Behind every great leader is a great mentor. Getting advice and guidance from a senior person in your chosen field is one of the best ways to achieve your career goals. The CWC/Canwest Mentorship Program can match you with a senior member of the communications industry for one year of personalized coaching, counsel and leadership development. The program is informal – you and your mentor decide together on the nature and frequency of meetings, and the objectives and outcomes of the mentorship. This program is offered to CWC members only (excluding students).

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The Dos and Don'ts of Mentorship

Here are some general tips on building a positive relationship with a mentor:

DO:

• Explain what mentoring means to you. Use phrases such as “specific feedback about…”, “develop next steps for…”, “refine my strategy to…”

• Be clear about your measures of success for the partnership, such as becoming more comfortable in practicing a specific skill or clarifying your personal learning goals.

• State the timeframes you have in mind - how many meetings and over what period of time.

• Give options. Mentoring needn’t start immediately; you can also suggest an exploratory meeting to see if you both can benefit from a partnership, as well as ask for suggestions about others with the mentor’s skills and experience.

• Describe what you will invest to make the partnership a success, what you have done to prepare for a partnership, and what expertise you can offer a mentor (or the mentor’s organization) in return.

DON'T:

• Position mentoring as a “last ditch” alternative for career malaise.

• Speak disparagingly about your organization, boss or previous mentors.

• Describe mentoring as access to a mentor’s network, or as an attempt to trade on a mentor’s profile and contacts (mentoring is hard work for a mentoree, not a shortcut).

• Set measures of success that are outside the mentor’s control, such as a new job, new clients or a career change.

• Use terms such as “teach me all about…”, or, “tell me everything you know about…” in your pitch. A potential mentor doesn’t need another employee on a learning curve!

• Forget your manners. Hounding a potential mentor or demanding a quick response will not only lose you a potential mentor, it will damage you reputation.