Anyone who has attended our webinars or read our blogs would know that for the program designers at Art of Mentoring, everything starts with organisational goals. Our fundamental philosophy is around “strategic mentoring” or a “strategic approach to mentoring”. It just makes sense to us that mentoring initiatives must be closely linked to what the […]
How to build a mentoring culture
Critical to business success is the creation of an environment where people want to join the organisation, perform and commit to stay. Yet, developing and sustaining a positive organisational culture is easier said than done. In The Ripple Effect, Melissa Richardson pointed to a set of human needs that, when met, can create positive organisational […]
Innovation and wellbeing – the key is human connection
Art of Mentoring recently partnered with the Australian HR Institute’s (AHRI) 2021 National Conference ‘Transform’. An impressive line-up of speakers from around the world presented data and findings on the current state of play. My main takeaway from the event was an affirmation and deeper understanding of what we’ve all been feeling – businesses need […]
Mentoring & Wellbeing
The benefits of mentoring for career-related outcomes are widely accepted. At Art of Mentoring, we know that mentees and mentors get much more from the relationship than they expect and that mentoring has positive impacts on wellbeing. Whilst there are many descriptions on what wellbeing encompasses, in the most general sense wellbeing is focused on […]
Reciprocal mentoring – key to diversity-focused culture change
GUEST BLOG It has taken a long time but suddenly business leaders have started to listen to what HR has been telling them for decades – it’s time to get serious about diversity. Among the problems in taking this beyond rhetoric, however, is that traditional recipes, such as implicit bias training, don’t work. The reason […]
Why mid-career public servants need mentoring
Time and time again, government agencies tell us that middle management and front-line management are the least engaged cohorts, based on their census or survey data. Like many organisations, government agencies often focus career development opportunities on new recruits, graduates, high potentials and on senior leaders. Layers in between, especially front-line staff who provide services […]
The Sticky Topic of Stuckness
Stuckness is a word we hear frequently in coaching and mentoring, but what does it mean? Here, Professor David Clutterbuck and Melissa Richardson have identified six kinds of stuckness in mentoring, each with its own context and challenges: When the mentor suddenly doesn’t know what to do or say next When the mentor feels trapped […]
Self-Matching vs Partner Preferencing
Self-Matching, Facilitator Matching, Traditional Mentoring, too many options and types of mentoring so how do I choose…? At Art of Mentoring, we have deliberately avoided developing self-matching, fast-knowledge-transfer solutions into our platform because we firmly believe that it does not lend itself to real, developmental mentoring. This type of mentoring is a mutual exchange that […]
Is it time… for men to seek female mentorship?
In a recently released working paper, Overcoming Gender Discrimination in Business: Reconsidering Mentoring in the Post #Me-Too and Covid-19 Eras, the authors provide an excellent description of the “women are wonderful” effect; men are associated with leadership qualities that are valued in corporate circles — confidence, risk taking and negotiation skills — while women are […]
Reviewing the mentor’s motivations towards the mentee
GUEST BLOG In every mentoring or coaching relationship, patterns gradually become established in how you work with the learner. We fall into roles, which may not be obvious. Reviewing these from time to time helps keep us balanced and prevents those roles becoming “fixed”. One useful model is the triangle of Protect – Exploit – Equate. Protect […]