Mentoring Scheme Information for mentees
Congratulations! You have now joined the British Gymnastics Mentoring Scheme as a mentee. This booklet will provide you with all of the information you need to embark on a relationship with your mentor.
Being a mentee Mentoring can help you to gain knowledge, insight, support and guidance and can open your mind to new ideas and possibilities. When you first meet with your mentor, they will expect you to have thought about what you’re looking for from the learning relationship and how they might be able to help you. Think about what areas you want to develop and what your expected outcome would be.
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What are my responsibilities? Your career and your development are your responsibility. You should start with a clear understanding of your goals and be able to articulate what you would like to achieve and what you need from your mentor. The key to a good mentoring relationship is the time and commitment that you and your mentor will need to give; so make sure that your mentor has the time to support you. You might also want to think about how geographically close you are to them – are you happy for an occasional face to face session interspersed with telephone or Skype meetings? Be clear on your expectations so that you neither you or your mentor encounter difficulties later on.
“ You can’t push anyone up the ladder unless he is willing to climb himself” Andrew Carnegie
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Initial meeting It is the responsibility of your mentor to organise a meeting with you about two weeks before the first formal mentoring session. This will be the initial meeting and an opportunity to set expectations, agree dates, times and objectives for the mentoring sessions, and discuss the level of support that you require. This initial meeting should last between 45 and 60 minutes. During the meeting, you will work with your mentor to establish what you require from the relationship and talk through what support they’re able to provide based on their knowledge and experience. Use the meeting to build rapport and trust, and get to know each other. You should also agree how and when you’re able to contact your mentor. Ahead of the initial meeting, familiarise yourself with the templates that have been provided to you, ready to complete them with your mentor during the meeting. These include: • A Mentoring Agreement • A Mentor Profile • A Mentee Profile Once the Mentoring Agreement has been completed and signed, ensure that you receive a copy for your records. At the end of the meeting, ensure that you feel comfortable with what you’ve discussed and are clear on the next steps.
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Mentoring sessions Once the ground rules are set, you can progress with your mentoring relationship and the formal mentoring sessions. These sessions should be used to: • Identify goals and objectives for you to work towards. • Identify strengths and areas for development. • Review experiences. • Discuss issues or problems. • Set targets for actions. • Receive advice or guidance from your mentor.
Communication and feedback Be a great communicator and keep your mentor up to date on any progress that you’ve made. Provide them with feedback about how something has worked for you. Be honest about what is happening so that your mentor knows how best to support you. As well as supporting you, their role is also to challenge and provide constructive feedback. They will ask you great questions, but they won’t provide all of the solutions for you.
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Monitoring and evaluation Monitoring and evaluation is an important part of the scheme. Your mentor will complete a Monitoring Form on a monthly basis and return it via email to Learning & Development, so that they can collate information on the scope and breadth of mentoring activity being carried out across the organisation. As a mentee, you should evaluate whether the relationship is providing you with what you need, and if your needs change, it’s important to make your mentor aware of this. At the end of the relationship, you will need to complete a Final Evaluation Form and return it via email to Learning & Development.
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Ending the relationship It is important to think about how your mentoring relationship will end and to plan for this. You should always discuss the reasons why you feel it is necessary to end the relationship and expect that your mentor may feel the same at some point. It is likely that you will have agreed an end date during your initial meeting, but it’s not always possible to do that depending on the goals that you are working towards. Sometimes, even after careful planning and agreement, the mentoring relationship may not work as well as you might have hoped and you may feel the need to end it prematurely. It’s important to be honest with your mentor about why you feel that it’s not working, but be careful not to become the victim or assign blame. There are a number of reasons why the relationship can end. These could be: • You have achieved your objectives • You feel that you are confident and ready to move on • Your mentor isn’t responding to the relationship and is not committed • The Mentoring Scheme is closing • The relationship isn’t working for either party Generally, it is good practice to review your original goals and objectives with your mentor and compare them to the outcome achieved. This enables a review of progress made and an acknowledgement of activity to date.
Who to contact for more information For further support or guidance, please don’t hesitate to contact the Learning & Development team learning-development@british-gymnastics.org
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