Why a Mentor is Valuable
You can build a great resume on the skills you gained outside of the workplace. So, take a lesson from your former childhood self and start filling your schedule with at least one ‘extracurricular-like’ activity and not only will you immensely enjoy the engagement and challenges but you’re giving yourself an outlet to further practice and naturally gain great skills.
I will never forget, or stop thanking the mentor I had in my corner early on in my career. He advised me on many great decisions, with two pieces of advice that ring blatantly in my mind. Firstly, he told me that a college degree wasn’t necessary for the path I wanted to undertake and secondly, that I was asking for salaries below the market value. Those two caveats given to me over just a couple of minutes, have led me to earn $500,000 more over the past 5 years.
The Industrious Framework’s goal here is to advise you on how to obtain a mentor and how to make mentorship fit your unique needs
Getting a Mentor is Your Responsibility
The first and most valuable step towards obtaining a mentor is realizing that getting a mentor is your responsibility. Many times, mentors are further progressed in their career and personal life, making them incredibly busy and arguably important people. From this truth comes many things:
Clear and Concise
When approaching a mentor, keep all your asks clear and concise. Here’s an example:
If you are a law student, reach out to a mentor and say “Hey, I want to be a lawyer, and I see you have your own practice. I was wondering if you can help me?"
I can assure you they will not respond or respond willingly to continue. Try instead:
“Hi. I want to be a lawyer in immigration law. I saw your piece on immigration law xyz. I also recently wrote an article on the issue for one of my classes. I have a great interest in being a clerk at your firm. I was wondering if you have time for a 10 minute video chat sometime. Thank you, I appreciate your time.”
With some fine-tuning, the latter sounds more like something that will grab a mentor's attention. And if they don’t have the time to answer, with a concise request they are more likely to pass along someone else who does.
First Impressions
Whether you’re a believer of “don’t judge a book by it’s cover” or not, first impressions will always be first impressions. It’s natural to pass judgment even unintentionally when meeting another person for the first time.
If you approach someone incorrectly and then follow up with a “correct approach”, it will be infinitely more difficult to show a mentor your best intentions. Adapt a “first-time” approach and prepare before reaching out to a mentor. Read up on your mentors' published accomplishments and use those to create talking points and sharpen your self elevator pitch so you can feel comfortable knowing where you want this mentorship to achieve.
Mentors Exist Cross Industry
As your careers and self improvement journeys progress, you may find yourself needing a mentor in another industry that is not your own. If this happens, you may not need a long-term mentorship but rather a few consultations. You can reach out to mentors with your intentions or even stick with finding a consultant in the field. Keep your circle of mentors tight as they offer the overall focus that you need.
People Like Helping
Team leaders, managers and those who have the experience in their field to mentor are well, obviously busy people. But they are skilled in their crafts and they usually want to help. So, when you approach a mentor, convince them that you can purely benefit from their mentorship. And in return you can always offer to help them.
As specific as a Path as Possible
A precondition to obtaining a mentor and is crucial to finding the right one is to understand the path you want to be on. If it is a self journey for improvement or a goal in your long-term career, knowing what you want will add infinet more value to your mentorship.
Once You Know Your Path - Tool at Your Disposal
There are many ways to find mentors, searching for emails, going to conferences and more but I've done quite a bit of research on this one, and I am less but satisfied with the current traditional solutions. Instead, I am going to offer LinkedIn.
Finding Someone
Linkedin is the best and only source you really need to reach out to anyone in any industry. People like posting and often welcome connections from strangers especially when an industry connects them.
Use Linkedin at your disposal. Search for someone: 1. Physically close to you or 2. In the same industry 3. With a similar role to one you want in the future 4. Who you feel you can relate to
Message one ask at a time
Once you’ve found someone to reach out to, as before keep your requests concise and especially online, message one ask at a time. Here is a template for messaging someone:
Hello , If I may, I would like to introduce myself. I am a that lives in and I am looking to advance in . If you had 3 pieces of advice for someone like me, what would that be? Thank you and I am incredibly appreciative of your time,
In this way you hit them with a question that’s hard not to respond back.
Message at a later date
To prevent your connections from fading send a follow up message at a later date. Something like this:
Hi , Firstly, thank you for your prior advice. I have used your tips and landed an offering at . Since your help was key, I am wondering if I could pick your brain again. Do you think the offer is sufficient and is there grounds for negotiating a higher rate? Thanks again,You have made your connection part of your journey and they will most likely want to continue the help as long as you keep concise. They now know you and know your interests, so guiding you has become natural.
Push Back on New Mentors
Linkedin can offer endless connections to people but once you’ve found a mentor push back on obtaining new ones. I found that I needed two mentors ; one for my personal life and another for professional life. As mentors offer their help, reciprocate and offer something back. It can be some work or research help for the mentor but keeping the connection closed is key.
Keep it Cordial
Keep in mind some key events of your mentor:
Birthday
Remembering your mentor's birthday is a good excuse to reach out to them. Linkedin especially is keen to let connections know who is celebrating that day but also use Google calendar to remind you in advance so you can fully capitalize on preparing a message.
Family and Ongoings
You want to contribute to your mentor’s success so get to know them. Create a digital folder with some main information, like where they live, who they are married to and their kids’ names. Also, write down ideas on how you can help contribute to their success.
Be supportive on Social Media
Make sure to frequently like, share, and expose their content.
Offering compensation - Meet every 2 months
AMentors may not ask for money for the time they spend giving advice but just a few minutes with them can be invaluable. For me, a couple of minutes with mine, led to me to earn an extra half a million in my career. I strongly believe in meeting a mentor for 15 minutes every 2 months just to touch base. Offering compensation that the mentor is comfortable with will keep the connection alive and show your appreciation for them. Anywhere between $100 - $500 for their time is plausible because to get where you want to go may be nearly impossible without them, so investing is definitely worth it.