Mentoring vs Coaching

This week was all about mentoring vs coaching. If you've received both as part of your career development or as part of growing your business, you'll probably have an intuitive definition for either one. Here are a few useful pointers:

Mentoring: To share knowledge, skills and/or experience or make introductions to your network, to help another to develop and grow. Is mostly done over a longer time-period of time, from a few months to several years and some even cite life-long mentors. Mentoring is often more directive, with the mentor sharing their experience or insights with the mentee. Often it is the mentee who drives the relationship and it is usually not performance driven.

Coaching: To provide guidance to a client on their goals and help them reach their full potential. Unlike mentoring, coaching is non-directive and the coach is asking 'the right questions', providing the space, trust and confidence for the individual being coached to consider how they can address a particular challenge, can achieve more, reach their objectives and find capabilities within themselves. In coaching, it is often the coach who is driving the relationship and there will often be plans and outcomes/ goals are measured.

Whether you consider one over the other or both as an experiment to in-source advice into your life on a particular topic, challenge or are that you're keen to understand better. Working with someone who's able to guide and support can be a real game-changer. In the last 20 years I've worked with both mentors and coaches and their input into decision-making, helping to act as sounding boards or looking at a particular challenge through a new perspective, has been tremendously helpful.

If you're looking for support but don't yet know whether a mentor or a coach is better, have a look at the following steps to get more clarity:

1) Be really clear about what your challenge is you'd like help with, provide context around it, help people understand why it’s a challenge (how its impacting you/ your business) and maybe what you’ve already tried to address it and with what outcome. 

2) Then structure a SMART ask around it: “I need to understand how to do ABC because of XYZ, can you share how you’ve done this in the past or how I could go about doing ABC in the coming 1-2 months”. Be clear what you need from a mentor or coach or speak to people who've solved a similar challenge in the past

3) Define what success would look like for you in the situation and how a mentor or coach can help you; is it a ‘roadmap’, is it a special ‘way of doing things’ (an approach/ strategy), is it a specific introduction or are they acting as a sounding board for an idea etc. Be clear what you want from them and how they can best help you.

4) Agree a timeframe for the support overall, for example 3 – 12 months, are you seeking support on a weekly or monthly basis? Check for any show stoppers or bottom-out expectations

5) Pre-arrange regular meetings/ check-ins/catchups so its in everyone's diaries, this helps with ensuring there is continuous commitment and regularity.

What else

Acknowledge their support: People like to give, show gratitude to them in any way that feels comfortable. A simple Thank You goes a long way. You can also acknowledge their support through a formal or informal gift (from a card to pot plant or something they will appreciate, a book or personalised gift). You can also acknowledge their support online, e.g. on professional networking platforms such as LinkedIn.

2) Become an advisor: One of the most powerful ways of learning is through giving professional advice on areas that you’re strong in or where you can add value through special insights you’ve developed through your own experience and practice, whether in a vocational or other setting. Remember, what goes around comes around. 

What are your top tips to finding and working with a mentor or coach?