Thoughts on Mentoring
By Molly Crampton, Lloyds Banking Group
During my career I have been privileged enough to be both a mentee and mentor, and can reflect on the experience from both perspectives.
Early experiences as a mentee during my grad-scheme helped to develop me into the person I am today and offered me the push I needed to embrace opportunities out of my comfort zone. After such positive experiences internally, I was keen to seek out an external mentor and then fortunate enough to find mentoring through the Future Faces scheme.
In this pairing my mentor helped me to set and stick to goals, acted as a sounding board for my ideas, and encouraged me to pursue public speaking opportunities, something with which I was not previously confident. This led to me speaking in front of over two hundred students at The University of Birmingham.
Having a mentor is invaluable, especially during the early stages of your career. A mentor acts as someone you can turn to for guidance, someone who can give you a reality check when you need one and someone who can act as your biggest cheerleader. A mentor gives you both a sense of accountability and support, they are someone who can give you tangible advice and encouragement on the way to achieving your goals.
If you are questioning whether seeking out a mentor is for you, the answer is yes! No matter what stage of your career you are at it is always helpful to have someone to look to for advice.
Being a mentor brings a keen sense of pride watching as your mentees grow and develop throughout your sessions. Mentees often allow the opportunity to approach your own work from a unique perspective by asking thought provoking questions that you’ve never previously considered. It is also incredibly rewarding to see your mentees succeed and to implement the advice and guidance that you’ve shared during your sessions.
Some individuals may be opposed to mentoring due to a perception that they are not far enough along in their career journey to offer helpful advice, but I can guarantee from my own experience that you always have some wisdom to share that is more valuable than you know.
There may also be the perception that it’s a huge time commitment, again this isn’t true, just one hour a month could change an individual’s life. I also picked up with Gary Saxon, area director Lloyds Bank, who mentored on a previous Future Faces cohort and reflected positively on the experience; “I really enjoy mentoring, particularly when the mentee has clear objectives and is highly motivated to achieve them. In quite a short space of time I can say I have really noticed the growth in my mentee, it has been extremely rewarding and I am sure my mentee has appreciated me being a sounding board and the options/ideas conversations that opened up our thinking.”
I would encourage anyone considering mentoring to take the plunge, it is a privilege and a pleasure.