Develop Mentoring Relationships

Develop and practice mentoring skills by serving as a mentor to others. You will find opportunities to share your experience with others in your club, at your job, in any group where you are involved. In areas where you want to improve, seek out someone who is succeeding and ask to be mentored to accelerate your skill building. It recognizes their accomplishment and is a sincere complement.

In your Toastmasters club ask the vice president education to assign you to serve as mentor for a new member working in the Competent Communication or Competent Leadership manual. Offer to mentor an experienced member working in the Advanced Communication program. As you fulfill your role, the "mentee" will observe you and give feedback on your leadership skills, writing comments on the evaluation guide at the end of the 'Mentoring' project in the Competent Leadership manual.

Ask the VPE if your mentee/evaluator will be able to give a verbal evaluation during a meeting. Some clubs may or may not be able to accommodate verbal evaluations of leadership projects during their meetings. If this is the case in your club and you would like a verbal evaluation, ask your mentee/evaluator beforehand to meet with you to provide one.

Mentoring is a 'win - win' relationship where both parties learn, grow and can benefit from each other's unique experiences.

Practice Mentoring In Your Club

• Determine your current mentoring skills
• Identify the steps in being a good mentor
• Practice mentoring skills in various roles

Your Toastmasters club offers the opportunity to develop and practice mentoring skills. The following roles involve mentoring:
Mentor for a new member. A mentor for a new member helps that member with the first three speech projects in the Competent Communication manual, with projects in the Competent Leadership manual, and to become familiar with the club, its operations and how to fill various meeting assignments.
Mentor for an existing member. A mentor for a more experienced member helps that person develop new skills or enhance existing ones. For example, a long-time club member may need assistance learning how to use humor in presentations.
Guidance committee member for someone who is working on a High Performance Leadership Program project. The High Performance Leadership program requires a member to serve as a leader for a project of his or her choice inside or outside of the Toastmasters environment. You can serve on the guidance committee for a member who is working on her project, providing feedback to the member as she works on the project.

How To Be A Good Mentor

A mentor provides a positive, nurturing environment that benefits the other person. You can provide this environment by:

• Offering opportunities for skill development. Provide special projects and assignments that will build new skills. Or refer the person to books or articles about that skill.
• Helping the person recognize areas needing work. Often a gap exists between the person's existing skills and the skills needed to complete a project or to advance in a career. Draw attention to that gap, then let the person discover what he or she can do to close that gap.
• Providing helpful advice. Offer ideas or information, when asked, that will enable the person to find a solution: "It might be useful to look at the data from last year."
• Being a role model. We all listen to people we respect and admire. Know that people will watch you to see how you handle difficult or challenging situations.
• Encouraging people to think for themselves. Don't solve your protege's problems for him. Instead, encourage him to find possible solutions himself. "You have several options. Which one do you think is best?"

Characteristics Of Mentors

Effective mentors possess certain characteristics. A good mentor is:

• Available. You must have time to spend with someone, observing him or her, listening carefully and offering guidance.
• Patient. People learn at varying speeds, and some need more guidance than others. It's important that you are willing to provide whatever it takes to help.
• Sensitive. Tact and diplomacy are vital. As a mentor, your role is to motivate and encourage.
• Respectful. Everyone is different. A mentor respects the differences between herself and the other person.
• Respected. A mentor is recognized and admired by peers, by others higher in rank and, in some situations, even by people outside the organization.
• Flexible. Not everything happens according to plan. You must adapt and adjust to various situations and accept that your "student" may make decisions you don't agree with.
• Knowledgeable. Before you can help someone else, you must be experienced and knowledgeable yourself.
• Confident. You need to be self-assured and friendly.
• A good listener. A mentor listens carefully. Often just listening, without taking on the other person's problem, can be of great help, because you enable the other person to articulate the problem and sort things out.
• Concerned about others. You must care about other people and truly want to help them.

The Benefits of Mentoring

Mentoring has several benefits:

• It helps reduce turnover. Many people leave organizations because their careers are not developing as they had hoped. A mentor can be influential in helping such a person in his career and convincing him to stay. This is especially true in your Toastmasters club. New members who have mentors are more likely to participate and remain in the club.
• It helps develop talent. Often an organization faces a shortage of qualified personnel. Mentors can be helpful in finding and training others to fill the void.
• It helps develop leaders. Leaders should be grooming others to assume leadership positions. In your Toastmasters club, having more leaders means having a larger pool of qualified people available to share the responsibilities involved in running the club.

Evaluate Your Mentoring Skills

Serving as a mentor is both a challenge and an opportunity for personal growth. How are your mentoring skills? Take the following test.

Possible Points: Always = 3, Sometimes = 2, Never = 1

• I observe people to identify those with potential.
• I am a good listener.
• When people come to me with problems, I encourage them to think of and consider possible solutions.
• I have the time necessary to help someone develop their skills.
• I like to help others grow and advance in their careers.
• I am sensitive to the needs of others and am tactful.

Scoring: add up the numbers.

17-18 points, congratulations, excellent mentoring skills!
12-16 points, skills need some attention.
11 points or less, it's time to make some improvements!

As you complete mentoring projects, take the test again to see your progress.

Mentors Are Leaders Building More Leaders

A mentor recognizes an individual who has less experience and cultivates that person's potential and talents and helps him or her succeed. Leaders also are mentors. You can be a mentor by offering someone opportunities for skill development, helping the person recognize areas needing work, providing helpful advice, being a role model, and encouraging the person to think for himself or herself.

Today's business world is complex and demanding. Leaders need talented and experienced people to help with the challenges they face. Sometimes a leader simply hopes someone will come along with the necessary skills. But the most effective leaders try to develop such people themselves, seeking out those with potential and exposing them to experiences that will help develop their skills.

Such a relationship is called mentoring. A mentor recognizes an individual with less experience who has potential, cultivates their talents and helps that person succeed.