Curtis J. Crawford, Ph.D., is founder and CEO of XCEO, Inc., a consulting firm that specializes in executive leadership development, professional mentoring, and corporate governance practices.

Manager’s Guide to Mentoring Original Edition

By Curtis J. Crawford

The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.

Copyright © 2010 The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.
All rights reserved.
ISBN: 978-0-07-162798-6

Contents

Preface1. Mentoring and Coaching2. Managing and Mentoring3. Who Needs a Mentor?4. What to Expect From a Mentor5. The Professional Mentor6. The Formal Corporate Mentor7. The Informal Corporate Mentor8. The Peer-to-Peer Mentor9. The Friend or Family Mentor10. The Mentee11. Cross-Culture and Cross-Gender Mentoring12. Seeking a Mentor/Duration of Relationship13. How to Find and Hire a Mentor14. Concluding Thoughts on MentoringAppendix. Principles of Leadership for MentorsIndex

Excerpt

CHAPTER 1

Mentoring and Coaching

The need for personal leadership in business is at an all-time high. Personalleadership is, in fact, the last frontier for long-term competitive advantage. Icontinue to believe that extreme personal leadership is the foundation forbuilding excellence. In this regard, enlightened corporations must strive toincorporate people development into their management gene structure. Therefore,people development must evolve as a core competency for all companies thatstrive to achieve the highest levels of performance and yield the highestreturns to their shareowners.

Managers must learn to view talent as a way of building the long-term value ofthe organization.

They have a responsibility to identify talent within the organization and turnit into a leadership competitive advantage for the company. Managers must committo investing time and resources in developing leadership during times ofprosperity or scarcity.

All personal leadership development programs should be comprehensive. Thereshould be a variety of approaches available to meet the varying needs of theemployees within the organization. Managers must identify how each individual isunique and help that individual develop in such a way as to achieve his or hermaximum capability while contributing to the success of the organization.

Coaching and Mentoring in Personal Development Programs

There are many tools available to help managers develop their high-performanceand high-potential employees. They may choose to construct in-house programs todevelop the needed skills or they may take advantage of university and industry-related training programs. While there are many options for managers toconsider, coaching and mentoring are indispensable and should always be includedin personal leadership development programs.

Coaching and mentoring are two powerful means of helping employees develop.While I emphasize the importance of both programs, coaching and mentoring arenot the same.

Researchers have described coaching and mentoring as continuous processes.Neither is a one-time event. Mentoring and coaching are intended to developindividual skills, resulting in improved performance and accelerating personaldevelopment. Because of the perceived value of mentoring and coaching programs,they have become a part of the workplace, providing organizations with theopportunity to increase job satisfaction, personnel productivity, and employmentstability within their organizations. In fact, with the increase of diversity inthe workplace and the accelerated changes in the work environment, mentoring andcoaching have become essential components for managers and leaders.

Both coaching and mentoring form a relationship that coaches and mentorsdescribe as a “partnership.” However, mentoring and coaching are not the same.It is important for managers to understand the differences.

Differences Between Mentoring and Coaching

At a basic level, it seems easy enough to distinguish between coaching andmentoring:

* Coaching aims to improve performance on the job, in a specific area of skillsand knowledge.

* Mentoring aims to develop potential, helping an employee move beyond the job,toward career goals.

* Coaching tends to focus more specifically on present job responsibilities.

* Mentoring tends to focus more generally, to prepare for future jobresponsibilities.

* In coaching, there usually is a specified time frame for working with theemployee.

* In mentoring, the relationship is more likely to be for an indefinite time. Coaching typically consists of instruction, training, support, and timelyfeedback.

* Mentoring is based on education, experience, exposure, and inspiration.

One of the more important differences between mentoring and coaching is that thecoach helps the employee do his or her job better and the mentor helps theemployee make the transition to self-development and the ability to do otherjobs, to achieve goals beyond the present job situation. In short, a coach willhelp you do what you need to do, but a mentor will help you do what youwant to do.

Sometimes the term coach is used to mean executive coach,further blurring the basic distinction between coach and mentor. Thus, whencoaching is defined as “Partnering with clients in a thought-provoking andcreative process that inspires them to maximize their personal and professionalpotential” (International Coaching Federation, Code of Ethics,http://www.coachfederation.org), we recognize it as executive coaching.

There are many books and articles that purport to define the differences betweenexecutive coaching and mentoring. Some of the research suggests that thedifferences are minimal and, as you would expect, other research suggests,rather strongly, that there are substantial differences between executivecoaching and mentoring.

Some of these differences are associated with personal behavior. Some expertssuggest that an executive coach will value behaviors that are more oftenassociated with mentoring than with coaching. Some claim the mentor bringscareer and business knowledge, while an executive coach is not burdened by theclutter and therefore will provide a more independent perspective.

Mentoring and coaching programs are designed to enhance the individual skillsthat result in improved performance and accelerate personal development. Becauseof the perceived value of mentoring and coaching programs, they have become apart of the everyday workplace. They provide organizations with the opportunityto increase job satisfaction, personnel productivity, and employment stabilitywithin their organizations.

Both coaching and mentoring are “relationship-based” and frequently defined byscholars as “intervention” measures. In the counseling profession, therelationship between the coach, or mentor, and the client is often defined asthe “therapeutic alliance.” Coaches and mentors describe it as a “partnership.”Nonetheless, whether it is characterized as an intervention, alliance, orpartnership, it is the foundation for achieving a successful conclusion to theeffort.

Further, coaching and mentoring differ in several other ways. Historically, onesignificant difference has been in the level of formality with both approaches.Coaching programs have been more formal than mentoring programs. However, withthe advent of professional mentoring and formal corporate mentoring programs,they are now equal to, or more formal than many other types of coachingprograms. Other considerations, such as personal style and particularcircumstances, are also important.

Coaching Past

In prior years, coaching carried a negative management perception. It impliedthat an individual might need remedial assistance to achieve the expected levelof performance in the current job. It was used to help marginal performers. Inaddition, coaching was provided to assist persons demonstrating inappropriatepersonal behavior that was negatively affecting the business performance.

Coaching: Past Attitudes Prevail

Some continue to view coaching as a sign of weakness and risk. Conversely, themore enlightened managers and leaders see coaching quite differently. They viewcoaching as a potential competitive advantage for their organizations. Today,coaching is viewed as an investment in the company’s best people. Thoseindividuals who are fortunate enough to have a personal coach are viewed ashighly valued versus those in risk of losing their jobs.

Coaching, like many other intervention programs, is usually a one-on-oneexperience. Further, coaching tends to focus on a specific area of improvement,and there usually is a designated term to work on the associated issue. Forexample, a coach might work with a client for six months to improve his or her”team development” skills.

Focus on Individual Needs

One of the more important differences between mentoring and coaching is that thementor helps the mentee realize his or her career aspirations. The coach helpsthe employee perform his or her job better.

Clearly, there is substantial overlap between coaching and mentoring. And, inreality, it really does not matter. It is more important to focus on theparticular needs of the individual than to struggle to define differences.

Mentoring can be valuable to anyone in the organization, not just the leaders. Amentor is someone who can be trusted, who will listen, and who will providecandid feedback about concerns important to career advancement. All employeesshould have the opportunity to be guided by a mentor, but having or being amentor should never be mandatory. A mentoring program should link the interestsof the company to the interests of employees.

A mentor need not be a member of the mentee’s department or even work within theorganization. A mentor need not be a senior leader; he or she could be thementee’s supervisor or even a more experienced peer. The individual seeking amentor and his or her supervisor should decide together on a person who theybelieve would be a great mentor.

Coaching programs should be offered as an integral part of managing. Those whoparticipate in the program—coaches, supervisors, and managers—shouldbe well trained and guided by a process that ensures that employees participateactively in development programs. This helps them develop the skills andknowledge to be successful.

Mentoring, in contrast, is something of a privilege. Individuals should earn theopportunity to be mentored by performing well in their current jobresponsibilities. Candidates for mentoring are ambitious, upwardly mobile, eagerto learn, and seeking opportunities to contribute more to the success of theirorganizations and to advance in their careers.

Finally, it should be noted that coaching and mentoring are different fromsupervising in that coaches and mentors provide input that supervisors do not orshould not. For example, a coach or mentor might discuss topics unrelated to thesupervisor’s duties or, in some instances, discuss topics that would beinappropriate for a supervisor to broach.

Mentoring

Although the boundaries between executive coaching and mentoring are sometimesblurred, there is a substantial difference between them. Generally, we look fora coach when an individual is looking for opportunities to improve his or herjob performance. However, the coach usually is not expected to have comparablecareer experience and business knowledge to the person being coached. In otherwords, for example, some believe a person who coaches a sales executive does notneed to have substantial sales experience.

The core principle of coaching is a collaborative, egalitarian rather thanauthoritarian relationship between the coach and the coached. The primary focusis on developing solutions not analyzing problems. The relationship assumes thatemployees are competent and have a good attitude. The emphasis is oncollaboration between the coach and the coached. The coach does not necessarilyneed specific expertise in a particular area of learning to be effective. Therole of the coach is to expedite goal attainment through a systematicstep-by-step process and to help the employee sustain his or her new skills.(For more on this, you might want to check out A. Grant, Towards aPsychology of Coaching, University of Sydney, 2001, pp. 1–55.)

Those who study the difference between mentoring and coaching suggest that theymeet the requirements of two constituencies. They are the mentee (or the personbegin coached) and the organization (see P. Hawkins and N. Smith, “Coaching,Mentoring and Organisational Consulting,” Open University: Buckingham, 2006).Further, these researchers believe both coaching and mentoring have generallyignored the needs of the organization. They point out that it’s equallyimportant to consider both the needs of the organization and the individual insetting up such programs.

The term mentor derives from Homer’s Odyssey, in which Mentor was thewise and old friend of Odysseus. When Odysseus left to fight in the Trojan War,he entrusted Mentor with the care, guidance, and education of his son,Telemachus. The generic meaning of a mentor, then, is a parental figure whosponsors, guides, and instructs a younger individual.

We can define mentoring as a caring and supportive interpersonal relationshipbetween someone experienced and knowledgeable and someone less experienced andless knowledgeable. In this relationship, the mentee, or protégé, receivescareer-related and personal benefits. Mentoring facilitates the transfer ofknowledge, skills, attitudes, beliefs, and values. The essence of therelationship is that the mentor takes a direct and personal interest in theeducation, development, and success of the mentee.

A mentor has a responsibility to always maintain unquestionable confidentialitybetween himself or herself and the mentee. Trust is the foundation forestablishing and maintaining any effective working relationship between thementor and the mentee. On the other hand, an executive coach is most oftenexpected to report to the supervisor of the person being coached regarding theprogress that person is making.

Finally, mentors play many roles, very often including coaching function.However, our focus in this book is on the mentor in the role as a careerfacilitator.

Managing and Leading

It’s important for managers to understand and value the differences betweentheir management responsibilities and their leadership opportunities. Ingeneral, managers are responsible for producing results by directing the work ofothers. However, when managers become leaders, they inspire employees to performat levels that go far beyond the results gained from simply directing theirwork.

Extreme Personal Leadership

In my book, Corporate Rise: The X Principles of Extreme PersonalLeadership (XCEO, Inc., 2005), I discuss how great leaders take exceptionalactions that inspire creativity and ever-higher levels of performance. The bestmanagers know how to demonstrate personal leadership, which inspires people toperform at the highest levels of their capabilities. Successful managers areresponsible and accountable. Great leaders reach for the stars! I call suchleadership extreme personal leadership and I call such leadersX-Leaders.

Leading from the extreme (in the best sense of that idea) is the practice ofgoing far beyond the boundaries of conventional expectations. It is the pursuitof what may not seem possible from an ordinary perspective. It means settingaudacious goals and achieving them while playing by the rules. X-leaders want towin with a passion. They have a very positive attitude. They are results-drivenand they are uncompromising in their pursuit of excellence.

Leaders: Born or Made?

Many researchers have tried to determine whether the ability to lead is aninborn personal trait or whether it consists of a set of skills that can belearned. Persuasive arguments support both views, and I see some truth in both.

However, my experience tells me that the ability to lead is a set of knowledgeand skills that can be learned. Much of my own success as a leader is the resultof what I learned from some of the best and brightest leaders and visionaries inthe corporate world, together with what I gleaned from ineffective leaders.

Many ineffective leaders offer evidence that the power to influence change cancome in the form of pure authority granted through political patronage orinheritance. However, the ability to cause change also can come in the form ofleadership. In other words, even if an individual is not granted directauthority to make change, he or she still can affect change by using leadershipskills. In my view, leadership is an opportunity that can be earned.

Clearly, it takes power to become an extreme personal leader. The source of thatpower is an ability to lead that comes from within, results from knowledge andexperiences. Professional mentors recognize the most effective way to developthe power to influence the outcome of a particular situation is throughknowledge and skills. However, a person also can develop power through passion.Mentors who care very deeply about something and effectively show their passioncan earn the power to make positive changes in many environments.

Mentors help others develop plans and strategies to realize and achieve theirlong-term career aspirations. A successful mentor will help the protégé earn thepower to influence the appropriate outcomes, which are fundamental toaccelerated career advancement and personal growth.

Effective mentors must also be effective leaders. When appropriate, they mustdemonstrate the ability to function concurrently as personal career advisors andcorporate change agents.

(Continues…)
(Continues…)Excerpted from Manager’s Guide to Mentoring Original Edition by Curtis J. Crawford. Copyright © 2010 by The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc.. Excerpted by permission of The McGraw-Hill Companies, Inc..
All rights reserved. No part of this excerpt may be reproduced or reprinted without permission in writing from the publisher.
Excerpts are provided by Dial-A-Book Inc. solely for the personal use of visitors to this web site.