Developing a Mentoring Process

Due to mentoring's effectiveness of developing more productive workers, it is in the organization's best interest to help shape and guide it. This does not mean that it has to be a totally formal approach in which the organizations assigns mentoring relationships; but perhaps a more informal approach in which it provides learning opportunities to both mentors and protégé. Thus, some processes that should be consider:

Guide and inform people looking for mentors
Develop future mentors with training and coaching programs
Establish guidelines and processes for the mentoring program

Mentoring Program Guide

This section lists a short guide for designing mentorship programs. The information may be gathered by some type of survey or questionnaire.

Mentorship Criteria

Questions to ask people wishing to become mentors:

What interests do you have in the mentorship program?
How will you coach others in seeking new and challenging opportunities?
Do you have the means and ability support and empower others?
What strengths would you bring to the program?
What developmental opportunities do you require to become a better mentor?
How often and in what settings will you meet?

Protégé Criteria

Questions to ask people looking for mentors:

What type of interests do you have in the mentorship program?
What developmental opportunities to you hope to achieve?
What strengths will aid in you in your developmental efforts?

Protégé Mentor Selection Guide

Questions to ask people who believed they have located a mentor:

Why have you selected this person as your mentor?
What skills or knowledge are you seeking from this mentor?
How often and in what type of settings do you see yourself meeting with your mentor?
How will you know if you achieved the desired results?

Protégé Action Plan

An action plan for protégés to track their progress may include mentoring sessions, books, classes, seminars, self-study programs, etc. If the plan includes a resource other than a mentor, such as a book or class, they should be assigned a short-term mentor who can guide them in their progress.

The action plan should include:

the skills they need to learn
why they need to learn each skill
date the skill is needed
the mentor who will work with them or mentor assigned to guide them in their progress of acquiring each skill

People, Data, Things Assessment

This skill assessment is completed by both mentors and protégé. It is useful for matching a mentor's strengths to a protégé's need for improvement.

There are no right or wrong answers to this skill assessment. If you are a mentor, select the items you skilled in. If you are a protégé, select the items you need to learn or need to improve on.

The checklist is located here. Note that the checklist has items listed under three columns: People, Data, and Things. The items are for reference only as you are free to change the terms to meet your needs as a protégé or strengths for a mentor.

Mentoring Program Feedback

Feedback form to track the effeteness of a mentor program:

I am a mentor / protégé (please circle) 



                             Strongly         Strongly
                             Disagree          Agree
                                         

We meet regularly               1   2   3   4   5

We have met our goals to-date   1   2   3   4   5 

Our meetings are productive     1   2   3   4   5 

We are building a trusting      1   2   3   4   5 
relationship

This program has met my         1   2   3   4   5 
expectations

I would recommend this          1   2   3   4   5 
program to others

Next Steps

Mentoring Resources

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