Millennials and Mentors: The key to successful mentoring relationships

I came across an article in Business Week about millennials and mentors in the workplace titled “The Misery of Mentoring Millennials.” While I sighed when I saw the article tagline (let’s face it, you gotta be a little bold with your headlines to get some clicks) I thought it was an interesting read as it covered some of the challenges that millennials see with mentoring and that mentors see when mentoring millennials. I think most of us can probably agree that having a mentor is a good thing in of itself, but as the article points out, formal mentoring programs can be the best of intentions but without the right message and execution they can fall short of their expectations. One young professional felt her assigned mentors were to formal and mechanical. On the flipside of the coin, mentors won’t just appear out of nowhere, and mentoring relationships won’t simply blossom overnight. Regardless of if you are a millennial, Gen X’er, Baby Boomer, etc if you are seeking out a mentor or would like a mentor there is a significant amount of work and effort required in order to get value out of the mentor/mentee relationship.

Like any relationship, mentor/mentee relationships require groundrules and guideposts. The article goes into detail of some bad habits that certain millennial mentees got into when trying to communicate with the mentors; I won’t pretend that these don’t exist, but I’m also inclined to believe that for many of us sound judgment and asking questions will be suffice to understanding boundaries and limits. I also believe that as a relationship between a mentor and mentee develops, a level of trust and familiarity begins to emerge, which hopefully makes both parties in the relationship more open, honest and direct about approaching each other.

As a young professional who has just started out his career, I find mentors valuable and important to my own personal and career development. Growing up, I know that any success or growth I had was a direct result of individuals who helped and guided me along the way. As such, looking for mentors was a priority for me the moment I started at my company. I am fortunate in that my firm is built on a model of mentorship and apprenticeship; these things are ingrained in our culture and happen on a daily basis. However, we also do have formal mentoring programs for all employees at all levels with a particular emphasis at those whom are entering from college or graduate school. To date, I’ve found that the best mentors happened organically, not because I necessarily sought them out, but because we became acquainted through some sort of mutual interest and ended up keeping in touch. Over time and through consistent initiative and effort the relationship grew, and a few of these mentors have opened up doors and helped me make decisions that I would have struggled to have done on my own.

Having also been a mentor to many other colleagues and staff, I find that the best mentoring relationships happen when someone takes the initiative to help the other and the other recognizes and appreciates this token or gesture. At the end of the day, a mentor and a mentee is a relationship between two people, and any relationship needs time, support and effort.

One thing I will say: I think that empathy will help both the mentee and mentor in the mentoring relationship. Simply making the effort to understand where the other is coming from will provide a needed perspective in how to approach, support and interact with the other in the mentor/mentee relationship. Having the mentor explain to the mentee explain the duties and responsibilities of a manager/director/vp/svp will hopefully give the mentee some understanding of the sheer responsibility and challanges that fall on shoulders of the mentor; perhaps the mentee can identify a way to help or support a specific initiative for the mentor. Additionally, having the mentor understand what it’s like to start out in the working world and in developing one’s career will give them a better understanding of the challenges and aspirations of young professionals who are entering the workplace.

I’d love to hear about some of your mentor or mentee relationships. How did they start? What did you like? What worked? What didn’t?

Want to change the world? Consider a reality check first

I’m a big fan of David Brooks. I read his articles pretty regularly and I think he provides insightful perspectives that blend both reality and optimism, two things I really admire. His recent post titled “Sam Spade at Starbucks” hit a chord for me because I know many of the “young people” he refers to in his article. These are the people I grew up with, went to school with and some I work with now in my professional career. These are fantastic young people with great minds and hearts. Above all, I truly believe they want to make a positive impact on the world, which I very much respect and admire.

Despite this “service religion” mentality, Brooks highlights some challenges that these individuals face, most notably around their attitudes towards how to go about making change and their belief (or disbelief) in working through traditional mechanisms such as politics and government. While I’ll be the first to admit both of these avenues present incredible challenges and have their share of faults, they still are necessary in order to enact scaleable and meaningful change to society. If you look back through our history, most of the meaningful and memorable positive steps forward came because people worked through government and politics to enact change.

I definitely share many of the sentiments of the young people Brooks refers to in his piece. I feel passionate about making a difference and changing the world, and I really do believe that I can and will in fact do just that. To some, that may seem like a lofty, fluffy or out of reach goal, but its something I’ve always believed. Having said that, I think that blending some reality with optimism never hurt, and if anything, helps ground you and keep you convicted in your beliefs. For those of you out there who think about these kinds of things I’d love to hear your thoughts on how you think you will in fact change the world too.

 

Stepping up from setbacks

When I was a little kid, I was one of those kids who didn’t take losing very well. For awhile I was your typical “poor sport.” If I would lose at something I would get upset, disappointed and often cry foul. Fortunately, my loving and supporting parents nurtured me through that stage of my life and I ended up having a solid athletic career throughout my teenage years. It didn’t make losing easy to take, but I learned how to deal with it and how to respond. To me, losing in athletic events was hard because I always felt that I prepared, did my homework and gave me best. Whenever the result would fall short it always stung because I felt the output never matched the input.

Much like losing in sports, disappointments and setbacks in life work the same way. Recently, I’ve talked to a number of young professionals who have encountered a setback or disappointment that is work or career related. Some didn’t get the performance review they thought they had earned, others got snubbed for a role or project, and the list goes on. I sensed anger, but also angst and frustration in the tones of the individuals I spoke with. Many didn’t quite understand how they saw themselves one way but someone else viewed it an entirely different way. Others felt exasperated because they thought they had done everything and it still wasn’t enough. And finally, others felt dejected, feeling like they have no more answers.   You go down a path, you invest time, effort and energy and despite this something doesn’t end up working out the way you had hoped. The end result doesn’t match or show the work you did and invested. Disappointments and setbacks in our careers or at work can be particularly frustrating. In some cases, we blame ourselves, thinking there was more we shoulda, coulda and woulda done. We play the “what if” game and run through thousands of scenarios of how it could have ended differently if we had just done this or that. Or, we blame others involved, and fault them for their mistakes, their lack of due diligence or their transgressions.

While it might sound peculiar to “get good” at dealing with setbacks or disappointments, knowing a few ways to manage and think through setbacks can help you identify opportunities and navigate through adversity. After all, many of our achievements end up coming out of setbacks. Through perspective, assessment and persistence, we can find ways to move forward.

Walk Away- Its easy to get upset or emotional when we first hear disappointing news. Its important to act rationally and appropriately, and to do what is necessary in order to do just that. After hearing of the news, step away from the environment you are in and do what you have to do to let it out. Feeling emotional or upset is absolutely natural, but doing so in a way that doesn’t damage your reputation is also critical.

See the other side– Once you’ve settled down and have begun analyzing the situation an important but difficult thing to do is to acknowledge the other side, or play devil’s advocate. Think from the other side, or other person’s point of view and try to understand how they arrived at that outcome or decision. Doing so will widen your perspective, and help you strengthen your argument. In addition, when you can acknowledge the counterpoint in a discussion, it can win the respect of your peers because it shows them that you are mature, intelligent and respectful.

Seek an outsider view- Perspective is so important that sometimes getting asking someone who doesn’t have any perspective is just the perspective you need. Find an honest outsider that you trust (both from a confidentiality perspective and an advice perspective) and as best as you can lay out the information objectively and get their opinion. Sometimes having a set of foreign eyes will help you see things you didn’t originally pick up.

Create an Action plan – Words and analysis will only take you so far. Put together what you will do to move forward and bounce back. As I said earlier, many of us have already created successes in life out of events that were initially setbacks and failures. Creating an action plan to move forward is one step towards finding that success.

Bouncing back from disappointments and setbacks isn’t always easy. But when we take the time to step back, think, get perspective and move forward there are opportunities to be found. While they will always part of our lives, learning to manage them will help us grow our live and careers and identify future opportunities.