The Hidden Power of Storytelling in Corporate Mentorship

Mentoring Programs

Twomentor Partners With WITI For Mentoring Programs

Twomentor has partnered with WITI (Women in Technology International) in order to begin offering creative and long-lasting mentoring programs to WITI’s corporate membership. The partnership is built to empower the corporate partners with many mentoring options that will improve recruitment, employee engagement and retention across the globe. Twomentor’s CEO, Julie Kantor will preform the duties of Master of Ceremonies at the 25th Women in Technology Summit from June 9-11, 2019, hosted by WITI.

“Over the past 30 years WITI has been the go-to-organization for women in technology looking to advance their career and grow their community,” said Carolyn Leighton, CEO and founder, WITI. “This new collaboration will allow our corporate partners to take advantage of Twomentor’s unique mentoring programs and help drive employee retention and inclusivity.”

An Association of Talent development report has shown that 75 percent of executives believe that mentoring was a key to their success. A separate Deloitte study revealed that over 75 percent of millennials believe that having a mentor is vital to their career growth.

A report from Wharton-Gartner discovered that mentors were promoted six times more often than non-mentors, while mentees were promoted five times more than their non-mentee peers. The retention rate for both groups was as 20 percent higher. Mentoring has been proven to help develop and keep new employees and it allows current employees to excel, which saves companies as much as 300 percent the cost of constantly refilling these open positions.

With Twomentor’s unique Mentor Roadtrip Flash Mentoring, companies receive a hands-on session facilitated by our professional staff that will take the participants on a journey of mentoring. The workshop is a dynamic 60-90 minute experience that will boost your conference and create a culture of clarity around the business case and create a value proposition of mentorship, showing it to be a driver of engagement and retention for employers. Twomentor also will offer the same service to employee resource groups and associations that desire to launch their own strategic mentoring and recruitment initiatives.

“Our goal is to help create a multi-generational and gender inclusive workforce where businesses benefit from more engaged employees,” said Julie Kantor, CEO and founder, Twomentor. “By partnering with WITI, we can help companies build sustainable mentoring initiatives and further elevate women and diversity in corporate America.”

Kantor will be the emcee at the Women in Technology Summit and will also deliver the Mentor Roadtrip Flash Mentoring experience on June 11th at 8:30 PDT in order to engage the conference’s attendees and help them t support each other in the professional arena.

To learn more about Mentoring initiatives, visit www.twomentor.com today.

Men Mentoring Women- 10 Healthy Boundaries in the Age of #MeToo

Courtesy of Pixabay

Oh, No. Not Matt Lauer! Did Russell Simmons just step down? #MeToo continues and seems like a slow-motion movie that plays on and on. There is a toxic vibe in the air in Hollywood, Wall Street, on Capitol Hill, weary HR executives abound. According to an ABC News- Washington Post poll, over 33 million U.S. women have been sexually harassed and 14 million abused in work-related incidents.

In the past year, I have had several companies ask if I could do a special session for high-level male employees and managers on mentoring women.

As I reflect, I have been very fortunate in my life to have phenomenal mentors and sponsors, both male and female. One male leader gave me two life-changing ‘breaks’ including his own job when he left the company. He still mentors me decades later. I have always felt a debt to him to pay- it- forward and help others, especially those getting their corporate sea-legs.

Traveling around the country, most leaders I meet (male and female) agree that they are where they are today, because someone else mentored them, saw something in them, believed in them. These are life-changing, game-changing relationships! In facilitating mentor training sessions I’ve had the opportunity to speak with executive women in almost every industry. Most share with me that men, in particular, mentored them. Men were often in higher positions of power, generous with their time, willing to make introductions.

“I would now tell men to just not do it [mentor women],” said Darren* a male entrepreneur I had coffee with yesterday as we discussed this article. “It’s too dangerous now with all the toxicity out there. You have to be ultra careful and conscientious with what you are saying.”

Will men pull back on mentoring and championing because they are afraid of being inappropriate? Fear the perception of having an affair? Decide only to mentor [or gulp- hire] other men? That would be a massive setback.

Additionally, in the workforce, we are moving to a new era of mentoring managers. The vast majority of Millennials want their managers to serve more as mentors and coaches as a management style. Mentoring is no longer a nice to have or a have to have, mentoring just IS. It is part of the new contract between progressive employees and employers.

Dr. John Soncini, Ph.D. spoke with us about how important ‘Mirroring’ is in mentoring. “We women need mirroring from male sources,” says Soncini. “Mirroring means to see yourself reflected in the eyes of the mentor (or…mother, father, husband, boyfriend, friend) as valuable: including your intelligence, capability, professionalism, attractiveness, etc.,” adds Soncini. “Women, especially need this mirroring from their fathers, so, as an extension, from male mentors too! Clearly, when the boundaries are SAFE, male mentors have a particularly strong and positive impact on the person mentored!”

As I read today about Matt Lauer’s apology as the latest #MeToo-Man-of-the-Hour, I decided that it was time to write this piece on healthy mentoring boundaries and say to men that we absolutely need you as mentors and champions.

Here are 8 recommendations:

1] JUST SAY NO– If you have a history of being accused of sexual harassment, sexual violence, you probably should find other ways to add value to the world. Don’t mentor one on one if you or your HR team feel concerned. If you are in a leadership role or management role, consider mentoring through public meetings with your team or small groups of diverse people. If you are feeling a strong physical attraction, help her find another mentor.

2] SAY YES TO MEETING IN PUBLIC– Yeah, hotel rooms are a no-go for any and all mentoring. Meet your mentee at Starbucks, in a conference room at work, have a great lunch at the new restaurant that opened up. Keep the relationship professional.

3] APPEARANCE & ASPIRATIONS– As a general rule of thumb, keep the focus on your mentee’s goals and aspirations. It’s ideal to have the mentee share 2-3 goals that are the focus of the mentoring relationship. I would keep comments about your mentee/mentor’s appearance to a minimum. “You look very professional today.” or “that’s a nice outfit.” Positively ‘mirroring’ your mentees accomplishments, efforts and sharing empathy in times of challenge are most welcomed.

4] ASK IF YOU ARE UNSURE– Ask your colleagues to help you understand what is okay or not okay. Ask for mentoring feedback. A lot has changed over the past several decades and you need to be up to speed. Something that was a compliment years ago like “spin around, let me see your new dress,” might be a threat today. Please watch this amazing video Deloitte UK put out on diversity. Best I’ve seen. STUNNING and eye-opening.

5] IT’S GREAT TO TALK ABOUT YOUR FAMILY– My mentors have been family men, and I am a family woman. They invite me to dinners or events with their kids, parents sometimes and visa-versa. They ask about my husband Marc and how my daughter is doing every time we connect. It builds lifelong friendships, trust. On the flip side, I had a potential major client behave very inappropriately after a colleague and I met with him. I used the “happily married” response following a barrage of texts that he sent following the meeting. With over 60% women being single, I realized one should not have to use the “I have a boyfriend” response. In discussions with 8 women friends, many single, we decided a clearly stated “I do not mix business with pleasure,” was a simple option to shut down these types of advances right away.

6] KEEP IT ABOUT PROFESSIONAL GROWTH– In a professional mentoring situation, I would suggest 80%-10%-10%.

  • 80% of the conversations on things that will help your mentee professionally, please share from your own experiences and learning.
  • 10% on life, the weather, family, skydiving last weekend or what you did over vacation
  • 10% on other topics that you feel qualified to assist each other with or other shared interests

I would encourage you not to delve too much into your mentees personal life too much unless he/she brings it up. Ask any HR professional and they will likely have additional guidance especially for management situations.

7] AFTER 8 IS TOO JUST LATE- Alcohol and mentoring are just not a great combination. “Lead me not to temptation…” Dinners, bars 1:1 are not ideal. I know I wouldn’t want my husband’s colleagues seeing me out for dinners with a male mentor(s)/ mentees, so I opt for lunch, coffee or a group event if I am at a conference.

8] THAT’S SOMEONE’S KID OR WIFE– Remember your mentee is someone else’s daughter (or son), mother or wife. It is such a huge honor to be able to mentor someone else’s family member in the world of work and more. How would you want a mentor to treat your own daughter or son? I often think of mentees as a little brother or sister, a niece, someone you care for and want to see grow. She does need and value your advice. It’s an incredible gift with a lifelong impact. It’s a sacred trust.

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Julie Silard Kantor helps leaders build their living legacies through mentorship and sponsorship. She and her team at Twomentor, LLC are helping to build a much-needed mentoring revolution through thought living-legacy leadership work, mentor training, mentor culture building, Mentor Road Trip™ flash mentoring web sessions and more in many sectors. Two adages that drive us are:1] The people who mentor at your company are the people who drive retention at your company and 2] If you want more diversity (i.e. women in STEM), mentor and sponsor more diversely

8 Recommendations on Being an Effective Mentor

“I’ve been mentoring for years but have never been formally trained,” shared a prominent CEO with me a few weeks ago. We scheduled three hours together and really focused on what does it take to be an effective mentor. Here are 8 of our recommendations at our company Twomentor. I’m sure you can add a few more to the comment section below.

As I cross the globe discussing the business case for mentoring, I have noticed that under 50% of professionals have a mentor… There is an opportunity to give and receive help that should not be underestimated especially if you want to increase employee retention and advance your career trajectory.

1] Listen- To be a successful mentor, you must be an attentive listener. This shows that you are genuinely interested in what is going on in your mentee’s life. Listen closely to gain a better understanding of where he/she is coming from, and to help you advise them appropriately. Find out what your mentee knows and what her/his blindspots might be as a newcomer in the working world.

2] Balanced- A mentee comes to you to share news, to ask for advice and opinions, and sometimes to let out their frustrations. Your job is not to agree with everything your mentee says, but to help him/her think rationally about situations and approach them from a level headed perspective.

3] Trust- Your mentee is going to come to you with all sorts of things, some of which may be personal or things they don’t want shared with others. He/she is telling you this because they trust you and value your advice. This is a great honor. It is imperative to keep conversations confidential and not break your mentee’s trust, unless it is a violation of HR policies or could cause real harm to the individual/company.

4] Be Open and Try Not to Judge- Mentoring requires a willingness to share about your own experiences that relate to your mentee’s queries, and be able to give thoughtful advice. Better yet, if you can lead your mentee to finding his/her own conclusions through your stories. The more open and authentic you are, the more open to sharing your mentee will be as well. You also must be open-minded. Unexpected conversations and situations are very likely, however you are here to help and advise, not judge.

5] Availability- Mentoring is a time commitment, and regular meetings are crucial in developing a good relationship. No matter how much you like your mentee, if you don’t have the time for them it is best to let them know and help them find a different mentor who can devote more time. We move into an era of skills-based mentoring as older generations are learning to pass the baton and embrace reverse mentoring in the workplace.

5 1/2] Many college students I speak with also share, they value mentors who are networked who might open some doors down the line.

6] Model- You are being watched. “Just while observing you, mentees pick up many things: ethics, values and standards; style, beliefs and attitudes; methods and procedures. They are likely to follow your lead, adapt your approach to their own style, and build confidence through their affiliation with you. As a mentor, you need to be keenly aware of your own behavior.” (E. Wayne Hart, Forbes.com)

7] Honesty- Be you. Do you. We live in an era where people would rather work for authentic leaders over ‘brands.’ “If you’re brave enough to ask your mentor for advice, he or she needs to be brave enough to give you a straight answer. If you’re contemplating taking a new job, for instance, and you explain the situation and ask for your mentor’s point of view – he or she should give it to you, unvarnished.” (Erika Andersen, Forbes.com)

8] Goal Oriented- “A good mentor continually sets a good example by showing how his/her personal habits are reflected by personal and professional goals and overall personal success.” (Franchise Growth Partners)

Personalized Mentoring is the Best Teacher Succession Plan

www.pixabay.com

Today we caught up with Heather Lageman, Executive Director of Leadership Development at Baltimore County Public Schools on mentoring and our multi-generational teaching workforce… We were so taken by her thought process and observations, we wanted to share them with you!

Twomentor: How is technology impacting the Mentoring of millennial teachers? What are you seeing?

Heather: It is difficult to make sweeping generalizations about any generation (for example, I just heard the other day that a study showed that Gen Xers are more addicted to social media and are on Instagram and Twitter more than Millennials). However, it is very clear in what I am seeing that social media and technology need to be a complement to the mentoring experience, rather than the substance. Colleagues who teach online have bemoaned the lack of engagement and connection, and veteran teachers speak nostalgically about the time when a faculty was truly a family. I believe we need to be very intentional about how to use technology to provide a way to sustain face-to-face connection over time, and enhance long-distance and just-in-time connectivity, while emphasizing the humanity and personal interaction needed to build deep and meaningful relationships of mutual support and learning.

As we focus on building learner-centered environments for our students, we must also create learner-centered coaching experiences for our adults. Choice matters, and learners of all ages engage most deeply in activities that they select to meet their own individualized needs. In this time of creativity and customization, shouldn’t we all be able to create our own personalized learning experiences, especially in the mode of coaching?

In a recent blog I wrote for Learning Forward, I spotlighted the work of a district in New Jersey using Google Hangout to building a professional learning community for busy principals and leaders – but the key is that they also incorporated a balance of face-to-face and individual coaching sessions. It is all about balance, all about choice, and all about the learner.

Twomentor: We talked about Millennials preferring to connect through technology versus connecting face-to-face for Mentoring with others. Heather can you speak more to this? What do Millennials benefit from the most in a Mentoring relationship?

Heather: Just as we can’t fire our way to Finland to increase student achievement, we can’t Google our way to teacher retention, support and effectiveness. Humanity is critical and nothing can replace developing relationships, listening, and sharing experience. Many millennials have been raised in a technology-based relationship model. They have friendships based on people “met” in chat rooms, playing online video games, and on social media. We are faced with the challenge of supporting a workforce with a variety of experiences and needs. Those educators who have not engaged in deep, sustained human connection might not yet know the power of a mentoring relationship. A balanced mentoring relationship can bring them the support and camaraderie that comes with collaborative learning with colleagues of all ages.

The mentoring relationship can be mutually beneficial as both people inspire, learn, and grow together. Warren Berger, the author of A More Beautiful Question, talks about how when the world gets more complicated and complex, we need to question more because we have to be learning and changing. He asserts that we need questioning more than ever, and we are less comfortable with it. The mentoring relationship is the perfect place to build our capacity and grow as questioners….and as listeners.

Balancing the positive elements of a technological connection – the flexibility and just-in-time learning and support intrinsic in Google Hangouts, Voxer, and #edchat, with the personal connection of face-to-face reflection and conversation, make for an accessible and personalized support system designed to meet the needs of the whole person. Then everyone is afforded the powerful opportunity to feel the energy that comes together when people start talking.

Twomentor: Is there tension in education between the generations? What interventions have you found to be effective?

Heather: Once we recognize that we all have value and worth, and we all want to be truly seen and heard, then on a human level it becomes clear that we all have much more in common than we realize. One of my favorite quotes from Dr. Maya Angelou is “Do your eyes light up when your child walks into the room?” I believe this applies to everyone we encounter as people and as educators. It gets at the human connection we all crave, regardless of our generational ties.

If the culture created in a school is truly a collaborative culture and all members of the staff and community are valued, then perceived differences are embraced in positive, non-threatening way. If we are all thinking the same way, then no one is innovating, creating and exploring new ideas. It is refreshing to see a shift happening from a more traditional, hierarchical mindset where veterans received ideal schedules, duties, and rooms in the building while new teachers received the challenging schedules, students, and often had to “float” without a classroom of their own, to one where we recognize and build off of the strengths that each person, veteran or new, brings to the table. Much like the military sends highly trained individuals like Navy Seals to handle the most complex and difficult missions, in education we should do the same and incentivize sending our highly effective teachers to help our neediest children learn and grow.

As an active member of Learning Forward (learningforward.org), I am thrilled to see a concerted effort to increase collaboration across the school, especially in the form of designated time for professional learning communities (PLCs), intentional scheduling to allow colleagues to plan together, and tools that allow teachers to build a true sense that we all are needed and bring our own gifts to our work.

Celebrating each of our unique gifts and recognizing the humanity of our colleagues and our students is the most effective way to create a safe place to risk, grow and honor mutual learning. It lays a foundation of trust that is essential for truly rich mentoring. While technology can be a wonderful complement to the relationship building process in this busy world, so much of trust and vulnerability is communicated nonverbally, and so face-to-face interaction is critical to establish the trust, true connection and understanding that enable people to fully engage online.

Twomentor: How can mentoring change an organization?

Heather: I believe that mentoring is the key to transforming lives. In my work with leaders at all levels, our theme has been “We all need a coach.” Both personally and professionally, we all deserve to have an experienced, trusted advisor and confidant. Someone who can support our growth and learning. Someone who can be our cheerleader and our advocate, as well as our honest critic and facilitator of self-reflection.

My life has been changed by every person who has taken the time to coach me through different portions of the journey of my life with kindness and compassion, while helping me be my best self. The mentors in my life have provided me with a safe place to learn to fly or to just free-fall, as one of my favorite bands Florida Georgia Line would say. This is why I believe we must all “lean in” and bring others along the learning journey with us. Personalized mentoring is the best succession plan we can offer.

#Millennialteachers #twomentor #BaltimoreCounty

Heather Lageman serves as the Executive Director of Leadership Development for Baltimore County Schools in the Office of Organizational Development. In addition, she is Program Manager of The Council of Educational Administrative and Supervisory Organizations of Maryland (CEASOM) Code.org Regional Partner Program and was facilitator of the Networks and the Internet Writing Team for the K-12 Computer Science Framework. Heather is a member of the National Task Force on Assessment Education and serves on the Board of the Maryland Assessment Group. She is also President of the Learning Forward Maryland Affiliate and Chair-Elect of the Learning Forward Foundation, and Vice-President of Maryland Affiliate of the Association for Supervision and Curriculum Development (ASCD).

Julie Kantor is CEO of Twomentor, LLC. Twomentor helps companies build mentoring & sponsorship cultures with a passion for elevating women and millennials in the multi-generational workforce.

6 Tips for Mentoring Millennials from Millennials

by Bridget McKeogh, Twomentor

We spoke to a dozen working millennials and asked them what they look for in a mentor. Here are the top six tips on mentoring from Millennials themselves!

Give Practical Feedback and Actionable Steps
Millennials are programmed for trial and error. They have grown up adapting to new technologies and learning new skills from watching YouTube videos. They want something to try NOW. Erik Borresen, a teacher at the Carmen Schools of Science and Technology, 27, explains that “Hands on experience is the best way that I learn.” Millennials want the band-aid ripped off. If there is something they can be doing better, tell them. Jenna Gebel, a second year MBA candidate at Wharton, wants “Candid, practical advice.” Give them an avenue to fix the problem. Michelle Sheahan, Associate Director and Budget Manager at Georgetown University says that the key is to “Provide constructive feedback. Be willing to openly discuss ways in which your mentee can improve” Alisha Glennon, 31, Vice President of Development at Foundation for Individual Rights in Education (FIRE), wants you to “Use personal examples, point out concrete mistakes you made and the lessons learned.”

Text
This might seem obvious, but be willing to text. Millennials are phone averse and often don’t even listen to their voicemail. In fact, this trend is so strong that some major companies, like Coca-Cola, are ditching their phone systems all together. Millennials are quick to respond to text messages, where it could take hours or days for a return call. Want to grab a quick coffee because your schedule opened up? Text! Otherwise you could miss the window of opportunity. We also have learned from Christopher Mims in the Wall Street Journal that to Generation Z (teens and early twenty year olds just entering the workforce) “Email is for connecting with old people, the digital equivalent of putting on a shirt and tie.” For our youngest generation, even email is outdated. Mentors must keep up with the changing technologies or they won’t be able to connect with young colleagues.

Get Personal
Don’t be afraid to get personal with your mentee and talk about things outside of work. Millennials want to care for and by cared by coworkers. PGi research tells us that 71% of millennials are looking for a second family at work and a staggering 88% want their workplace to be social. Almost every millennial interviewed touched on this point. Preya Nixon from the National Utilities Diversity Council, wants a mentor who “Encourages discussion about personal life AND professional life.” Jenna wants her mentor to help her “marry my professional and personal goals as a female professional.” Cynthia Bell, 26, Sales Operations Manager at Industry Dive, needs to “have almost a friendship with (her) mentor” for the relationship to be effective. Quintus Cunningham, a college senior, echoes this sentiment, “I want to feel cared about by my mentor, not just me as a student or employee, but me as a person.” Mentors, go ahead, let your guard down, tell a story, listen to their stories, offer follow-up questions the next session or a quick text of encouragement here and there. It will go a long way!

Be Honest
Millennials are not easily fooled. They are quick to fact-check or corroborate a story on their smartphones and have been honing this skill since the middle school. To have a successful mentoring relationship – be authentic. Our millennials interviewed kept coming back to this topic. Dylan McGuire, 23, Marketing Coordinator at Bowie Gridley Architects explained, “True mentorship comes from being able to explain actions and truly care that they get it, not just show/tell someone what to do. It needs to all feel real and honest for it to truly stick.” They want you to talk about your mistakes and why it was important that you made them. Be candid. Ryan Reese, 31, Director of Student Life at The Field School says, “Mentors shouldn’t sugar coat.” It’s important to give honest feedback in real-time. Talk about company norms and expectations. They will appreciate getting the heads up from your as opposed to reprimanded by a manager. Nervous about delivering hard news? Be sure to set up this ‘norm’ at the beginning of the relationship. Madeline Conicello, a middle school teacher, said that she and her mentor had a code-word for tough feedback, they called it a ‘band-aid moment.’ “When she told me that she had a band-aid moment coming or I saw band-aid on the agenda, I knew tough feedback was coming. I was prepared. I also knew she was telling me to help me.”

Focus on Self-Advocacy
Millennials are independent. In fact, Red Brick Research shows that 79% of millennials would consider leaving their jobs to work for themselves. This autonomy and entrepreneurial spirit has great benefits, but at what costs. Many millennials have trouble navigating and negotiating within their own company, so they leave. Teach your mentee how to advocate for themselves and work within the company. Michelle says, “Discuss explicitly ways in which your mentee can negotiate and promote themselves in the workforce. If you can provide specific numbers for industry standards or based on your experiences, that is invaluable.” Salary, bonus and raise norms are especially important for young professionals as they enter reviews or contract negotiations. Bennett Pang, biologist, 26, wants to know how you got to where you are. “I have one version of how to get ahead in my mind, but my guess is that there are loads of other avenues as well.” Show your mentee that there is no right path to success, rather many different ways to achieve.

Learn from your Mentee (Reverse Mentoring)
There are advantages to being a mentor and not only the “feel-goods” you get from helping others. Several studies have shown great benefits to the mentor including higher retention and an increase in promotions. Sun Microsystemsfollowed 1000 employees over five years and found that 25% of mentees and 28% of mentors received a raise, compared to only 5% of managers that did not mentor. Are people promoted because they are wearing their mentor ‘hat’? Of course not. They are promoted because they themselves are getting better. Millennial mentees have a lot offer. They are creative and focused, motivated and energetic and, not to mention, rulers of the Twitterverse. Use them! Ask them questions, lean on them. Millennials need to feel valued. Cynthia wants a mentor who “Understands that I can be a resource too! I’ve posted jobs on behalf of my mentor and connected her to other people I think she’d find interesting.” Some of the millennials we spoke to simply want the mentor to treat them as equals. Caila Driscoll, 26, high school math teacher, wants “Conversations to feel like two peers discussing something, where each has valuable input, rather than one older, more experienced person, telling the other what to do, I think it builds mutual respect and understanding.”

In the end, every mentoring relationships will be different, but if you want the inside track to connecting with millennials – use these six tips!

DID YOU KNOW: Twomentor helps companies build mentoring cultures with vast experience working with major corporations, organizations, educational entities and more. Schedule a call with us to discuss your needs associate@twomentor.com www.twomentor.com for our products and services + 15 outstanding Advisors

Are You a Mentoring Manager? 70-20-10

If you are in the training and development field you have probably heard of 70-20-10. My friend Raul C. recently enlightened me on this topic (thank you Raul!).

Based on three decades of research by the Center for Creative Leadership, managers learn 90% by doing, experiencing, communicating and learning from others. To break it down:

  • 70% from challenging assignments
  • 20% from developmental relationships (learning from others)
  • 10% from coursework and training

“Development generally begins with a realization of current or future need and the motivation to do something about it. This might come from feedback, a mistake, watching other people’s reactions, failing or not being up to a task – in other words, from experience. The odds are that development will be about 70% from on-the-job experiences – working on tasks and problems; about 20% from feedback and working around good and bad examples of the need; and 10% from courses and reading,” states researchers Lombardo and Eichinger expressed their rationale behind the 70:20:10 model this way in The Career Architect Development Planner.

When managers learn-by-doing (John Dewey) and receive mentoring/help from others, they are in a better position to take that learning enlightenment and return to teach others… (aka the Joseph Campbell hero path below).

According to a Deloitte survey over 79% of Millennials want their managers to be mentors and coaches in their management style.

We need to look at the role mentoring plays in this 70-20-10 model. Especially in a time where more and more people are reporting that they do not have a professional mentor they go to for professional life. In fact, over 50% report to NOT having a mentor at 40+ professional conferences where we ran surveys and polled the audience)

A good mentor:

Shares from his/her experience

Listens

Gives feedback

Tries to help another come to his/her own conclusions

Creates a safe space for communication (and confidentiality)

A mentor might take their mentee to do something experiential together

Cares about their mentees aspirations, goals and successes

A mentor is a lifelong learner and will learn from teaching and invest in his/her mentee

Finds strength and meaning in seeing another human being self-actualize (Mazlov’s hierarchy of needs- plus!)

I was speaking with some leaders from Gannett Corporation and they shared with me that in a 2015 survey, 100% of their senior leaders felt that they got to where they are today thanks to a mentor.

Can you think of your own 70-20-10 learning and what role mentors have played (or not played) in your career? Perhaps you didn’t use the word mentor before, but if that person’s help led you well onto your path, let’s stop now and reflect on that… and them.

Love to hear from you and learn from your experiences! Contact us info@twomentor.com

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Julie Silard Kantor helps leaders build their living legacies through mentorship and sponsorship. She and her team at Twomentor, LLC are helping to build a much-needed mentoring revolution through thought living-legacy leadership work, mentor training, mentor culture building, Mentor Road Trip™ flash mentoring web sessions and more in many sectors. Two adages that drive us are:

1] The people who mentor at your company are the people who drive retention at your company

2] If you want more diversity (i.e. women in STEM), mentor and sponsor more diversely

Does She Need a Role Model, a Mentor, or a Sponsor?

It was about time to get the word ‘women’ into ‘mentor’. So, I did. Just launched my new company twomentor (t-women-tor), LLC to get the words ‘women’ and ‘men’ into STEM mentoring. It will take a unified approach. Today we celebrate twomentor’s one month anniversary with this blog and luckily not Pampers and Medella equipment at this stage of raising her.

So do girls and young women need a role model, a mentor or a sponsor? Likely all three along their professional paths.

If we want to recruit, develop, retain great girls & women in the STEM (Science, Tech, Engineering, Math) workforce we need to look at the whole pipeline and what women most need at different phases.

Reflecting back, I realize I needed three things personally and professionally:

1] A Role Model

2] A Mentor

3] A Sponsor

A role model was needed to show examples of great women: in science, in Senate, as leaders, board members, in tech, as business owners, and perhaps soon as President of the USA. The women in my family also served as key role models of women who found professional fulfillment, have families, and hung out with great loyalty with their girl friends (Mom and Ina just celebrated 55 years ‘together’ as BFFs). My father who came to America as a refugee from Hungary served also as a powerful example of resiliency and perseverance. He also taught me gratitude.

A mentor took on the role in a socratic way of helping me find answers within myself. In middle school a mentor (Karen C.) gave me an internship and taught me that I love small business. She let me work at her store for three years and helped me build some skills such as: inventory management, running the cash register, making marketing signs with Mr. Sketch pens, customer service and more. Mostly, she taught me to love work. I haven’t stopped working since, a dozen jobs and a few degrees later. A college mentor taught me how to get my work published and how to see others in their plights. A peer mentor got me into an interview for my first job at the company she worked at. Another mentor more recently taught me how to use a 3D printer. One of my mentors is a 72 year old dynamo and one is a 19 year old tech whiz.

Mentors came into my life as welcomed guides and were both male and female. One common ingredient was they all reflected that I had to have faith in myself, believing in me often before I believed in myself.

While a Mentor encourages one to climb the work ‘tree’ to new heights, a sponsor takes on the role of going out on a limb for others. In other words, a mentor speaks to you and a sponsor speaks about you and advocates for you behind closed doors. Mike Caslin was such a sponsor in my life and I wrote about him HERE. Mike mentored me when I ran Network for Teaching Entrepreneurship in a few markets and then he championed me to take his national VP job after serving the company 20 extraordinary years. Other people wanted the job and he was the one to say ‘Let’s choose Julie.’ At several conferences recently, women would approach me and ask how to get such a sponsor. From all these discussions & research, I am becoming more convinced that we lose professional women mid-career because they do not have a sponsor.

I reflect back and clearly understand I needed three things from girl to career woman: a Role Model (s), a Mentor (s), a Sponsor (s). I think my start-up needs all three, and gratefully, they are all swirling around twomentor, llc as key advisors.

But I need to acknowledge something else here.

I am also now needed more than ever to be a Role Model, a Mentor and/or a Sponsor and I suspect you are too. It’s time to start. Start simple (invite her/him for coffee chat). Start soon. Invest in her. Pay it forward.

Julie Kantor is a global speaker on women in STEM, President & CEO of Twomentor, LLC offering mentor training and strategy to America’s top corporations. She is also Senior Advisor to Million Women Mentors and STEMconnector.

Going Through Big Corporate Changes? Time to Start Mentoring Initiative at Your Company

What happens when the leaders leave (or are replaced)? When the revenues are not resembling hockey stick performance? When a big company gobbles up a smaller company? When there is an 8% layoff of the workforce? People start feeling like their jobs might be on the line. They feel a new leader might not understand their contributions. They might feel someone is trying to steal their lunch. Culture changes. Isolation increases along with Indeed.com searches. Linkedin resumes get brushed up. Mistrust or toxicity coupled with insomnia can seep in.

I’ve heard it many times in my five years of building mentoring initiatives. “Julie, with all the change, shouldn’t we wait until after things calm down to get started with our mentoring initiative?” a top HR executive asked me.

In running both mentor and mentee training, often the rising-star mentee is looking for someone who can help them navigate the new environment. Someone who will sit down with an iced coffee (or Ben & Jerry’s pint) for a chat, a safe haven to reflect on, ‘How do I best position myself in the midst of change?’ ‘How do I get off to the right start with my new boss?’ ‘How can I be part of the solution, when I am worried about how things are going financially?’

The mentor, often with more experience, might not have all the answers, but likely has experienced more change in their tenure and will have new perspectives to offer up.

The mentor serves as a role model. They care about their mentees goals and objectives and can be instrumental in talking someone ‘off a ledge’ who is nervous. Encourager and challenger, the mentor often will help the mentee understand their role in better ‘owning’ their career trajectory and not being the victim in a who-moved-my-cheese environment that we are seeing more and more. Change = Today’s Reality.

I was watching Good Morning America a month ago and the words ‘America’s Loneliness Epidemic’ crawled across the bottom of the screen. Curious, I Googled the UCLA research and it was eye-opening. Almost 1:2 Americans (20,000 in the study) stated that they sometimes or always feel alone, lonely or left out. Particularly hard hit are our youngest generations. How does that manifest in a workplace which is often a key pillar in our lives and psychological/financial stability? Read more HERE on the study’s findings.

In building a pilot-to-sustainable and scalable mentoring initiative, we create an opportunity for our workforce to not isolate. A world where people are recognized for helping-each-other. We engineer and hold the space for people to connect with morale-boosting support from the top. Employees have the learning conversations with structure in place.

When I ask hundreds of mentors in trainings what do people most come to them for advice on, the response is usually:

1] To help them advance their career,

2] To learn how to network better,

3] To be better at people management, leadership and

4] To help them prioritize

With the fast-paced corporate growth and more predictable flux ahead, do you want to wait for another season or reason to show your people you are a stand for them as they take a stand for each other?

Julie Kantor is CEO of Twomentor, LLC a high impact company that provides mentor strategy, training and execution for large companies and organizations. She can be reached at julie@twomentor.com