Confidence comes with experience. But what do you do if you face a new challenge that you’ve not encountered before? Avoid it? Make it up as you go along and hope for the best? Or would you prefer to check out your thoughts, feelings and hunches and get some tips from people who have walked along this kind of path before? Before you take your own big step into the unknown?
Tony Oram Associates draws a distinction between coaching and mentoring, even though some tools and techniques can be used equally well in either setting. In broad terms, mentoring has two purposes. It’s either about enhancing a current leader’s capabilities and performance, or it focuses on succession training and development - in other words, growing the leaders of the future from the people in the now.
A mentor is a guide or wise counsellor, an advisor or sometimes even a tutor or trainer. Mentors can motivate and inspire. The conventional wisdom is that the idea of mentoring originates from the concept of some form of apprenticeship, when an older, more experienced individual passes down knowledge of a particular craft or skill. The experiences and knowledge of people who have been managers and leaders are valuable in enabling the next generation to develop their own abilities to tackle whatever the future holds.
Mentoring and coaching have skills acquisition and development built in. Both require awareness about the context that someone with a specific role finds themselves in. Hints, tips and anecdotes from someone “who’s been there” can be a real benefit for those making a move into unfamiliar territory. Mentoring can save a lot of hassle and heartache, and creates the possibility of avoiding the “big hole in the road” that may be just around the corner. It may even be the ladder that helps you climb out if you’ve already fallen in.
Tony Oram Associates provides mentoring support for people needing to tackle unfamiliar “here and now” issues, or who are looking to move on up to the next stage in their career. We’ve grown from our experiences of sometimes having to figure it out as we go along, finding our own way forward, dealing with the occasional knock backs and enjoying many different kinds of success. We’ve also benefitted from having our own mentors and guides, so we know how very rare the good ones are and how valuable they can be. We’ve learnt a lot along the way, with some of the most helpful learning being the unexpected variety. Mentors help us to make sense of the lessons, weigh up the next steps and boost our chances of success.
We can work one to one, or with teams and groups, exploring the way ahead and helping to clarify what options are available for making that next move the right one. By the end of the day, the path we take must be our own decision, but it helps to check out what might lay ahead, how to make the best of what is to come, and what sensible shortcuts and time saving lessons you can learn to make the journey easier all round.