Mentoring isn’t just advice – it’s the shortcut to sustainable success
Articles about the tools used for the mentor, the mentee, the coordinator and other that work with mentoring.
I am so very happy that mentoring is in the trends for 2013, for me that is important. Telling me that mentoring still is important, so important that it is among the other «IMPORTANT TO DO IN 2013».
I am working on mentoring for entrepreneurs and that really is the future. The future for business and the future for personal development.
More on mentoring entrepreneurs is to come, so stay tuned
Last year I started my blog list of the best mentoring blogs on Internett, it’s a wide range of blogs out there and some are business sites as well. To gather the best blogs/sites demands me to look not only for bloggers but also for company sites. The aim is to gather the best sites about mentoring, I can see that calling it best mentoring blog required to only look at blogs, but I hope that in my strive to find mentoring information that is ok.
I want to find the blog with information about mentoring, so that if you want to start as a mentor or maybe start a mentoring program you can look at that blog.
I also have a new logo, a logo that look more like a diploma. And a more energized color, red.
I will post the list within short time, and then making an article on the best three blogs.
When you are interesting in a topic you want to read the book that explain the topic best or maybe the books that tells us about the future of that particular topic. But how can you find the best books? Because searching on Internet or Amazon and that will give you a whole lot of results.
If you use Google this would be your result:
Coaching – 246 000 000 pages about that topic
Mentoring – 39 400 000 pages about that topic
or
Coaching and Mentoring – 4 050 000 pages about that topic
If you use Amazon just on books, this would be your result:
Coaching – 17 050 books about that topic
Mentoring – 3 924 books about that topic
or
Coaching and Mentoring – 4 275 books about that topic
So, are you just going to start reading (and buying) or maybe find a list for the best books about the specific topic.
I looked for lists, so that is what I will recommend you. The blog “ready to Manage” have put together the list “Top 20 Best Books on Coaching and Mentoring”. Remember such lists are subjective.
Top 3 of Top 20:
1. Challenging Coaching: Going Beyond Traditional Coaching to Face the FACTS, by John Blakey and Ian Day, 2012
Challenging Coaching is a provocative book which encourages coaches to move beyond the limitations of traditional coaching. The authors detail their unique FACTS coaching model, which provides a practical and pragmatic approach focusing on Feedback, Accountability, Courageous goals, Tension, and Systems thinking. Using this model enables the reader to enter the zone of uncomfortable debate that sustainably transforms individual and bottom-line performance. The authors explore FACTS coaching in theory and in practice using case studies, example dialogues, and practical exercises so that the reader will be able to successfully challenge others using respectful yet direct techniques.
2. The Five Minute Coach: Coaching Others to High Performance in As Little As Five Minutes, by Lynne Cooper and Mariette Castellino, 2012
The Five-Minute Coach offers a simple, step by step guide to how to coach quickly and effortlessly and get better results at work.
Designed for leaders, managers and supervisors, in any setting, this approach to coaching has been developed by the authors and used in organizations across the board large and small, private and public, with adults and teens, and across a variety of voluntary and community groups. Professional coaches have also adopted this system in their work. The book leads the reader through a simple process which changes thinking about how to work with others. Leaders no longer need to have all the answers. They benefit from true delegation. They uncover the talent and resources of others. They free up time for themselves-time to think strategically and to be more proactive, creative and innovative.
3. Transformational Executive Coaching, by Ted M. Middelberg, 2012
In Transformational Executive Coaching, Dr. Ted Middelberg outlines an approach to coaching leaders at the executive level. His system is built on a structured and goal-focused process that gives coaches the ability to effect and sustain the change that leaders want from a coaching engagement. Based on building relationships and using high-quality colleague feedback, the transformational method is tailored to coaches who work at the executive level, or aspire to work at the executive level.
For rest of the list click her
I have posted some posts now about powerful questions, but it is also important to that good questions are one thing. But what if you use your time with the mentee to prepare the next questions and not listen properly to what your mentee is saying?
A great coach taught at a University and their Coaching Certificate for many years and he found that students were ever eager for the right «powerful question.» It became a mild obsession among some of them to have just the right, the perfect, the well phrased question that would tip a coaching conversation to depth and value. And he too had long sought those powerful questions – and still do.
Over time he began to notice that some of these emerging coaches were missing whole chunks of critical dialogue – they were talking past treasured clues that the clients were freely giving up. But they had great questions!
He began challenging the coaches to forget their «powerful questions,» to risk asking stupid questions or, when right, to ask nothing at all and remain still in silent expectation.
There are times when focusing on the best question distracts us from attending to the wealth of data being provided in the coaching interaction. Of course there are terrific questions to prompt the coaching dialogue – dozens have been listed. His greatest task is to be curious – to make efforts to be present to the exchange. When he pull that off he find that the questions he was seeking are inherent in the conversation, He do not require to remember or think of a question.
I was also like the students who wanted to have all the powerful questions ready for every mentee/mentor session. But what happened, well I could´t use them because the mentee respond differently than I had thought of. But after more experience I find myself starting to go with the flow, or dancing in the moment…
One mentor can help you, but maybee you should try more mentors who can broaden your perspective and grant access to new opportunities. Building your mentoring network by personal relationship and recommendations.
Identify the people you need help from to be successful in your current job and everyone who might help you advance your career. Use your current mentors to provide introductions and to fill you in on people’s backgrounds, interests, and current projects. With that information, you can make meaningful connections by offering relevant expertise or ideas, or finding other ways to assist you in your path.
This will maybe be one of your best investments of time.
I had a good discussion with a coach from Erickson College (http://erickson.edu/) and we disagree on something which is very important for me. Feedback…
At Erickson College they learn that as a coach you should never give feedback – because it will lead the coach to do the same next time.
For me this is so very wrong for what I am thinking and doing as a mentor. I have feedback as one of the five tools to use as a mentor. But of course you have to be careful and discuss more about the feedback and what to bring further.
For my friend, the Erickson College coach, that wasn´t any better, but he understood what I meant . And that is a reminder that there are different methods and possibilities.
And as a mentor or coach is it important to think this trough, and find out what you would do and what suits you as a mentor or coach. There is nothing wrong about feedback, the mentee or coach is the main person her not the tool. Remember that…
As a mentor it is important to have the «right» questions in the mentoring session and to become even better at it you can attend a training or a seminar at The Option Institute.
Their seminar «Power Dialogues» is the fundamentals of their core system for personal change. The Option Process® Dialogue is a non-judgmental, non-directive system of questions designed to enable people to uncover and discard hidden beliefs which fuel emotions of unhappiness and ineffective behaviors. It is a process which people have been using for more than 35 years to overcome life crises large and small.
Additionally, for those of you who are looking to master this technique and begin a fulfilling career helping others, this course is the first step.
Half of the program will focus on helping you to implement the attitude of an Option Process Mentor. (The Mentor is the person asking the questions.) This attitude consists of being incredibly present with the person speaking, totally accepting them and everything they say, not having an agenda for what they think, feel, or decide, and creating a sense of deep caring about the person. Not surprisingly, this attitude, once mastered, has enormous benefits in many aspects of life outside of the Dialogue as well.
The other half of the program will focus on enabling you to grasp the fundamentals of the questioning technique itself. You will have the opportunity to practice doing Dialogues in real time and get feedback and assistance.
In PowerDialogues you will learn to:
Always be equipped for any crisis – yours or someone else’s
Engage a powerful attitude at will where you are unshakably comfortable, relaxed and caring
Be the resource for others that you always wished you could be
Understand yourself much more deeply, and make significant personal changes by unearthing and shifting your own beliefs
Take the first step toward creating a career helping others
You can read more here, at their own we page: http://www.option.org
Some mentoring programs simply introduce the mentee for the mentor and leave them to «get on with it».
But people need to know what is expected of them, how to go about it and why it is important and as the coordinater of the program you need to be confident they have the skills for mentoring.
The purpose of training is to enable mentors and mentorees to establish effective relationships. Because it´s not the same to manage people at work and to have a mentee. You have to build a relationship and trust on a short period of time.
And as a mentor you need the right communicating styles and techniques for applying the mentoring process.
No, as Ann Rolfe in Mentoring Works says: Effective mentoring results from a set of attitudes, behaviors, skills and motivation. Training, complemented by ongoing support and follow-up, significantly increases your return on investment. That’s how a mentoring program works.
I always train the mentors in my program and I use my training “The Big Five”, which is the five most important tools/techiques for the mentor to use in the 1-on-1 meetings.
The five tools are:
Under the whole the participants sit two and two and train on the tools. I don´t believe in a training where the trainer talks all the time and the participants sit and takes note. Everything is gone in the minute they walk from there.
So to be a good mentor you must practice, practice and practice…
Finally I got new business cards. I have new email and blog address, AND I wanted new design. So this is my own design and I am trying to be to the point.
Comments?
Front:
Back:
They are all white and using red on the highlights. Click on them if you want to see closer.
Many people come to me and says I get easily in touch with the attende on my trainings and not at least I get them to open up for me. Many of my trainings are quite personal and you make some «soulsourcing» and we get on a very personal level.
There may be things being said to me in confidence or in plenary. It should be noted that I have been participated in several trainings where the trainer don
´t get the same contact with the participants.
In one training the trainer was really focused on the training and he was not open for discussions in the breaks. He was focusing on the trainings and if he should change something for the next session
He therefore had no contact with participants during the break. I believe that it´s in the breaks you can «pick up» new things or clarification etc.
So here are my three most important tips as a trainer:
1. Be Precense
2. Respect the person and what he is saying
3. Show that you care
What are your top three tips?