Discussion points for the first mentoring meeting

Someone recently asked me to mentor them.

From past experience and looking around, I found this list to be a good starting point for our first meeting. I asked them to schedule the first meeting and I suggested that we would start with discussing the following points:

1. Introductions and experience background of each of us (let's please exchange resumes and/or brief autobiographies before the first meeting)
2. Goals? (for both of us)
3. Constraints, issues, boundaries, and considerations
3.1. Confidentiality
3.2. Duration, frequency, and Length of meetings (How long of a commitment will this be for? How often will we meet? How long will we meet each time?)
3.3. Checkpoints to assess the mentoring status and/or if we should continue
3.4. Considerations of environment: such as lack of confidence, new to position, etc.
3.5. How will we consider that we're reached the goal
3.6. Can we contact each other ad-hoc? Under what conditions and how?
4. Agenda for our meetings?
5. Who will take notes (i.e. action items, learnings, agenda for next meeting) and how will these notes be shared?

Big consideration for the first meeting: Is there any way that we can meet in person? Even if our periodic meetings must be on the phone, can we at least meet in person for the first meeting?


A few reference articles for mentoring:

• http://www.mentors.ca/mentorpartnertips.html
• http://www.rad.washington.edu/academics/mentor/pdf-forms/Mentors%20Checklist%20-%202%20-%201st%20mtg.pdf/view
• http://deptmed.med.som.jhmi.edu/faculty/body7.html
  

I'm open to suggestions for improving this list. Please leave a comment!

Notes from the Mentoring Conference call this past week

This past week, a good friend of mine, Ron Hadley, spoke on Mentoring on the PMlessonsLearned.com conference call I host.
The presentation is available at PMlessonsLearned.com (see the link for "Files and Presentations"). The recording is now available for the next few weeks by phone (for the phone number and access code for the phone recording see details on top left of PMlessonsLearned.com - It will be available until the next conference call on June 3rd) and the MP3 and other recordings will be available on-line in the next few weeks (see the link for archives on the website at PMlessonsLearned.com).

Here are my notes from the call:

• With Mentoring, go slow before you go fast
• Many people concentrate on "Who" to be mentored by before they concentrate on "What" to be mentored about. Take the time to plan the "What" first. Start with the goal in mind.
• Mentoring is a way to develop, so what are you trying to develop?
• Discuss strategies that are outside your comfort zone to be put into practice before the next meeting. This will push you to grow.
• An important value of mentoring: Mentoring builds relationships which works at the need to build "purpose at work" which builds retention of your best people.
• Start with a one year commitment, you can always keep going if it works well. This will set a goal and it isn't too long to commit to.
• Ron suggests that it's best to find someone in your company/organization but from another department. This will help you to learn to navigate your organization.
• Ron recommends that you make an agreement at the start of the mentoring.
• Types of mentoring: one on one or group mentoring. Group mentoring is starting to grow in use. The group presents and issue, brainstorms solutions and then at the meeting the following month they discuss how they handled it.
• It is best to have written goals for mentoring
• What should your mentoring work on? Try to get a 360 degree assessment. If you can't get one at work, then ask people what you should work on.
• Ron said one of the best lessons he learned from his mentor was that he was always bringing his lunch and eating alone, but the mentor told him he should never eat lunch alone. (note: I (Henry) suggest the book "Never Eat Alone" by Keith Ferrazzi)
• When asked what the best format is for a meeting with your mentor, Ron suggested: Review the progress of the last meeting's action items and discuss what needs to be done to move forward (discuss next steps and action items) for the next meeting. Ron suggests that mentoring meetings should be once a month and should last about 1 to 1.5 hours.
  
• Where to find a mentor? Ask at work (ask your manager first), church, and/or other organizations you belong to (PMlessonsLearned.com or your local PMI Chapter for example)
  

I hope you think about getting a mentor!

Are You in Transition?

I know a bunch of people in "transition" at this time. In other words, they're out of a job.
In all cases, it's not due to their lack of productivity, but due to so many companies cutting costs in this economy.

Today I talked with someone and gave him some thoughts about some ideas for job searching. He asked me to send him an email about it. So, I've put my thoughts here so that other can take advantage of these ideas too.


Networking:

Networking is the number one way that people find jobs. Here are some ideas of how to get started.

• International Networking group: Empowering Todays Professionals: etpnetwork.com - Rod Colon, a good friend, mentor, and past career coach founded this group. Look for great articles and if you join the ETP network (nominal fee) you gain access to great networking meetings, newsletter, phone calls, and more!
  
• Jibberjobber.com - Jason Alba (his website has great info too) created this jibberjobber.com website to track your career. In addition to the tracking tool, it has lots of free information in the blog, library and more. Here's a recent article on his blog titled "Where to Find Network Contacts" - he also hosts free

Places to Look for Jobs:

• Follow Job Angels on Twitter
• Build a network for yourself in linkedin.com
  

Books I suggest you read right away:

• "Never Eat Alone" by Keith Ferrazzi - this will teach you how to network with ease. I hear his new book "Who's Got Your Back" is also very good.
  
• "How to Win Friends and Influence People" - This book will teach you principles on how to win a job, win a career, and more than that, how to be a great friend to people. Written by Dale Carnegie decades ago, you can pick the book up for very little money, but you'll find great value in it.
• "Rites of Passage" by John Lucht - This book has great information for the job search, including one great lesson I learned about interviewing: Whenever asked a question, only speak for two minutes.
• Vega Consulting - Kim Shand and Maggie DaRonco have been great help to me personally and others in our PMlessonsLearned.com group. They will be especially helpful to you if you're in I.T., but if you want any general job search or career information they are there to help. They believe, like Zig Ziglar says, that if they keep giving to others it will come back to them.
  

If you're in New Jersey, you can also take advantage of these opportunities:

• The Breakfast Club of New Jersey: I've not been to this group, but have heard great reviews of it.
  
• Dover Professional Services Group (PSG: doverpsg.com): This group is open to all professionals who are in the NJ Unemployment system. I am a past member and found the group very helpful. I highly recommend it.

I hope to add more information in this post soon, so keep stopping back!

Phone Interview Pointers for interviewees

Well, It's been a bit since I conducted phone interviews, but I had to do some more today.

I know a lot of people out of work right now and thought they might benefit from what I found myself doing in these phone interviews (most of them apply to face-to-face interviews as well):

1. It's true - phone interviews are to screen people out. So, don't give the interviewer any ammunition. Give as little information as required so that you get called in for a face-to-face interview. Keep in mind the entertainers credo: always leave the audience in a way where they want more.

2. Keep your replies brief - I had a few too many times when I asked a question and wanted a short reply and the person talked on and on, much of the talking off subject! I always try to keep in mind what John Lucht says in his book "Rites of Passage:" when in an interview, try to keep your response to 2 minutes or less and end with a variation of "I hope that answers your question, or is there something else you'd like to know?"

3. Be a good listener: I was surprised at how some people heard my question and went off onto another subject without answering my question. Maybe it was because they didn't know the answer or because they weren't listening to the question closely, but it didn't reflect well on them.

4. Show some initiative: I had one interviewee who asked if they could send me a paper they wrote on a subject I asked about. It was a clever way to get my email address to follow-up. Another interviewee said they had researched the group I am in, so he knew what we do. These all demonstrate someone with initiative, a very valuable trait for us interviewers to find in someone.

5. Close the conversation with a question: Some people just said thanks and they hoped to hear from me again. That's nice. However, one asked when he would hear from me again and asked to be kept in the loop while waiting.

Another person, with even more initiative, asked when we would make the decision and who else he would need to talk to before the decision was made. He mentioned that he needed to know because he had other opportunities he was holding off. It showed he was interested. For someone who might be a strong candidate, this might give them an indication of how well they did because it might cause the interviewer to try to "sell" the position. It might also make the interviewer realize that they need to make a decision before the candidate takes another position.