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Lesson Plan CHL 308
Mentoring Programs for Central Service Personnel
[Reprinted from Communiqué: July/August 2008]

Mentoring occurs when an experienced member of the Central Service department provides professional advice to a less experienced employee. It can occur informally when a relatively inexperienced person solicits input from an “old timer.” Alternatively, formal mentoring programs exist in which experienced volunteers receive training in mentoring activities and then interact with staff selected for participation in “fast track” career development programs. In between these extremes are numerous variations of opportunities for relatively junior members of the department to learn from their more experienced counterparts. Mentoring relationships can last for a short time (just the length of a conversation) or for many years or longer. In this article, we will explore more formal mentoring programs.

Background

Mentoring programs can benefit Central Service departments in several ways:

• Junior staff can more quickly learn about the department’s culture and how to properly work within it.
• Higher levels of mentoree job satisfaction can occur with the decreased chance that newly-employed Central Service personnel will encounter job-related problems or resign from the department.
• Problems that hinder the mentoree’s current performance can be addressed.

Advantages can also accrue to the mentors as well:

• A mentor will likely feel good about the opportunity to provide advice and to “make a difference” in the professional success of a new staff member.
• Mentors themselves learn as they interact with mentorees.
• Mentors may receive special consideration as their own careers are evaluated.
• Sometimes mentors cannot be promoted until someone is available to assume their position, and this can be the mentoree.

An effective mentor typically serves several roles:

• Trainer – Mentors who are asked about specific on-job performance issues can provide applicable assistance and serve as an informal trainer.
• Coach – Mentors can provide positive reinforcement about desired performance, and they may advise against actions that may lead to on-job difficulties.
• Counselor – Counselors do not make decisions for another person. Instead, they discuss the pros and cons of a situation. They ask open-ended questions to learn what the other person is thinking. A counselor provides benchmark information that can help one to evaluate personal perspectives.
• Guide – Just as a guide safely leads someone unfamiliar with a geographic area to a destination, so can a mentor help someone (a mentoree) on the way to a longer-term destination (career).
• Role model – The saying, “Actions speak louder than words,” suggests that mentorees can learn much from their mentors just by observing as they (the mentors) interact with others in the department.
• Advocate – A mentor in a senior position can emphasize the strengths and abilities of a mentoree to those at higher organizational levels.

How exactly can a mentor assist a mentoree? Examples of mentoring activities include:

Helping the mentoree to develop a career ladder (a progression of increasingly more responsible positions).

Advising about development activities that can assist the mentoree to move toward career goals.

Evaluating alternative education and training programs and courses of action to address on-the-job concerns.

Providing applicable education and training materials.

Suggesting alternative courses of action to address on-job problems.

If applicable, making special assignments and arranging for special training.

Providing on-going counseling.

Planning and Implementing a Mentoring Program

Several steps can be used when planning and implementing formal mentoring programs, and these are outlined in
Figure 1.

Let’s look at each of these steps:

• Step 1: Obtain support of top-level administrators – Human resources personnel, managers, supervisors, and others who support the need for a formal mentoring program should serve as advocates to top-level facility or departmental officials.
• Step 2: Determine mentoring program goals – Numerous goals including benefits to the Central Service department, the mentors, and mentorees noted above are likely to be among desired results.
• Step 3: Appoint key planning staff – Those interested in developing a mentoring program are likely candidates.
• Step 4: Plan mentoring program – Decisions will be required about how mentors and mentorees will be selected and paired, their responsibilities, the “mechanics” of how/when the parties will interact, topics for which mentoring discussions are appropriate, and how the program will be announced, administered and evaluated.
• Step 5: Obtain approval of top-level managers – Earlier input from these officials may have been requested and provided; if so, approval of the mentoring as planned is likely to be easier and faster. Hopefully, the mentoring program will be seen as beneficial, inexpensive to implement, and with few disadvantages that will require consideration as an approval decision is given.
• Step 6: Implement mentoring program – Program announcements, staff meetings, organizational newsletters, information in orientation programs for new staff members, and conversations between Central Service managers, supervisors, and other personnel are among promotion possibilities. As well, the availability of and procedures for the mentoring program should be an integral aspect of applicable career development programs.
• Step 7: Select mentors – Effective mentors are usually successful, high-performing staff members with a track record of successful performance over many years and, probably, in several positions; however, they will also likely need to learn basic mentoring skills. Knowledge, skills and abilities of effective mentors frequently include:
  • The desire to assist mentorees.
  • An ability to think creatively and to suggest problem-solving alternatives.
  • The ability to motivate mentorees.
  • Effective oral and/or written communication skills.
  • An interest in assisting the department and the mentoree.
  • An ability to apply change management principles.
  • An understanding of the department’s culture, and the ability to use this knowledge to explain and defend suggestions made to the mentoree.
  • Detailed knowledge about Central Service policies and work procedures.
• Step 8: Train mentors – How should mentors be prepared for their role? Topics to be addressed in training sessions can include:
  • Mentoring goals of the department, and for the mentor and mentoree.
  • Critical aspects of the mentoring relationship.
  • Suggestions for determining the mentoree’s needs and for generating alternatives that address them.
  • Procedures for developing career plans.
  • Training and career development opportunities within the department.
  • Training in communication skills.
  • Relationship skills.
  • Effective coaching tactics.
  • Problem-solving and conflict resolution suggestions.
• Step 9: Select mentorees – During informal mentoring activities, less-experienced staff may simply request that a more experienced counterpart discuss issues of concern. In a more formal model such as that discussed in this article, “fast-track” staff are assigned a mentor, and this input is an integral part of the mentoree’s planned career development program.
• Step 10: Match mentors with mentorees – Considerations in matching mentors and mentorees can include the extent to which the mentor has held similar positions to that of the mentoree. In some instances, gender match and/or a common ethnic, racial, class culture, or class background may be judged to reduce barriers that hinder trust. As well, mentors are typically not a staff member’s immediate supervisor or trainer. The reason: the mentoree may be less likely to discuss problems or to be candid about other matters if he/she is interacting with a supervisor or person responsible for initial on-job training.
• Step 11: Monitor, support, and evaluate (improve) the mentoring program – Mentoring efforts should be evaluated to assure that they are cost-effective and are achieving planned results. Also, like many other programs, continuous quality improvement (CQI) efforts are helpful to assure that the mentoring efforts better meet the needs of the Central Service department, the mentors, and the mentorees as it evolves.

In Conclusion

The environment within which an effective mentoring relationship exists is one of mutual respect and trust, productivity and safety (comfort). “Ground rules” for managing the mentoring partnership can help to insure that this environment continues. These can include how and when meeting times are established, how and what discussion topics are determined, and how disagreements, if any, should be resolved. Sometimes, statements of confidentiality are used to help assure that neither the mentor nor the mentoree shares each other’s confidences with others without mutual approval. As well, mentoring-related meetings should receive a priority, and each person’s full attention should be concentrated on them.

Take the CHL 308 QUIZ

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