Mentorship is a powerful tool for career growth. It can help you to set and achieve goals, stay motivated and connect with a useful network of industry professionals.
What is a mentor? A mentor is someone who offers leadership and guidance to an individual who’s moving up the ranks in their career. Mentors should be reliable, willing to offer advice and successful in their current position.
We’ve listed the top benefits of mentorship and how it can positively contribute to your personal and professional development.
Give honest and constructive feedback
Identifying strengths and weaknesses is beneficial for both personal and career growth. However, this form of reflection is rarely self-initiated. A mentor, who has a focus on your career progression, will help you to identify the areas in which you’re performing well, as well as those that need improvement.
Mentors can also help you to form the habit of requesting feedback. This will set you up for ongoing improvement.
Expand your networking opportunities
A mentor will help you to gain some momentum towards achieving your career goals by introducing you to their trusted network of contacts. The more support you have within your industry, the more opportunities will present themselves.
Encourage you to set goals
Effective goal setting is integral to achieving career success. Once you have a good idea of what you want to achieve and the timeframe in which you hope to achieve it, the pathway to success becomes a lot clearer. A mentor can guide you in setting both short and long term goals that are specific and measurable.
You can learn more about setting goals to improve your career here.
Keep you accountable
A mentor will hold you accountable for your actions and keep you motivated to achieve your goals. If you respect and admire your mentor, you’ll work harder to make them proud. You’ll strive harder to achieve your goals when you’re not the only one on board!
You can learn from their experience
Your mentor was theoretically walking in your shoes not too long ago. They may have faced similar challenges and can therefore provide advice on how to overcome them now and in the future. You can also learn from your mentor’s mistakes and hopefully avoid making them yourself.
Help you to build your personal brand
A personal brand is your reputation, or how others perceive you. A mentor can provide an honest, outside perspective that can help you to better curate your own personal brand. We can often have conflicting ideas about how we think others perceive us and how they actually perceive us. A mentor’s contribution will help you to recognise any contradiction and allow you to make positive and memorable first impressions.
View the five reasons you should build a personal brand here.
How do you find the right mentor?
Finding and fostering a mentor relationship can feel like a challenge, however it’s a worthy task to channel your energy into. It’s useful to make a list of prospects who you know, respect and who are advanced and successful in their career. Search for prospects within your personal network, including family, professional and workplace connections.
Once you’ve chosen who you’d like to approach, prepare your very best elevator pitch. Be sure to include why you’re seeking mentorship, why you’ve chosen them and what you hope to gain through the experience.
Mentorship could be a driving force in your career and the right person could even guide you towards achieving qualifications to further your progression. If you’re interested in learning more about the qualifications available to you, get in touch with the Skills Certified Australia team today.
