It also made me realise what I wanted from a mentor and that this would be different at different stages of my role within a university and at different times in my career. In fact the realisation that asking for help and pro-actively seeking a mentor is an important decision and is a positive step. Some people do not want mentoring and I can understand this as it is difficult to articulate difficulties or challenges that you have without feeling negative or feeling like a failure. But pro-actively seeking a mentor is a good thing to do and an opportunity. So you have to self-mentor in order to have the confidence to ask and go for it. Of course, there will be instances when people do not want to be a mentor, I have experienced this but for the most part people are very willing and engaging. I also wanted to make the decision myself as to who I would ask as I had a good idea of what I was looking for and I take it quite seriously.
The two previous mentors that I have had have both been very efficient and effective with a straight forward approach probably similar to mine. This has been useful as it enabled me to take their suggestions on board and fit them with a way of working that I could manage. But this time I thought it would be useful to ask someone who could give me a different perspective on challenges and also someone outside of the institution that I work in.
During 2012 - 2013 I worked at the University of Edinburgh as the Student Information Points Manager which was part of the university Student Experience Project. The Student Experience Project manager is Mark Wilkinson. He started in the role a few months after me and was my line manager for a while until I moved to Heriot-Watt. This meant that we got to know each other a bit over a short period of time so have a basis of trust and respect. As well as being very good at his job he is a person of integrity which is important to me in a mentor - trustworthy but not always too serious. Also he has a good way of pointing out things that you might be doing wrong without you feeling bad about it. I contacted him to see if he would be interested in mentoring and included a brief summary of what I was interested in discussing as broad headings.
Managing and leadership – similarities and differences
Managing people and managing teams within a professional service.
Change management - ideas about effectively managing a change project or initiative.
Influencing and negotiating
How to make the most of opportunities that arise within a University and recognising how they may be of use to me in my career development
He was happy to take part in mentoring and we agreed to meet up on a regular basis once or twice a semester. So far we have had 2 meetings and it has been very useful. In our first meeting we talked about a variety of topics, general and specific including:
Discussion about mentoring and what we could both gain from the experienceThe format of our meetings i.e. an opportunity to talk about
work situations in general and also an opportunity to look at specific
challenges and strategies for coping with and resolving them. Building teams – inheriting 'embedded staff' and how to clarify 'how you would like them to work' Values – recognising values and matching them to the role that
you work in. Common values bring common purpose to team. Finding a balance between seeking consensus and setting out a
position. Clarifying your position as a manager for your team and also for
line manager. Setting a challenge – one thing to work on before next meeting
So far so good and it has definitely been useful to look at things from a different perspective and from someone who I know but have not got a long history of working with closely. Mentoring, for me, is different to line managing - I have a line manager, she is very good, I'm not trying to replicate that working relationship. I don't feel under pressure to resolve issues which is good for me as in my normal working situation I am very solution focused. Mentoring is providing a structured and informed, by someone with experience and insight, opportunity for me to stand back and have a look at what I'm doing and what I would like to do.
