Boost Your Career with Mentoring

Be One. Get One. Boost Your Career with Mentoring

If you are looking for a career boost or a professional development accelerator consider getting a mentor … and being a mentor.

Mentoring is a well-known concept in the business community. Surveys indicate that 37% of business professionals have a mentor. Mentoring relationships come in many different shapes and formats but regardless of its form, they are widely recognized as serving a valuable purpose for career growth and in improving company culture.

While its important to realize there are some very different mentoring practices, it’s also necessary to eliminate some confusion about the different roles of a mentor, a champion and a coach.

Clearing up the Terms

A mentor is someone who agrees to serve as a resource to help you advance in your career. Mentors can be within your company or firm, or external. They are willing to help you through a combination of getting to know you and your goals, leveraging their experiences and network to help you, and being a trusted advisor. Initially, I believe mentoring works best as a formal relationship, with set meetings and a basic agenda. Overtime, they will become less formal and take on a life of their own. Mentoring relationships can last long periods of times, perhaps spanning decades and numerous jobs.

A champion is someone who can influence your career progression and is willing to speak up on your behalf to help your job status and career. Most likely they are a senior person within your organization. They have a desire and interest in seeing you advance, and likely are prepared to use their political capital to help you. While a champion might also be a mentor, you can’t always expect your mentor to be a champion.

Coaching relationships are often shorter terms, and frequently engaged to serve a single purpose such as transitioning into a new role, developing a strategy, or improving performance (i.e., increasing sales, being a better leader, improving communication). Coaches generally exist outside of an individual’s organization and are hired for a specific purpose and over a specific agreed upon term. That said, coaching will frequently turn into longer and more flexible relationships with executives and senior managers.

All these roles are useful, and it is quite alright if you end up having relationships that blend together these roles. The fact that you are building trusted relationships with others in the organization is where there is benefit for both parties … the mentor, and the mentee.