Organisations are keen to ensure that their mentoring programme will be the best. They want it to run smoothly, with everyone getting a great deal out of it!
To achieve this you will need to put in a certain amount of effort, a lot of planning up front and be willing to listen to feedback to improve as you go along. 7 tips and the Infographic follow…
Shortcuts to a successful in-house Mentoring Program
So here are 7 tips to achieve a truly effective in-house mentoring program:
1. Designated Mentoring Coordinator
Have a designated mentoring coordinator to run it, allowing time in their workload specifically for this. If they are overloaded, the mentoring programme may be the first thing they drop leaving your programme floundering with no energy and momentum.
2. Plan the Programme up-front
Plan the full programme up front and publish key events at the beginning so that people can get them in their diaries. These will include training/briefing dates, supervision sessions, evaluation events and/or focus groups, and even a celebration winding up event at the end.
3. Keep in touch with participants
Keep in touch throughout, and not just at the beginning and at the end when you ask the participants for feedback! You should be in touch with everyone within the first 6 weeks with a soft-touch check-in. This ensures that they have everything they need to start their mentoring relationship. This is also a time to reaffirm their contact point to discuss anything that might crop up in the future.
4. Have mentoring resources available
Consider having mentoring resources on your intranet for mentors and mentees to dip into as and when they need them. For example, infographics or short guides or videos on different stages of the mentoring relationship, or simple exercises to assess what success means to the mentee.
5. Have a mid-point supervision session
There should be at least one mid-point supervision session, two if you are able, to support mentors and mentees in refreshing their knowledge on the purpose and processes of mentoring, and up-skilling with new models and techniques. These touch-points may also highlight if mentoring is still ongoing or if further intervention is required to reboot it.
6. Save programme feedback for evaluation
Collect and save anything you hear about the programme as you go along to feed into your evaluation. This may include a passing comment, or that someone who is being mentored has been promoted or achieved a goal within their mentoring relationship. Certainly listen for anything that needs some improvement. Maybe integrate this into your ongoing programme if appropriate, rather than waiting to the end.
7. Celebrate your mentoring programme
Remember to celebrate your mentoring programme. Always share findings with the whole organisation at the formal programme end. You might also ask some of the mentoring pairs if they would like to be case studies for any internal publications and websites – short talking head videos are effective ways to showcase this.
Finally, remember Coach Mentoring Ltd has extensive knowledge and expertise in setting up and running mentoring programmes. We can support you through all stages, or just areas where you are less confident or time-strapped. Our clients often appreciate help with training, matching mentoring pairs, virtual supervision sessions and evaluation.
Infographic — Keep your mentoring programme running effectively
PDF: Infographic — Seven ways to keep your mentoring programme running effectively
Contact me, Jacki Mason if you would like to discuss how I can support you with our Virtual Programme Manager Service in any of these areas. I would be delighted to have a discussion with you.
