5 Benefits of being a mentor

 

Everyone has mentors in their life. This is the person you turn to for advice when you're not sure of how to move forward. This may be an official mentor mentee relationship, your favorite author, or even your favorite blog. ;) 

As you progress through your career and life you experience a vast array of situations and learn lessons through your success and failures. You can think of this experience like your encyclopedia and personal handbook on how to handle work and life. You refer back to it when presented with a similar situation. When you find a similar situation, you look back and what has worked in the past. You find yourself in a situation you've never been before and innovate to find a way through it, while adding that to your list of experiences.  This knowledge and experience is valuable in your personal and professional journey and even more valuable if you use it to help mentor others.

Here are 5 benefits of being a mentor. 

Improved Communication and Interpersonal Skills

Being a mentor requires you to communicate with other people. You may or may not be naturally inclined as an introvert or extrovert. Neither is a guarantee that you are a good communicator. Having to regularly talk to a mentee, whether in-person, on the phone, email or any other way, will cause you to naturally improve your communication and interpersonal skills. You'll need to think through how to simply communicate complex ideas as well as read your audience to gauge their level of understanding. This process will not only help you provide the best advice to your mentee it will also help you become a better communicator in your regular work and personal life.

Hone your own skills

We just mentioned that the need to regularly communicate with your mentee will help to make you a better communicator both in and outside of the mentee relationship. You'll also improve your skills in other ways. As you think through different situations that you've had in the past or that your mentee is facing, you'll stop and think through the best path forward. This will do multiple things for your skills. You'll be improving your problem solving skills by identifying the past path forward.  Increased emotional intelligence by needing to listen to and respond with empathy to your mentee you'll improve your ability to gauge and properly respond to the emotions of others. The very act of mentoring requires you to listen to situations and follow-up with them later and though this process you'll become better at closing the loop.

Improve your confidence

Nothing is a better confidence than being admired and appreciated for a job well done. While you may see the advice you're providing as elementary or simple it's not. If you think back to when you were new to a career or situation, you may have felt flustered and wished someone was there for you. The advice that you provide is often invaluable to helping an individual successfully navigate the challenges of life. Be proud of the help you're providing and know that your mentee is grateful for all that you do. 

Grow your professional network

As a mentee grows in their career they slowly move on to bigger and better things and need less coaching and support. They may graduate from the mentee role into a peer role and that's great. Not only have you helped them grow as a person but two things will happen. You've gained a valuable peer and ally as well as the opportunity to take on a new mentee.  Over your career this process will continually grow your professional network and influence across your own team or multiple organizations.

Personal growth

You may not be naturally inclined to talk to others or may feel uncomfortable. Put those feelings to the side. I myself am an introvert and have had to push those preferences aside in my mentor/mentee relationships. This has helped me grow as an individual. It's improved my emotional intelligence and made me more sensitive to the problems of others. This has had tremendous benefits in my professional life but also helped me to become more caring and empathetic in my personal life. You may have a completely different growth experience being a mentor, but the most important thing is that you will grow.

Being a mentor has tremendous benefits and there are probably even more. What benefits have you found from being a mentor? Thinking back to when you had a mentor, what did you find valuable about the experience?  Tell us below!