Does your mentor initiate?
You’ve probably heard that it’s important to have a great mentor in business – someone who can help you learn the ropes, avoid pitfalls and expedite your path toward career growth.
But did you know that there are two different stages of mentorship?
And did you know that taking on the wrong kind of mentor at a critical moment in your career can actually set you back, rather than help you get a head?
If not, keep reading. What I’m about to share could save you both time and money, and help you avoid the heartache of giving your power away to someone who ultimately isn’t the right kind of guide to help you get ahead.
Stage 1: Capacity Building – Becoming a Pro
In the early stages of your career, your primary focus will be on learning the ropes. At this stage, there’s a lot you don’t know yet about “how things are done around here.”
For example:
- What is the industry standard for… (fill in the blank)?
- What kind of language will garner respect from your colleagues?
- How do experts think about
- What’s considered innovative?
- What gets rewarded?
- What does great (traditional) leadership look like?
Traditional mentoring (the kind you tend to hear about in corporate leadership training initiatives) is well suited to help solve this problem.
A mentor who is doing a similar type of work, who has walked a similar career path, and/or who has worked in your industry for a few years (or a few decades!) longer than yourself already knows the ropes.
He or she can save you time by giving you direct answers to questions you might only otherwise answer through research or mentally and emotionally taxing trial and error. And, if your mentor has been able to beat the odds, or otherwise break through an advancement barrier or glass ceiling of some kind (e.g. becoming the first woman or person of color in your organization to hold a C-Level position), then they also know what it takes to move through the specific barriers to entry that exist your unique context.
Receiving this traditional type of mentoring can help you build a strong foundation of industry knowledge and develop general political savvy.
And it can help you build confidence, by boosting your understanding of the “rules of play” – a critically important attribute required for women who aspire to succeed in senior levels of leadership today.
However, it’s just the first step.
Stage 2: Initiation – Becoming an Artist
In her book the Artists Way, author and writing coach Julia Cameron speaks about the moment of initiation when a “shadow artist” (someone who secretly or not-so-secretly wants to make art, write, sing, play music or otherwise actively create) steps OUT of the shadows and INTO the limelight as a creator.
Likewise, in your own career, there will be a moment when you are ready to surpass your traditional mentors and become the creator of your own unique professional contribution.
In one of my favorite quotes of all time,
the great Pablo Picasso challenges us to: “learn the rules like a pro, so you can break them like an artist.”
In other words… it’s time to fly.
Unfortunately, most women in leadership wait much longer than necessary to embrace this second stage of their leadership journey. Instead of beginning to source from their own internal wisdom and leave traditional mentoring behind, they continue to study, research and ask for advice – striving to get clearer about the rules and perform to the test that their industry seems to be requiring, in order to finally succeed.
We’ve received SO many messages that there’s a right and wrong way to achieve that we come to believe if we’re NOT succeeding, we must not understand the rules quite well enough yet. So we study. We practice. We get another mentor. We ask MORE questions.
And we start (or continue) to give our real power away.
The truth is, the next step – the one we might be scared to take – is being courageous and self-assured enough to start leaving the rules behind.
The bad news is, when you miss your window to become an artist and fly, you’re likely to experience a plateau in your career. At best you might feel bored, off purpose, or somewhat misaligned. At worst you may find yourself hating your work, hating the people you report to, or even hating yourself.
The good news is, if you’re one of these women, it’s possible to make the choice to step out of the old paradigm and start creating immediately.
Literally, your graduation into artist-hood is just one decision away.
But you don’t have to do it alone. You just need a different kind of mentor.
As you can imagine, at THIS stage in your career, a different type of mentorship is required. Rather than focusing on bestowing you with industry-specific knowledge, your mentor must have the ability to see BEYOND their own experience to help you envision what’s possible – or even what’s necessary – for YOU.
In traditional societies, this type of graduation often comes in the form of a ritual right of passage, facilitated by a skilled initiator who has already walked the path – one who is committed evoking to the full self-expression of the mentee (and who is unattached enough to the outcome that his or her preconceived notions about what’s right, good or possible don't get in their way). This moment is about accepting the responsibility of mature societal contribution, which includes breaking free of pre-prescribed rules and making self-directed decisions.
Authentic executive presence – and the industry-level impact it makes possible – are not about following ready-made prescriptions for leadership.
Instead, this stage of career development is about becoming more of yourself, and allowing the uniqueness of you (your vision, deeper values and core superpowers) to shape the legacy you will ultimately leave.
How do you know which-type of mentorship is right for you now?
Ultimately, I recommend trusting your gut.
To help you self-assess, I’m including a few questions below to consider:
- What stage of career development are you at now?
- How do you know? (What evidence do you have? What are you seeing? Thinking? Feeling? What results are you getting? What reflections have you recently received?)
- Given your stage of development, which type (or types) of mentorship are right for you now?
- And, how would you like to be mentored? What quality or qualities of support, presence, inspiration, care or communication do you feel would serve you best in a mentoring relationship this year?
If this post resonates, I invite you to take one step toward establishing (or re-establishing) a right-fit and aligned mentoring relationship today.
Curious to learn more about initiatory mentorship?
At Guts & Grace, we specialize in offering initiatory mentorship to clients who are on the cusp of a career-level breakthrough.
Book a VISION and DISCOVERY CALL with a Guts & Grace coach today to get a taste.
With faith and inspiration,
LeeAnn
