Mentoring in the Workplace
 

Really interested to hear of people's experiences of this as a way to fast track interns and graduates pace of learning on the job

In my opinion it is an obligation of those that know to pass on to those that don't but want to know. I started my engineering apprenticeship in the UK at 16 and we were assigned to an old salt who taught us the ropes - invaluable and confidence inspiring. I'm now a senior exec in a pretty decent size company and I treat it as my duty to take the younger guys under my wing and not only teach them the technical skills but also the subtle social skills on how to manage up and down the organization. How to behave in meetings. When to open you mouth and when to keep it shut. I believe that it is also important to expose the younger guys to different parts of the business to enable them to have an appreciation for the role of others and potentially spark an interest in another area. My goal is to equip the guys with as much knowledge as I can before I retire. Not sure if you recall but I actually connected one of our interns with you as he was interested in composite chassis design.

I am in sales and have had many mentors who helped me to be in the top 1-3% of the companies I work for over the last 20 years. I am always glad to help others as my mentors helped me. My current employer is willing to make things work out so that the trainees get help without my commissions being damaged. Currently, the two people who have better numbers than me were mentored by me.

We (USA Dept of Energy weapons lab) don't usually hire baccalaureates "cold", but we do what we call "post-bacs" which are basically non-student grad student stints. Six - twelve months of that get both sides a good understanding of the candidate and the environment (and it pays somewhere between a grad-assistant and a junior engineer's salary). I've worked three kids through this and at least two were good "grabs"...

For us, a grad research position is the entry point. That's how I got in, a GRA doing metallurgy pursuing my MS in Metallurgical Engineering - paid for the degree, paid far better than the TAs got (so I think we know who had to pay for beer), got a clearance and slid peacefully into a few decades of the nukular-weapons-industrial-complex.

But if you're mentoring - be active! It's more than a little thing here and there, it's a job. I cannot do it anymore as I don't have the attention span but there's nothing sadder than a summer intern camped out on their phone. Props to the people that manage all of that. Especially for some of us in "interesting" places (remote/rural/etc...) it's a great tool to find those that really want to sign up and help.

I've mentored a few young'uns. I wouldn't say it's a method for fast tracking as much as for targeted training. Some of my mentees responded well some did not. It is an excellent way to develop people.

Pick me! Pick me! I'll sweep the floors for free!

In my business, a mentor is just somebody you can ask questions without being screamed at

I have had some interns. They were pretty slow...

We probably had an inferior recruiting process which gave us inferior interns.

It is a great strategy if you have the corporate culture to execute. Mine doesn't.

I basically spent 25 years of my career mentoring new inexperienced air traffic controllers. As an air traffic controller after you were a full performance level controller you were expected to always (mentor) have a developmental controller assigned to you.
The developmental controller would work on your ticket and you would have an override on his radio control transmissions for on the spot corrections. At our facility this would take about a year of daily training till the developmental either was certified or washed out.

I think the toughest part was spending a year working very closely with a developmental writing and conducting training session de-briefs on every minute spent training. Hearing stories of their asperations and family life but to know after a few months of working together that a developmental was not progressing. Tough to then have to continue to write about the develomental's training failures and start a paper trail toward justifying a developmental's training termination. Great when they succeed but the lows of failure were very tough for the developmental and the instructor too.

In racing I have had 4 mentors (some mechanics, some drivers some were both) and every mentor I choose has been an improvement.
So my racing mentors have been extremely helpful to my amateur racing and race car prep.
My current mentor was an engineer for 10 years with Richard Childress racing.
Funny I had a couple of mentors that when I would ask questions about car set up they answered honestly that "you need an engineer to find that answer".
I'm thinking then how are we running these cars with out an engineer, that would be by the seat of the pants. lol
Having an engineer as a mentor deleted 90% of the seat of the pants experience and instead increased driver and car confidence by 100%.

I spent the last half of my career mentoring junior engineers. I found it extremely satisfying and rewarding. I was fortunate, however, in that the group in which I worked never hired anyone off the streets, right out of school. One had to earn their way into that group through one's performance in other engineering groups.

Until one day, our new manager decided to roll the dice and hire a couple of fresh grads. Boy, we we all worried. We got lucky, however, and both proved to be outstanding. And they had not yet learned all of the "bad habits" from other groups, who functioned somewhat differently than ours.

So, yeah, if you have a chance to mentor, I don't think you will find a more rewarding use of your time. And it's a lot of fun. Starting with sharp young people to begin with, who are eager to learn, who have the basics is fantastic. Our mentoring was really just task-specific application more than anything else. All we had to do was show them how we did it, explain why we did it that way, and they were off to the races. Fun times.

The smartest move a young person can make
is to pick out a successful climber in the corporation,
usually at the manager level, and approach him/her
and ask politely if that person would have any tips or advice.
Cozy up and check in periodically and discuss career choices
and advancement.

The idea is to put that manager in an informal mentor position.
They'll recognize the move right away and usually go along willingly,
for them it's usually an ego thing.

Not only will the young person get guidance,
but will also gain from someone higher up
looking out for them, protecting them,
and also pushing them for advancement.

If it's a large company, the young person
can pick out two or more managers from
different departments.

Mentoring should be different than "training".

Training teaches you a job.

Mentoring should help you get your next job.

Technically correct.

c/p.
Training is an event.
Mentoring, on the other hand, is a professional development tool in which a less experienced employee seeks advice, learning, and support from a more experienced professional. Unlike training, which may be required, mentoring is an ongoing social learning relationship between two people.

According to the Business Dictionary, mentorship is defined as “an employee training system under which a senior or more experienced individual (the mentor) is assigned to act as counselor, guide, or advisor to a trainee or junior (mentee).

How would you distinguish teaching people how to do their job well vs teaching them how to advance? Part of how I measure my career success is how many people I've helped get to their 3-5 year career goals.

Mentoring is self preservation.

You do it to reduce the amount of time the newbs can make your life miserable.

The faster you can smarten them up the sooner you can get away from the fallout of their youthful exuberant ideas and actions.

Thanks for the replies, interesting to read what mentoring means to people

I've said, yes, I'm interested to a design/engineering mentoring role at a F1 team. It should be be a very rewarding role and a huge learning experience for both sides. I've done a bit of mentoring in the past but nothing that could be called a structured approach

Been asked to have a think about how I'd go about it. Have a few ideas, talked to few people from design, manufacturing and recent graduates within the team and there is a real need for it.

Opportunity is perfect timing as having just done my umpteenth new car design and build which felt a bit been there, done that and it doesn't excite me anymore. How ungrateful and spoiled does that make me sound :rolleyes:

Within the last few weeks I've started to look around for motorsport opportunities outside of F1 which might benefit from my decades of F1 design/engineering and manufacturing knowledge eg Dakar, Moto GP, LMDh, WRC :cool: All new itches I need to scratch

Think a mentoring role might just be what I need to get me over the finish line of 500 F1 races

Please keep the stories, ideas and experiences coming, its very insightful reading

...and you can teach them to stay off your darn lawn! :D

Where did you say to apply… 🙋🏽

Sent you a pm. ;)

To me, mentoring is teaching someone general principles and ask the student to analyze what they see so they can apply their own technique and style.