Taking Control of Development

For years, mentoring has been viewed as a valuable informal learning tool. In an organizational setting, mentoring typically has been managed in a top-down manner. Traditionally, senior executives identify an organization’s mentors and high-potential employees and then pair a mentor with a protege to help the latter craft a long-term career path. The learner gains value from the mentor’s insights usually through one-on-one meetings and discussions.

However, the mentoring process is changing for two reasons. One is globalization and the need to share knowledge, expertise and growth opportunities across the organization regardless of geographical separation. The other is more cultural in nature, and it is this change that is likely to have the most profound influence. Mentoring in the future will involve a workforce with attitudes shaped by technology and social networking. Instead of the mentor controlling the process, in the future talent managers are likely to see the learner drive the mentoring engagement and maybe even choose a mentor outside the organization. This shift is already under way and changing mentoring in several positive ways.

The Changing Face of Mentoring
In the traditional setting, mentoring happens within the organization where the learner and mentor are employed. The mentor’s role is to open doors, create connections and teach the learner to navigate the organization. The mentor is literally a human portal making connections that could be valuable throughout the learner’s career. The portal connects learners to others who can help them overcome and capitalize on challenges.

In a truly global environment, mentoring is increasingly virtual. A mentor in California may help guide a learner in India without the two ever holding a live meeting. Even more startling, it is frequently not the organization selecting the mentor; the learner selects the person or persons who can provide the best career growth guidance.

With the growing prominence of LinkedIn and similar networks, savvy employees, and quite often their employers, are making connections and joining groups, all of which is part of their learning process. It only follows that an online connection made by an eager learner and a savvy veteran willing to offer advice will evolve into a mentoring situation.

Some executives may view outside mentoring as threatening since they no longer control the process. Yet this is the direction mentoring is headed, and it should be welcomed because of the opportunity and value it offers. There always will be a quantifiable link between mentoring interaction and its value to the organization, especially in the continuing improvement of job performance. The future in mentoring offers additional benefits that may not always be achieved in traditional mentoring arrangements.

Future mentoring situations will be more customized. While traditional approaches should not and will not disappear, the learner initiating the process may favor one of the following mentoring options:
• Peer-to-peer. Learners connect with peers either inside or outside the organization to discuss goals, support ideas and share experiences.
• Bottom-up. The learner seeks out and matches with executives to discuss new thoughts, trends, technology and learning itself.
• Generational. Younger learners decide to learn from the wisdom of more seasoned professionals and make a connection. These professionals also may see the value in learning from their younger counterparts and make a connection to keep their skills updated.
• Cross-cultural. A learner is interested in gaining diverse perspectives and establishing ties in the global workplace.
• Short-term. Learners come together to focus on a project with a specific goal.
• Virtual. This is perhaps the biggest possibility with no in-person interaction. Rather, technology makes the connection — synchronously and asynchronously.

When cultures, time zones and expectations are different, challenges that do not exist with everyone in the same locale manifest themselves quickly. In their research paper “Mentoring in an Increasingly Global Workplace,” three associate professors of management from Troy University, Tish Matuszek, Dennis Self and Mike Schrader, identified these future challenges:
• Proximity. In the global workplace, a mentor’s physical presence is not always possible and often may be impractical.
• Language. Language skills are necessary for any company that values mentoring on a global scale. Americans will have to emulate their European and Asian counterparts, many of whom speak at least two languages.
• Cultural differences. “There is no monolithic culture,” the authors said. Mentors and their prot?g?s will have to be sensitive to these occasionally subtle differences in a world of cross-culture mentoring.
• Credibility of mentor and learner. The success of a mentoring program depends on mutual trust and respect. This may be much less of an obstacle in a learner-driven scenario.

These challenges may seem daunting, but they can be overcome through the same methods that occur in a traditional mentoring situation: mutual respect, sensitivity and trust.

How to Strategically Drive Growth
In every mentoring situation, the mentor’s challenge is to be continually supportive, because the learner’s perspective and growth are of paramount concern. The fact that learners are taking more control of the process should not be interpreted as arrogance. The learner is simply driving the process, while the mentor helps with the steering and navigation. A learner who has chosen a mentor is often more accepting of this two-way interaction.

Because of the Internet in general, and the increasing presence of social networks in particular, future learners will be subject to a number of outside influences, which are likely to sharpen their acumen at work. These will be especially helpful when the learner is assigned to teams. With the mentor’s guidance, the learner still will be able to improve communication skills and build a sense of commitment to the team and organization. The importance of these skills and what they mean for the future of both cannot be underestimated, especially when forged by the learner’s motivation and the mentor’s skillful advice. Consider this supporting evidence of the value of having an outside mentor of the learner’s choosing.

Traditional mentoring has focused mainly on maximizing the individual productivity of high-potential talent with only a sporadic, minor focus on other organizational growth strategies. The new approach to mentoring opens the opportunity to re-examine the impact on growth planning at a broader level. High-speed communication technology has increased the speed and flow of information and helped to increase the entrepreneurial spirit in the newest generation of workers. This revived spirit of innovation and renewal can be further enhanced through effective mentoring. In an article published in Canada’s Financial Post in March, an Ernst & Young executive said, “the whole concept of fostering entrepreneurship is about nurturing innovation,” adding that smaller companies seem to have an easier time harnessing this desire than their larger brethren who are often “hindered by bureaucratic decision-making processes.”

There is no reason for these obstacles to exist. Mentoring can draw on entrepreneurial creativity and should play a role in any growth strategy regardless of the mentor’s location or affiliation. Enlightened management may want to consider including its high-potential talent in an open discussion on the value of mentoring and how it can be applied to help the organization’s long-term plans.

By employing learner-driven mentoring and embracing more entrepreneurial change strategies, an organization can enhance its employee brand over the long term. An organization known for its worker involvement in newer concepts such as virtual and learner-driven mentoring has an excellent chance of creating an employee-friendly brand that can facilitate a more dedicated and driven workforce anxious to take advantage of the opportunity for growth. This type of forward-thinking also can position the company to help attract top talent seeking to be nurtured in a pressure-filled professional environment.

Mentoring, whether it originates within an organization, social network or global workplace, will play an even more important role in the future of an organization and the high-potential employees who are likely to be at the core of its success. Further, learner-driven mentoring can play a significant role in succession as future leaders come to the surface by leveraging their people skills through technology connections, helping to change the face of the organization. While the goal of mentoring may not change, its future will look quite different as learners take more control of their own development and talent managers look to learners to apply learning in innovative ways.

Kevin J. Sensenig is the global vice president of learning and organization development at Dale Carnegie & Associates. He can be reached at editor@talentmgt.com.