Why CEOs need to lead a culture of mentoring

We’ve been in the ‘mentoring’ business a little while now and one thing that has become clear, is that most people generally believe in the concept of mentoring.

However, where people’s opinions differ is what they define as a mentoring relationship.

Our philosophy at Mentorloop is that the right connection can change your life. That’s why it’s our ambition to make mentoring mainstream. But when we talk about our business and explain that through our platform we connect mentees and mentors in mutually beneficial relationships through online tools, people sometimes question whether a meaningful mentoring relationship can be formed in an online format.

The reality is that all types of ‘relationships’ have gone through a digital makeover. 20 years ago, people questioned whether romance could flourish on line, and when it did, people were very judgemental, forcing those who had met online to make up elaborate stories of their courtship. Fast forward to 2016 and online dating is almost the ‘norm’ for any singleton. I haven’t as yet attended a ‘Tinder’ wedding but it won’t be far away I’m sure.

So that’s why I’m often surprised that when it comes to mentoring, a similar outdated view is applied to how these relationships should be formed.

Despite organisations and individuals embracing social and professional networking platforms, many leaders still hold the belief that mentoring relationships are developed through your existing personal networks and that face to face communication is imperative. The trap that many leaders are falling into here is that they are applying their own personal lens — this is how mentoring happened for them so that’s how it should be for everyone else.

[On a side note, Australian Deputy Prime Minister Barnaby Joyce (achieved world-wide notoriety for his spat with Johnny Depp and his dogs) gave a stellar example this week of what I’m talking about here.]

However, the fact is mentoring has evolved from a traditional hierarchal one-way relationship, to one that is now seen by both parties as mutually beneficial. It’s moved beyond boardrooms and old boys’ networks to something that should be embraced as an organisational wide people engagement and development strategy, especially as the millennial workforce takes over.

Yet even though many CEO’s have a favourable view of ‘mentoring’, many senior leadership teams still fail miserably at implementing and promoting mentoring. According to the 2016 Deloitte Millennial Survey, 63% of millennials say their leadership skills are not being fully developed. This is despite the survey also finding that those intending to stay with their organisation for more than five years are twice as likely to have a mentor (68%), than not (32%).

Fit for purpose mentoring platforms such as Mentorloop are making it easier than ever for large organisations to scale their mentor programs and create an internal culture of mentoring. New Mentorloop clients have experienced over-subscription to their mentoring programs by up to 80% — identifying a latent demand for mentoring they had not previously been aware of.

We are keeping up with how people want to connect and communicate while also making mentoring more accessible for more people, rather than just a select few. Our approach to mentoring actually aligns with the majority — not the minority.

Today’s CEO’s need to move beyond the bottom line and take more responsibility for how they can impact people engagement and performance throughout the entire organisation. It is no longer about talent management and improved processes — it is now about people management and how we can we make life at work better. Creating a culture of mentoring is the first step in trying to achieve this, because at a base line level, it starts to show your people that you — as a leader and an organisation, well, you care.