going to Maui on her honeymoon in early June with the guy she met in the soda aisle of Safeway. She might be the HR manager, Director of Operations, she might be the CEO, Comptroller. Whomever she is… she cares and offers comforting words of wisdom, challenge, new perspectives. She guides them. She guides them all and can’t stand the notion that others are not ready to help… to mentor. If she has a strong Rolodex, she opens it up and makes strategic connections. She is “The Giving Tree” or the proverbial ‘mother hen’ in the office. It makes her feel valued and valuable until she starts feeling like a stump with few resources left, especially if she faces challenges in her own life.

When a family member and I were discussing Shel Silverstein’s world-famous children’s book The Giving Tree a frown came to her face. “Too much sacrificial love,” she said.

The story is about a little boy who visits the tree, swings from her branches, enjoys her apples… but then as he gets older, he has no time for such things. He needs to work and make money.

He leaves for years at a time and she feels lonely and misses the boy. She is thrilled when he comes back.

He shares he is struggling and she happily gives him all her branches to help him build a home.

…And then when he gets much older and has new needs, she gives him her entire trunk to build a boat. All that’s left of her is a stump, a place where he can sit in his old age. A place they can be reunited.

The tree will keep giving. She is happy that she has something to offer, but I speak to so many women executives that share they feel like a stump, drained of energy, burning out in the workforce. Men share this too. They need to be replenished in a world that loves and welcomes martyrs @work. The big challenge for our giving trees and mother hens is asking for help. They are willing to give but find it hard to receive. Couple and Family Therapist Dr. Joan Soncini and I spoke and she shared that part of it is co-dependency issues. When a child’s parents withhold approval, they may spend their lives seeking the approval of others. Feeling that they are not enough.

How do we create a more reciprocal environment at work and decrease burnout of our valued team members? How does the Giving Tree learn to take and welcome help?

“I use to think that if I were a better person, others would be happy. So I’d stay in the office later at the expense of my health and family,” shares Taylor* a commercial real estate executive. “Then it dawned on me that no one else cared if I stayed three hours late, missed yoga and dinner, so why was I doing that to myself?”

“Speak to the person and start with empathy,” states Soncini. Boundaries need to be set if they are giving too much away at the cost of their well being. “Don’t respond to work emails from9: 30 pm to 8 am,” I suggested recently to a good friend and we discussed her writing a document of her accomplishments over the past year and how she feels the company could be structured better to avoid significant stress. “How can you better prioritize yourself?

One female CEO shared with me during one of our Twomentor Flash Mentoring exercises (where we orchestrate it for everyone to mentor and be mentored) that she forgot how to ask people for help. That she was experiencing some challenges and really appreciated the strategic mentoring she received in the session. It energized her. She set up two follow-up coffee dates as well.

For women, especially executive women, we have so much to offer and we do need to avoid stumping- ourselves. We need to build mutual mentoring and sponsoring relationships (a sponsor is someone who champions you to others for opportunity, a mentor encourages, challenges and advises you). Our branches are so much stronger than we realize and we can definitely trade apples… I have Fuji and you have Red Delicious, plus you know that amazing leader who has Granny Smiths- can you connect us?

When mentoring-sponsoring-givers coming together in the workplace we become orchards of strength with vibrant, healthy trees bearing many kinds of fruit for ourselves, our families and our companies.

Julie Kantor is CEO of Twomentor LLC and passionate about building corporate mentoring cultures and initiatives. She can be reached at julie@twomentor.com

#NationalMentoringMonth #Martyr #TheGivingTree #Twomentor #ExecutiveWomen #Burnout #Selfhelp #codependency

Diversity + Mentoring = Increased Inclusion in the Workplace

Twomentor.com and Pixabay

I’ve been reflecting a lot on the Venn diagram between Diversity and Inclusion (D & I) and what we like to call Mentoring 2.0 (Mentoring + Sponsorship). For some reason, they seem to be siloed “movements.”

A sponsor is a leader championing another executive behind closed doors for career advancement and opportunity. A mentor shares his/her skills, knowledge, and experience with another in a mutual collaboration or partnership.

“Should mentoring fall under HR or Diversity?” executives ask me often. That’s one of the big issues. Who in a corporation “owns'” the work to build a mentoring initiative or culture?

“Mentoring is a four-letter word around here,” said another executive. “We had a failed initiative a few years ago and …”

The more I work with leaders on the challenges they are solving for, the more I see they are interdependent movements that need to join each other at the strategy table from now on. Employee engagement, Millennial retention, advancement of women and minorities, workplace isolation with a 32% engagement rate (Gallup), the more I see inclusion is actually the heart of the Venn handshake between mentoring and diversity (see image above).

Let’s look at some of the data out there:

According to the Association for Talent Development, 44% of CEOs list mentorship programs as one of the three most valuable strategies to advance women into Senior Management. At Goldman Sachs, 70% of women who were mentored by senior leaders (1 leader mentoring 5 women) were promoted to Managing Director roles within five years.

Additionally, a relatively new study by Kaitlyn Conboy and Chris Kelly at Cornell University illustrate some powerful findings:

Mentoring is more effective than other diversity initiatives. “Large companies implement a variety of diversity initiatives, including voluntary training, targeted recruitment, cross-training as well as mentorship. Mentorship programs can boost the representation of Black, Hispanic, and Asian American women, and Hispanic and Asian-American men at manager levels by 9% to 24%, as compared to the other initiatives which have lower results ranging from -2% to 18%,” the study states.

It is reminiscent of my conversations a few years ago with Harvard professor Frank Dobbins who researched 800 major companies over 30 years :

“In analyzing three decades’ worth of data from more than 800 U.S. firms and interviewing hundreds of line managers and executives at length, we’ve seen that companies get better results when they ease up on the control tactics. It’s more effective to engage managers in solving the problem, increase their on-the-job contact with female and minority workers, and promote social accountability—the desire to look fair-minded. That’s why interventions such as targeted college recruitment, mentoring programs, self-managed teams, and task forces have boosted diversity in businesses. Some of the most effective solutions aren’t even designed with diversity in mind,” states Dobbins.

The Cornell study also found that “Mentoring improves both the promotion and retention of diverse groups. In fact, they help increase promotion and retention rates of minority men and women by 15%-38% compared to non-mentored minorities. It has been inferred that this is due to innate biases that influence people to help those who are similar to themselves; therefore, the lower number of minorities in upper management means that those who do not have a mentor, either organic or assigned, will not benefit due to a lack of access.”

Part of that access is that mentees often choose mentors in their own likeness and mentors often choose mentees in their own likeness. Golf course- manicure buddies! So where and how does our workforce get that access that will drive more diverse mentoring and yield more inclusion?

“Ladies and gentlemen, we want you to find someone who does not remind you of yourself,” I said at a conference from the podium midway during one of our Mentor Road Trip™ Flash Mentoring sessions.

Leaders and executives look at me with mild surprise and then go about the task of finding someone who they believe is different then themselves.

“You can go beyond race, religion, and gender,” just find someone who for whatever reason does not remind you of yourself, I restate.

They do and big smiles come out. The interaction desire is strong.

Earlier I asked ” How many of you have a mentor, someone you can go to for professional advice?” Less than 30% raise their hands (every time and less than 15% share they are mentoring others).

“Whoever traveled the furthest to be here at the conference (or training session), you will take on the role of the mentor this segment”

“Mentors share your first three months on the job at the company [be it Verizon Wireless, Marriott, NextEra, University of XYZ etc.]. What is the best mentoring advice anyone gave you there?” I ask. “Mentees, this is for your learning so don’t hesitate to ask questions. You have 6-minutes team, GO.”

Before people leave the session, they set up a coffee date with someone that they choose to continue a mentoring conversation with. The next month, its time to formalize these or new pairings with official mentor training 1.0 and a six to nine-month gameplan.

It is a simple exercise but boy does it break down the barriers or the ‘elevator pause’ we see out there! That feeling you have when you are on an elevator of strangers. Does anyone say hi? Do we break the ice and human meets human, or do we pause, look down at our Samsungs and iPhones, step off on floor six and go about our days?

When we mentor more diversely we get more diversity in our companies. When mentoring meets diversity hand in hand we get more inclusion. When our younger generation mentors our older generations (reverse mentoring) we get more engagement and inclusion.

When we engineer mentoring in a fun, user-friendly way we get more mentor-mentee and diverse mentor matches. Human sees human. Phone goes into the jacket pocket. Human helps human.

We are happy to share our new Mentoring Imperative E-Book with you to look at the compelling data and start a new dialogue internally.

You will learn how mentoring is a vehicle to drive:

Diversity, multigenerational employee retention, engagement, knowledge transfer, and build leadership legacies.

YOUR COPY: Just email info@twomentor.com with your name, company, and best contact information.

HERE TO HELP YOU BUILD THE RIGHT WAY: Let’s discuss your unique needs and our outsourced mentoring offerings, training, conference keynotes, flash mentoring sessions and more. Contact, Sophia@twomentor.com or 18006071605.

The Walls Between Us

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By Julie Silard Kantor, CEO Twomentor LLC. Published on Medium.com

I’ve been walking around this week with Crowded House’s lyrics playing through my head on a continuous loop. Walls have been on my mind and how we break them down with each other

Hey now, hey now

Don’t dream it’s over

Hey now, hey now

When the world comes in

They come, they come

To build a wall between us

We know they won’t win

 

You’ve all seen the scenes that play out…

The four-top at the restaurant where the Galaxy and iPhone screens win over the menu and vibrant conversation.

The same scene but this time at work right before the Monday weekly staff meeting.

The relatives who you did not see over Christmas, Chanukah or Thanksgiving because of differing political opinions.

As I travel the globe I am inspired by the many diversity leaders, HR leaders, CXOs who are focusing on how to bring down these invisible walls that separate us. They are stumped by the disconnects they see every day. They know there is an issue. It’s hard to put our finger on it, but it is significantly impacting workplace culture.

The workplace has a key role to play in curbing America’s Loneliness epidemic. Arthur C. Brooks, President of AEI had this to share in a recent NY Times Op-ed titled “How Loneliness Is Tearing America Apart”

Why are we becoming so lonely? One reason is the changing nature of work. Work is one of the key sources of friendship and community. Think of your own relationships; surely many of your closest friendships — perhaps even your relationship with your spouse — started in the workplace. Yet the reality of the workplace is rapidly attenuating, as people hop from job to job, and from city to city, as steady work becomes harder to find and the “gig” economy grows.

When we isolate by not bringing down the walls between us we become sick. We feel sick with our concerns and challenges and forget that thousands of other people may be dealing with similar issues. The walls go up and according to Cigna’s research 46% of American’s often or always feel alone. The hardest hit is our 18 – 22-year-olds. We see that anxiety and suicide rates have gone up in our country and self-medicating the social pain with opioids has brought our overall life expectancy rates down as a nation. Gallup released a finding last Thursday that among those under the age of 35, an average of 87% felt they had good mental health in 2015 – 2016. That number, however, dropped to 74% for the past two years. A divided nation?

In a quest for a feeling of Belonging, people seek out others who are most ‘like them’ and join tribes. They push away and dismiss others quickly who are different creating more polarized societies and chipping away at years of social inclusion and diversity efforts. This is playing out in politics today and can become very dangerous according to Howard J. Ross who just put out an extraordinary book on this topic that is my Audible #1 Our Search for Belonging: How Our Need to Connect Is Tearing Us Apart.

CAN MENTORING BRING THE WALLS DOWN & FOSTER A STRONGER SENSE OF BELONGING OR INCLUSION?

I have shared often an observation that surprises many. In most boardrooms, hotel conferences, association webinars, when I poll executives under 30% share that they have someone that mentors them. One group of senior managers at a financial institution 3, yes three out of 26 raised their hands said they have a mentor.

I’m beginning to think the word itself ‘mentor’ causes a lot of confusion for some reason. As January is National Mentoring Month, we should reflect on this and the role mentoring can play to create solid bridges and meaningful connections. Has it played a role in your life?

A mentor shares from their experience, skills, learning. “How many of you are currently mentoring someone else?” I asked the same group

I remember gulping back my own shock that so few managers had mentors and that less than 10% reported they were mentoring others.

A Deloitte survey showed that 79% of Millennials want their managers to be mentors. They don’t want to isolate. They want to learn from you and feel included as a most basic human need. It’s a WIN/WIN because they want to grow from your knowledge and experiences and add tremendous value by reciprocating.

From what we have seen, we can bring down these man-made walls with a little engineering around mentoring connections and mentoring conversations. I want you to see the joy in people’s eyes when we create the space for people to share and learn. Human helps human bringing out the best and both parties benefit. Perhaps we can modify the melody to

We come, we come

To remove the wall between us

We know that we [humanity, each other] can win…

———————————————————————————–Twomentor: Building Corporate and Organizational Mentoring Initiatives and Cultures

1 833 5 (MENTOR)

Overview Prezi: https://prezi.com/p/mtpvhyrq5_op/: https://prezi.com/p/mtpvhyrq5_op/

Building Corporate Mentoring Initiatives & 8 Steps to Get Started

We are at the halfway mark with our 18 cities Corporate Mentor Roadtrip™ (see below) this year with amazing partners and are very excited to share with you some big learning!

In this video, you will learn how corporate and organizational mentoring drives:

1] Inclusion, community and belonging in your workforce

2] Better retention and helps onboard your newer employees and interns

3] Elevates leaders & high potential employees w/ succession planning + increased management capabilities

4] Increases knowledge transfer between the generations in a reciprocal manner

Thank You AVIXA, Anthem, MITRE, Banco Sabadell, NextEra Energy, Women in Technology International, Abbott/St Judes, University of Delaware, ASAE, Optics Society of America, Hazelden/ Betty Ford, Active Minds, Chemonics, South Florida Business Journal for being wonderful partners in this journey!

THE MENTOR ROAD TRIP™ JOURNEY 2019

1] Ft Lauderdale, FL Expo Center (Mistress of Ceremonies for Women in Technology Conference)
2] Los Angeles, CA (Keynote and Flash Mentoring for Audio Visual Industry Executives)
3] Fort Lauderdale, FL (Keynote for 200+ Female Executive Mentors & Mentees for South Florida Business Journal at FIU)
4] Minneapolis, MN (Mentor Training for Medical Sales Executives)
5] New York City, NY (Catalyst Conference for Best Practices for Women Executives + Offsite Session on Men as Allies)
6] McLean, VA (Inclusion Mentoring Training for Government Contractor)
7] Bedford, MA (Inclusion Mentoring Training for Research & Development Industry)
8] Delaware (Alumni Mentoring in Legal Profession for University of Delaware)
9] Global webinar session for Association Leaders with ASAE (Mentor 2.0- Mentor + Sponsorship to Grow Your Leadership)
10] San Francisco, CA (Leaders in the Optics Industry)
11] Bogota, Columbia (Entrepreneurship + Mentoring with EO)
12] San Jose, CA (Emcee and Presenter for Women in Technology International)
13] Orlando, FL (Mentoring @ Sea Flash Mentoring Session at InfoComm)
14] St Paul, MN (Leadership Session on Mentoring and Sponsorship for top executives in the treatment/addiction industry) 16] Indianapolis (Training for Healthcare Leaders)
15] Toronto, Canada (Mentor + Mentee Training for AV and IT Executives)
16] Jupiter, FL [Best Practices in Internship program mentor training for MBA’s)
17] Dallas,TX (Flash Mentoring for Managers)
18] Washington, DC (Diversity Council -ERG- Session for Global Non-Profit Leaders)

Let us know what you think and we’d love to learn from you too,

Warmest regards,

Julie Kantor

CEO

www.twomentor.com

Scheduling contact: Sophia@twomentor.com

Mentoring-in-a-Box Deliverables * Mentor & Mentee Training * Flash Mentoring * Dynamic Keynotes
Overview Video: Click HERE Overview Information Deck: Click HERE Inclusion Mentoring Article: Click HERE