Get yourself connected
"I'm all right thank you; I can manage
quite well by myself." Is that you? Is that you keeping yourself and
your dilemmas to yourself? As Ruth
Chambers ;explains, you need a mentor
A mentor could help
you at any stage in your career. Sure, you can manage without, but a mentor
could help to guide you and challenge you about your career. The increasing
pressures in the NHS mean that it's vital to find new ways of coping
and thriving at work. A mentor could enable you to reflect on your current
situation, your strengths and weaknesses, and your aspirations. They could
help you to grow and develop in your career, not spoon feed or sponsor you,
but help you to give yourself a push or find solutions to your career or
personal issues. Box 1 describes the benefits for you.
Box 1: Why have a mentor?1
Mentoring
- Boosts your development:
- Stepping stone to other
opportunities
- Encourages your deeper insights
- Increases your confidence over time:
- Supports you
- Challenges you to justify your
chosen course of action
- Offers you alternative
perspectives
- Helps you to take control, for example, of aspects of your
work or career development
- Encourages your reflective practice as your mentor
can:
- Act as a sounding board
- Increase your understanding of your own environment, and
influences on your performance
- Enable you to solve problems
- Enhances your self development through:
- Action planning and learning
- Goal
setting - creating your learning contract, visualising your
achievements.
- Developing your professional
confidence
- Giving you a greater understanding of the perspectives of
others
- Increasing job satisfaction
Box 2 gives a definition of a mentor that is
generally accepted, so you know the sort of process you'll be
engaging in, and will not have unrealistic expectations.
Box 2: Definition of a mentor
A "process whereby an experienced, highly
regarded, empathic person (the mentor), guides another individual (the
mentee) in the development and re-examination of their own ideas, learning,
and personal and professional development. The mentor, who often, but not
necessarily, works in the same organisation or field as the mentee,
achieves this by listening and talking in confidence to the mentee."2
Here's your starting point
Think what part of your career or life a mentor can
help you with. Be sure what kind of outcomes you're hoping for so you
know what kind of experience, qualities, and commitment you're
expecting your mentor to have.
When you read box 3 and see the sort of qualities and
skills that a mentor should have, you'll wonder if you can ever find
such a saint. Some of these qualities will be more important to you than
others and there may be others you'd want to add, maybe relating to
sex, age, type of background, or experience.
Box 3: Qualities of the mentor you're hoping for1
Essential
- Impartial
- Good listener
- Supportive
- Interested
- Perceptive
- Nonjudgmental
- Trustworthy
- Ethical
- Respectful
- Confidential
- Skilled in feedback
- Chemistry - intellectual and emotional compatibility with you
- Able to challenge
Desirable
- Experience
- Technical expertise
- Patience
- Authority
- Adviser
- Seniority
- Knowledge of the health service
- Inspiring
Finding a mentor
Or two. Because actually you might want one mentor who
can focus on your career - and a second mentor who is experienced in
another of your goals, say personal effectiveness, or even setting up in a
business.
Find out from your deanery or trust if they run a
mentoring scheme or can fix you up with one or more potential
mentors - because you'll want a choice. No luck? Then you need to
seek someone yourself. Treat finding a mentor like searching for your
perfect holiday. Do your homework. Think of all the possibilities. Is there
a list of people who might be willing to be mentors - in your
trust, in the library, or on a website? Decide what sort of person you
need, do some research, go and visit a few people and see whether or not
you think you would be able to build a rapport with them in a mentoring
relationship.
Sometimes it is easier and more comfortable to choose
somebody who has a similar personality to yourself or who has had similar
professional or life experiences. Although it may feel easier to remain in
your comfort zone, you may learn more from selecting a mentor who views the
world differently to you and can offer a broader or more diverse
perspective from your own. A mentor who challenges you will be likely to be
more effective than one with whom you have a cosy relationship.
Ruth Chambers, clinical dean and general practitioner, Staffordshire University
Email: R.Chambers@staffs.ac.uk
studentBMJ 2005;13:221-264 June ISSN 0966-6494
- Bayley H, Chambers R, Donovan C. The good mentoring toolkit for healthcare. Oxford: Radcliffe Medical Press, 2004.
- Standing Committee on Postgraduate Medical and Dental Education (SCOPME). Supporting doctors and dentists at work. An enquiry into mentoring. London: SCOPME, 1998.
