Do you know if your mentoring program has the essential components to be successful? Here are 7 quick ways to see if your mentoring program is on the right track:
1. Guidelines
Do you have clear guidelines that describe the interaction and the ground rules of the relationship? *This is normally called a program descriptor, which is also used to recruit and inform people about the program.
2. Training
Do you provide training on mentoring dynamics to both mentors and mentorees? Frequently a company will only train mentors. This is a huge mistake! Pairs need to be on the same page; therefore, both partners need to be trained in the understanding of mentoring dynamics.
3. Manager Involvement
Have you oriented the mentoring managers on their role if any in the program and the relationship between the mentor and the mentorees’ manager (hint: there shouldn’t be one).
4. Matching
Is the matching process that you use based upon criteria that are objective? Is more than one person who participates in the matching process?
5. Support
What kind of ongoing support does a mentoring program manager provide to the pairs throughout their relationship? For example, do they check in with each person on a monthly basis? Do they conduct periodic surveys?
6. Evaluate
How do you evaluate your program? Do you conduct interviews? Surveys? A combination of both?
7. Feedback
What kind of feedback do you get from participants with recommendations on how to improve your program? Are those recommendations implemented?
These are just some of the ideas you should be considering when assessing whether your mentoring program is on the right track.
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Image credit: Flickr/James Wheeler