Motivational Maps as a Relationship Accelerator Series: Mentoring

Using Maps to Support Mentor-Mentee Relationships

The Harvard Business Review defines mentoring as “the offering of advice, information or guidance by a person with useful experience, skills or expertise for another individual’s personal and professional development.”

Mentorship is increasingly seen as necessary with the shift to remote work. Research has shown that younger workers received less mentoring than before the pandemic. Rather than leaving a younger generation unprepared, some employers see mentoring as a natural way to engage an experienced workforce to support the next generation.  

 “Mentoring improves motivation (…) mentoring adds a certain drive to most mentors, especially if they have already climbed to their desired position and have come to a standstill within their career. Mentoring can open a lot more doors and provide a different perspective on their own job."

Yet, if mentoring is such an asset, why are workers so often left to their own devices to develop those relationships in the workplace? Are there tools that support building a fruitful and goal-oriented mentor/mentee relationship?  

Finding your Mentor or your Mentee

The following elements are key to establishing a good mentor-mentee relationship for organizations with formal mentoring programs.

• An application process where the mentor and mentee can state their goals and expectations for the relationship;
• A tool to match and guide mentors and mentees as they build their working relationship;
• An appreciative tool or process to evaluate what went well in the pairing and what value it brought to each party.

Whatever the organization's size, having a practical approach for matching mentors with mentees and building the relationship is crucial for participants to support each other purposefully and with tools to tweak the relationship as needed.

Motivational Maps help mentor and mentee gain awareness of their own motivational energies and those of their counterparts. It provides insight into our decision-making, communication styles, and relationship to change.   

For formal and self-directed mentor/mentee pairings, a dual map debrief can be a fun, insightful, and productive first step to forging a relationship and establishing trust.

In a more structured employer-led mentorship program, having potential mentors and mentees complete maps can help establish a set of "matching" suggestions. Then, once pairings are made, the mentor and mentee can use the Maps profiles to get to know each other from the angle of motivational energy, which complements resumes and goal statements.

Matching for Similarities or Differences

Maps profiles are golden in how scores point to similar or differing motivational energies, decision-making, and communication styles. A pairing can be initiated when a mentee has found a potential mentor whose perspective and professional journey they respect and want to learn from, and the mentor is willing and available. The Maps provide the information the pair needs to navigate differences and similarities in motivational energies, shed light on blind spots, and begin to share a common language.

What kind of information do the Map profiles reveal? Let us look at decision-making styles. 

Someone primarily motivated by Growth factors (making a difference, freedom, and creativity) relies more on their gut to make decisions and what they know and value. Their decision-making style is fast, based on "just the key facts." Others more motivated by Relationship factors are highly geared to feeling, reflecting their need for security, belonging, and recognition. They will require details and time before they feel it's safe to decide. Those more fuelled by motivators in the Achievement cluster are thinkers who care about control, creating wealth, and developing expertise. Their decision-making is based on data and concrete information, more so than the first group of motivators, but occurs faster than those primarily motivated through relationship motivators.

Figure 1 illustrates the rate of change and speed of each motivational cluster.

(For a review of the nine motivators and categories of motivators, please click here.)

A Motivational Map profile can also point to whether a person is change-friendly, change-averse, or mildly open to change, as well as their risk tolerance. The graphic above illustrates the link between change agility and decision-making in each cluster. 

For a mentee, being mentored by someone with a different motivational profile can be very helpful. Let's consider this example from a recent assignment:

Karine and Sonia

This case is based on an authentic work situation. Names and specific details have been changed for the article.

Karine and Sonia work in a mid-size federal agency with a strong public safety mandate that predominantly employs individuals with a scientific background. 

The agency has a mentoring program to support the professional evolution of persons less represented in leadership roles or the workplace at large. 

Karine is a director. She has enjoyed all assignments she has held in a twenty-five-year career at the agency, but this science graduate will be the first to admit that her leadership roles were not particularly planned. She was invited to apply for progressively more responsible positions and learned she enjoyed developing new skills and working with teams to achieve goals. She particularly values the relationships she has developed through working in various agency departments.

Sonia describes herself as happy and motivated in her current front-facing role, involving site inspections and working with clients to improve performance, a position Karine has previously occupied. Sonia admits that management does not seem appealing to her. She loves her current job and feels the agency provides her with purposeful work where she can constantly build and share her knowledge with clients and colleagues. For her, finding a mentor means continuing to learn and grow her career.

Karine and Sonia's Motivational Map profile scores reflected their shared and non-shared motivators and confirmed that both are very motivated in their current roles. They have just begun meeting as a mentor-mentee duo and want to use their Motivational Maps results to get to know each other better and plot out some objectives for their time together.   

Shared motivation

In sharing their joint results, Karine and Sonia's Motivational Map Practitioner used their individual scores to produce a "team of two" report, showing their joint motivator scores in decreasing order.   

This duo's results showed that they each had strong Growth energy through a shared Searcher "top-three" motivator. A Searcher's need is for meaning and making a difference. Their professional activities must be important for their own sake, not for money or status. They are big-picture thinkers who need and enjoy variety.  

For Karine and Sonia, this shared motivation presents the shared values from which their relationship can grow. Karine and Sonia may be motivated by different factors, but this shared strong motivator reflects their commitment to their agency because of a shared sense of the good it does in the world. They are also highly motivated because of how they can contribute to this goal in their respective role. Knowing their shared values is a fine place to begin a mentor-mentee relationship. 

Key differences to leverage the mentoring relationship

Sonia, the Expert

With a very high Expert and high Searcher, Sonia values holding and sharing expertise (Expert) and being listened to and consulted (Searcher). For Sonia, managing a team where the team members have the expert knowledge, not her, would be strange, even demotivating. Interestingly, this is something Karine has done several times in her career. Karine's "Expert" is in the middle range scores. Acquiring and sharing knowledge is not a primary source of motivation for her.

Karine, the Friend

Karine's highest motivation score of Searcher is closely followed by Friend, which comes with a pronounced need for belonging, nourishing, and fulfilling relationships in one's professional and personal life. People with a high Friend value team players and collaborative environments. They want to build supportive relationships. Sonia's "Friend" score is in the middle range. For her, a sense of belonging and fulfilling relationships is not a primary source of motivation at work.

Director Energy

Reviewing Director motivator (values being in control or in charge, making decisions or having influence over them) scores makes sense for Mentor-Mentee duos. It is a marker for interest in management roles and will often be a motivator in individuals with those responsibilities.    

Sonia's leadership in her team and her strong work ethic have been noticed, but she is not interested in a management role, which is reflected in the "Director" motivation being her lowest score. Karine, having a similar academic background as Sonia, wants to encourage her to keep an open mind while respecting Sonia's strong sense of engagement and fulfillment in her current role.

Where could this mentor-mentee relationship go?

Karine will be able to advise Sonia on formal and informal leadership roles that may require strong subject matter expertise, as Sonia is not interested in management for management's sake.

A natural networker, Karine would be able to guide Sonia in identifying key contacts for her development in the agency and make those introductions on her behalf. The employer is keen to hold on to highly motivated subject matter experts such as Sonia and wants to keep them engaged. Exposure to different sectors and teams through special projects and job shadowing could contribute to broadening her knowledge of how the agency operates and keep this active learner engaged. Already, Sonia has shown leadership in organizing monthly learning activities in her sector. 

Communication styles, goal setting

Both Karine and Sonia have motivations in at least two motivation clusters. Karine, with Growth (big picture – conceptual) and Relationship energy (detail-oriented) is adept at navigating between communication styles depending on the situation's demands. Sonia's high Expert (Achievement Cluster) is balanced with considerable Growth energy in Searcher and Creator. Sonia balances the Achievement Cluster's logical, coherent, and planful approach with the big-picture focus of the Growth motivators. 

Sonia's motivation profile will drive her to want structure, including in her mentor-mentee relationship. She wants to learn and set clear goals and objectives. She wants to know and feel that she is progressing. This will be good insight for the more relationship-focused Karine so that the mentoring is not only based on broad objectives but clear milestones.

Top motivator values and potential for tension

Karine and Sonia are getting along so well that they can't imagine having sources of tension between them. And yet, they were intrigued to learn about the factors that can create tension for them in teams.  

The table below shows how motivators are associated with reactions and triggers in tense or conflictual situations. 

(To learn more about Motivational Maps and navigating tensions in teamwork, refer to our previous articles by clicking here for Part I and here for Part II.)

Both mentor and mentee recognized they could be more comfortable with conflict. They saw where their motivation profile might point to opportunities for development and strengths when facing conflictual situations. 

While Sonia has experienced feeling drained in teams exhibiting emotional conflicts, she knows she can rely on her expertise with a calm and reassuring demeanor when stakeholders are upset by a less-than-stellar inspection report.   

Karine, an empathic listener, has learned to sit with conflict to find out what people need and want rather than try to rush people into a harmonious resolution. She is also much better at expressing her own needs and boundaries. Karine admits this was not always the case. She now draws more on Searcher's energy to depersonalize conflict and remain the engaged listener focused on resolution for the good of the whole.  

By exploring their relationship to tension and conflict, Karine and Sonia now know they can have trust-based discussions should they face tensions in their relationship or elsewhere. 

In Conclusion

Leaders often have a story of encountering a more senior colleague or advisor who tried to convince them they would be fabulous - if only they were a bit more like this and less like that. In fact, their distinctive trait could be the "superpower" that has enabled them to survive and thrive. While all advice can have a kernel of truth and value, changing the other is certainly not the goal of a mentoring relationship.

Offering or receiving mentoring from someone with a different motivational profile can be very rewarding if those differences are acknowledged and honored.

"Leader, know thyself" is the first lesson of leadership. The second, is that not everyone thinks or behaves like us, has similar preferences or dispositions. Knowing how to leverage and respect diversity in human beings on our teams with compassion is the key to outstanding leadership. Motivational Maps is an effective tool to build and support mentoring relationships that honor differences and foster mutual growth and self-discovery.

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Marie-France Lefort is a certified Motivational Map practitioner, coach and group facilitator based in Hamilton. You can reach Marie-France at mariefrance@mariefrancelefort.com

Suzanne Drouin is a Certified Integral Master Coach, ICF Certified, and Motivational Map Practitioner based in Ottawa. You can reach Suzanne at suzdrouin.coaching@gmail.com