Education & Career Trends: December 2, 2024
Curated by the Knowledge Team of ICS Career GPS
The standard approach to mentoring needs to adapt to changing needs and generational expectations.
Article by Andy Lopata Published on Psychologytoday.com
In today’s dynamically evolving workplaces, mentoring remains a cornerstone of professional development and personal growth. However, the common approach to mentoring has failed to evolve with the changing expectations and needs of the workforce and new challenges they face.
Where organisations have a mentoring programme in place, they typically focus just on the basics—a matching process based on a skills or experience swap and the minimum of training. Elsewhere, it’s left to individuals to arrange their own mentoring. In both cases, mentors are expected to know what they are doing, but they don’t always receive the guidance and support they need.
Mentoring requires a tailored approach; each individual comes with their own set of experiences, challenges, and learning styles. The one-size-fits-all model is outdated and often ineffective in fostering genuine development.
The efficacy of mentoring depends on acknowledging and incorporating the mentee’s unique context. This requires mentors to better understand their mentees’ backgrounds, preferences, and challenges. By fostering a personalised approach, mentors can create a supportive environment that encourages open communication, genuine engagement, and meaningful progress.
Bridging the Gap: Personalised Engagement
Statistics reveal a significant gap between those interested in mentoring and those who actually have mentors. An Olivet Nazarene study revealed that 76% of people recognised the importance of having a mentor, yet only 37% of professionals actually have a mentoring relationship in place. The disparity underscores the need for more strategic and intentional mentoring programmes within organisations. There is a palpable need for a shift towards personalised mentoring that aligns with individual learning plans and engagement styles.
Neurodiversity is a good example of a factor around which mentors need to be better equipped to personalise their engagement with mentees. Neurodivergent individuals often require distinctive forms of support and communication; a blunt, one-size-fits-all approach can be counterproductive.
Neurodivergents can thrive with the right support systems, one in which mentors understand how they respond to challenges and their preferred method of processing ideas. Mentoring programmes must provide mentors with the training and resources necessary to support neurodivergent mentees effectively.
It’s not just neurodivergent people whose methods of learning differ from the norm. We all have our preferences. Some people rely on data and need to know the source of, and evidence for, suggestions from their mentor. Others respond better to stories illustrating the impact of a particular approach. Many mentees benefit from a coaching-style relationship, encouraged to find the answers for themselves with the guidance of their mentor. Others just want to be shown the best path.
Understanding each individual and tailoring the approach for them not only benefits mentees but also enriches the experience of mentors’, fostering a more inclusive and empathetic professional environment.
Mentoring Millennials and Gen Z
Recent generational shifts in the workforce also call for a new approach to mentoring. Millennials and Gen Z, who place significant importance on personal growth and professional development, view mentoring as crucial to career success. The younger generations seek environments that invest in their development and well-being. They expect managers and coworkers to take an interest in their personal growth, not just offer project-based guidance.
For these generations, mentoring is not just about navigating immediate career challenges; it’s about fostering a holistic, long-term perspective. Personalised mentoring can address such needs, helping younger professionals integrate their personal and professional goals, building sustainable and fulfilling careers.
With a job-for-life seemingly a thing of the past and many younger people unlikely to stay in their role for longer than two years, organisations need to shift how they view their investment in mentoring. While a mentored individual is more likely to stay with their employer for longer, with retention shifting, on average, from two years to five, we still need to accept that the mentored individual may not stay with the same company for their career.
Organisations must invest in mentoring while accepting that people may still leave. However, they will get more from those individuals while they are working there, enhance their reputation in the broader workforce as word spreads that they invest in employees, and attract more high-quality recruits as a result. They are also investing in the future workforce on a societal level.
The Role of AI in Mentoring
Technology, particularly artificial intelligence, is making significant inroads into the mentoring landscape, but AI won’t replace human mentors. While AI can enhance mentoring by making better matches and personalising experiences based on collected data, it lacks the capability to provide emotional connection and empathy, which are inherently human tasks.
The heart of mentoring lies in the human connection. The emotional support and personal validation that mentors offer cannot be replicated by algorithms. The psychological support that mentees often seek in mentoring relationships and the needed personalisation of the mentoring experience underscore the importance of the human touch in such interactions.
The modern mentoring landscape must embrace personalised and strategic approaches to be effective. Understanding and catering to individual differences, particularly in terms of neurodiversity, generational expectations, and learning styles, is paramount. Moreover, while AI can enhance certain aspects of mentoring, the emotional connection remains a fundamentally human element. As we move forward, supporting both mentees and mentors in personalised approaches will be key to fostering meaningful and transformative professional relationships.
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(Disclaimer: The opinions expressed in the article mentioned above are those of the author(s). They do not purport to reflect the opinions or views of ICS Career GPS or its staff.)
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