Effective Mentorship: How to Prepare for the First Meeting and Ask the Right Questions | xoreni
Summary
TLDRIn this video, Renny discusses the importance of mentorship and how to make the most of your first meeting with a mentor. She emphasizes the need to understand the purpose of the mentorship and to prepare well by researching the mentor beforehand. Renny suggests starting with an introduction and then asking specific questions related to career progression. She provides examples of questions to ask, such as about their career journey, challenges faced, and advice for growth. Renny also advises on how to handle the end of the meeting, including expressing interest in continuing the mentorship and sending a thank you note afterwards.
Takeaways
- 😀 The initial mentorship meeting is an opportunity to get to know the mentor and decide if you want to continue the relationship.
- 🔍 Before entering a mentorship, understand the purpose of the relationship and ensure your questions align with that purpose.
- 👤 It's important to research your mentor beforehand to know their background and expertise.
- 🗣️ As a mentee, take the initiative to run the meeting and come prepared with an agenda and questions.
- 👋 Start the meeting with an introduction of yourself and your goals for the mentorship.
- ❄️ Use icebreakers to establish a personal connection and find common ground with your mentor.
- 📝 Prepare a list of specific questions related to career progression or other areas you want to learn about.
- 🚀 Ask about pivotal steps your mentor took in their career and any mistakes they made to learn from their experiences.
- 🤔 Pose situational questions to get advice on specific challenges or scenarios you're facing.
- 🤝 Inquire about what your mentor values in a mentee and what they believe makes a mentorship relationship mutually beneficial.
- 💌 Always send a thank you note after the meeting to express gratitude for their time and insights.
Q & A
What is the main purpose of a first meeting with a potential mentor?
-The main purpose of a first meeting with a potential mentor is to get to know them, understand their background and expertise, and decide if you want to continue the mentorship relationship.
Why is it important to know the purpose of the mentorship relationship before starting?
-Knowing the purpose of the mentorship relationship is important because it guides the direction of the questions you ask and the topics you discuss, ensuring that the mentorship aligns with your specific goals and needs.
How should one prepare for a mentorship meeting?
-One should prepare for a mentorship meeting by researching the mentor, preparing an introduction about themselves and their goals, and having a list of specific questions related to their mentorship objectives.
What are some icebreakers that can be used to start a mentorship meeting?
-Icebreakers can include mentioning common interests or experiences found on the mentor's profile, such as working at the same company or running a podcast, to build rapport and create a comfortable conversational environment.
Why is it important to have questions prepared for a mentorship meeting?
-Having questions prepared ensures that the meeting is productive and that you cover all the topics you wish to discuss. It also helps to keep the conversation flowing and provides a fallback if the discussion stalls.
What type of questions should one ask during a mentorship meeting focused on career progression?
-Questions should be focused on the mentor's career journey, their experiences, and advice for career advancement. Examples include asking about pivotal steps in their career, the value of formal education like an MBA, and how to handle situations where one feels underqualified for a role.
How can situational questions benefit a mentorship meeting?
-Situational questions allow the mentor to provide specific advice tailored to the mentee's current challenges or experiences, making the mentorship more practical and applicable to real-life scenarios.
What are some examples of situational questions to ask during a mentorship meeting?
-Examples include asking for advice on receiving constructive criticism, selling an idea to stakeholders, preparing for a performance review, and improving delegation skills.
Why is it important to discuss the value of mentorship and what both parties can contribute during the first meeting?
-Discussing the value of mentorship and mutual contributions helps set expectations and ensures that both the mentor and mentee understand and agree on the goals and benefits of the relationship.
How should one follow up after a mentorship meeting?
-One should send a thank you note expressing gratitude for the mentor's time and insights. This follow-up helps to leave a positive impression and maintain the connection for future interactions.
Outlines
🤝 Introduction to Mentorship
The paragraph introduces the concept of mentorship by comparing it to a first date, emphasizing the importance of understanding the purpose of the relationship. The speaker, Renny, encourages viewers to prepare for a mentorship meeting by researching the mentor and having clear goals. It's suggested to start with an introduction and to ask open-ended questions to get to know the mentor better. The paragraph also highlights the importance of mentees taking the initiative in running the meeting and being prepared with questions to ensure a productive mentorship.
🎓 Career Progression and Education
This paragraph delves into questions that focus on career progression and the value of formal education. It discusses the importance of understanding the mentor's journey and their views on whether an MBA or similar education is necessary for career advancement. The speaker suggests asking about pivotal steps in the mentor's career and their approach to roles they weren't initially qualified for. It also touches on the idea of becoming a leader without a leadership position and the importance of learning from the mentor's mistakes.
🤔 Situational and Mentorship-Specific Questions
The final paragraph discusses the value of situational questions that allow the mentor to provide guidance based on specific scenarios the mentee might be facing. It includes examples of such questions, ranging from dealing with unhelpful feedback to selling ideas effectively. The speaker also recommends asking mentorship-specific questions to understand the mentor's expectations and values. The paragraph concludes with advice on how to establish the frequency of future meetings and the importance of sending a thank-you note after the mentorship session, emphasizing the value of expressing gratitude.
Mindmap
Keywords
💡Mentorship
💡Career Progression
💡Introduction
💡Agenda
💡Icebreakers
💡Management Role
💡Leadership
💡Mistakes
💡Situational Questions
💡Reciprocity
💡Thank You Note
Highlights
The importance of understanding the purpose of mentorship before entering a mentorship relationship.
The necessity of knowing your mentor's background before the first meeting.
The mentee's responsibility to prepare and lead the mentorship meeting.
The suggestion to conduct research on your mentor using platforms like Google and LinkedIn.
The value of starting the mentorship meeting with personal introductions.
Using icebreakers to establish a connection beyond professional interests.
Asking about the mentor's past experiences and lessons learned from their career.
Inquiring about pivotal steps that advanced the mentor's career.
Discussing the necessity of formal education like an MBA for career progression.
Understanding how to approach a role for which one might not be fully qualified.
Learning how to demonstrate leadership qualities without a leadership position.
Gathering insights on avoiding significant career mistakes from the mentor's experience.
Seeking advice on how to position oneself for growth within a company.
Asking situational questions to get specific guidance on current challenges.
Understanding what the mentor values in a mentee and what they expect from the relationship.
Discussing the mutual benefits of mentorship and how to make it a successful partnership.
The significance of sending a thank you note after the mentorship meeting to show appreciation.
Transcripts
just like when you have a first date
with someone this is your opportunity to
get to know them
and decide if you want to carry on with
them
[Music]
hi everyone welcome back to my channel
my name is renny
thank you so much for taking your time
out of your busy day to watch this video
so make sure you like comment and
subscribe before we start
and today we'll be talking all about
mentorship so i know i just did a video
about mentorship
and it was pretty well received a lot of
you asked for
a video about the specific questions i
would ask during a mentorship meeting
so that's what i'm going to do today so
let's set the scene
let's say this is someone that you are
meeting for the very first
time somebody introduced you to and
you're meeting them for the very first
time either online
or in person the first thing that you
need to know before you enter a
mentorship relationship
and i've said this before you need to
know the purpose of the mentorship
relationship
so if you're looking to for them to help
you with career progression
make sure that the questions you ask are
revolving around career progression so
with your first meeting with your mentor
it's really all about getting to know
them
if you're if this is a mentorship that
will last for months and months and
months
if it's not then you may want to dive
into a lot of the questions
at the beginning but still make sure you
start with an introduction of
you and them ideally and i emphasize
this you should know a lot about your
mentor before
the relationship even starts so if
someone connects you with someone
make sure you're doing your googles
you're searching on linkedin and you're
getting to know all about that person
so you can it's basically like you're
you're going for an interview you know
about that person and what they do
they can tell you more about what they
do but just know a general high level so
it's not like you're going in blind
remember that as a mentee the onus is on
you
to run this meeting so the mentor should
only do as much as you do as the mentee
so if you come unprepared and you have
no questions
you don't have an agenda set for the
meeting you can't expect the mentor to
do that so i would introduce myself and
tell them a little bit about me
and my goals for this mentorship and
then ask them about themselves when you
first sit down you would say something
like
hi lisa thank you so much for taking
your time to meet me
i was so happy when billy was able to
introduce you to me
so i am currently working in digital
marketing at
this company and i am working in digital
marketing but i'm so
interested in getting to know more about
print marketing
i know that you are the head of print at
this company and i would just love to
learn more from you
and get to know some of the projects
you're working on and any opportunities
that are available
where you work i really want to learn
from you and learn about your career
progression
and hopefully build a long-term
relationship with regular meetings so
that i can
learn from you so this is a great way to
start the meeting if
you are just getting to know them for
the first time
i also recommend even before this you
start off with
some icebreakers not formal icebreaker
games like you would play
at an event or something but just
getting to know them if you
saw on their profile that they worked at
the same company as you that's something
to mention or if you see that they run a
podcast
that's something to also mention as well
don't be creepy about it
make sure it doesn't seem like you're
digging in too deep before you even met
them in person
but just knowing a bit about them and
building with them on a level
not just professionally but personally
is a great asset
and it will help for longevity in the
relationship once you've had this
introduction both personal
and professional and you've established
that you want to discuss career
progression
i would ask questions specific to career
progression
i always come to my meetings with a few
questions prepared actually not a few i
usually have like 10 or 15 questions
prepared
but of course i usually don't have to
ask all of them because the conversation
flows naturally
however you it's always good to have
those prepared just so that
in case you are stuck and you have
nothing else to say you can think
you can just look at your notes and ask
them specific questions
don't worry it's okay to have your notes
there there's no harm in that
especially with virtual meetings they
won't even know that you have your notes
there
so make sure that you have notes and
you're prepared for every single meeting
that you may have so these are some
great questions that i
i've asked in the past relating to
career progression
and some questions that you can ask as
well the first question is
what do you wish you knew before you
took your first management role
this is a great question for getting the
person to open up and tell you about
their history
and of course in the introduction they
should have told you about where they
started and the roles leading up to
where you are right now but again this
allows them to tell you okay these are
the mistakes i made
losing up to this role that i'm in now
and i really wish that i had done
xyz before the second question would be
what is a pivotal step that you took
that propelled your career to move into
a management role
do you believe that getting an mba is
necessary so this
is a great question for learning exactly
what the person did to get them into the
world they currently
in and it also lets you know whether
they think that getting
education formal education is necessary
in order to
get into this role for some roles it's
actually necessary for you to go back to
school in order to get it
but for a lot of them a lot of people
will say no like there's no need to
waste your money on an mba so this is a
great way to gauge
and of course as i said before you
always need to have a board of directors
which is your
group of mentors so some mentors may
have different opinions on this but it's
just good to get people's feedback and
see how they
see their journey thus far next question
is was there ever a role you applied for
and landed but weren't 100 qualified to
do so
how do you approach it to ensure that
you don't disappoint anybody
this is a great question to ask if you
are in a similar position
so for example if your manager is
preparing you to move into a more senior
role but you feel like you're not
qualified
this would be a great way to ask a
mentor and see what they think i think
most mentors
whenever i've asked this question have
said just go for it this is a great
opportunity many people don't get pushed
into roles
they actually prove themselves many many
times before and often get passed over
for a role
so if you're able to get this
opportunity definitely make sure that
you take it
another question would be how do i
become a leader
even if i'm not in a leadership position
so i find that this is a great question
to ask and a lot of people are very
intrigued by this question
because as many of us we are individual
contributors or project managers so we
are not in that level
that we are we are people managers but
we want to get there so this is a great
way to see
how you can prove yourself while you're
an individual contributor or
a people or a project manager and
hopefully that will allow you to become
a people manager
so again learning from their experience
another great question that i like
is what is one of the biggest mistakes
you've made career-wise that i
should avoid so this allows you to again
to learn from their mistakes mentorship
is
a guide who is taking you through their
life and allowing you to not mistake
make the mistakes
they made so asking a direct question
like this allows them to give you
it straight and easy okay they can tell
you exactly what mistakes they made
and what not to do one more question
that i would ask in relation to career
progression
is when you've outgrown your role but
want to remain within the company
how do you position it to management so
that you don't hurt the relationship
i think this is something that many of
us face especially if you work in a
large organization there's a way to
navigate things
because of all the politics that go on
and bureaucracy that goes on
so people who are more senior than you
are able to teach you and
teach you how to navigate these
situations some other questions that and
these are the ones that i find most
valuable
are the situational questions i think
these are some of the best questions to
ask
because you're actually asking i did
this
and i want to know your opinion on it or
i want to know how i should approach it
in the future
i'll just give you a few examples of
these questions
so number one would be my manager is
constantly giving me
feedback such as you're amazing you're
great when i ask for a genuine critique
she says i'm perfect and then there's
nothing wrong
how do you approach a situation like
that to get more constructive criticism
a second question would be so say the
person that you're
reaching out to is in sales you would
reach out to them and
quote their sales experience so you say
as someone in sales
what are your tips on how to sell
someone on an idea you are pitching
recently i have been presenting many
projects to management and i want to
learn how to get
buy-in from key stakeholders so one more
question would be
a question about a situation that's
going on that
everybody has to face so something like
a performance review my performance
review is coming up
what type of preparation do you most
appreciate seeing from your employees
one last situational question that i'll
give you is
i tried to delegate a task last week and
it did not go well
can we work through what to do
differently next time
lastly i'll just give you some questions
about
mentorship specifically that you can ask
that your mentor
so if you're looking to make this an
ongoing relationship i would ask some
questions
such as what do you value in a mentor
and what do you value in a mentee this
is a great way to know what their
expectations are from the jump
you know exactly what they're looking
for and if you cannot provide that of
course
make sure you ballo and you do not
continue to have this relationship
or if their values don't align with
yours make sure you bow out another
question would be
to you what is the value of mentorship
and how do both parties work together to
make it
mutually beneficial you wanted to get to
know as much about this person as
possible before you decide to go
on a second mentorship meeting it's just
like when you have a first date with
someone this is your opportunity to get
to know them
and decide if you want to carry on with
them and after you ask all of these
questions
make sure that you establish if you want
to continue make sure that you establish
how regularly you want to meet so after
you say thank you so much i
like i appreciate your time you then
express
that you would like to make this an
ongoing thing so you can gauge from the
reaction if they also want to make this
an ongoing thing
so i would say something such as thank
you so much for your time
i appreciate every word of wisdom that
you gave me and i'm looking i'm
definitely going to implement these
things into
my life i would love to update you on my
progress with all of these things
so i think this was a great mentorship
meeting and i would love to make this a
recurring meeting
i know you are very busy and i value
your time so would you be willing to
have meetings with the every month or
every two months
if they say yes great this is a great
opportunity you
have a mentor make sure you send them
over that calendar invite as soon as you
can
ask them if they have a preferred day or
a preferred time like if it's fridays at
2 p.m that would be a great time
for you both to meet and you make your
calendar open for them okay
don't try and like say oh i can only
work on these days
try to make your calendar as open for
them as possible because
they're the ones really giving you the
most value however
sometimes they may say no so they may
say
oh i'm so busy or like oh no just feel
free to message me whenever you want
you can ask me anything that you want
anytime or
oh i actually have a lot of mentees
right now and i can't afford to take on
another one at the moment but if you
but you're able to message me anytime
that you want for help
so this is a nice way of saying no
that's fine not everyone has to be your
mentor
but you've made the connection and make
sure you keep that connection it doesn't
have to be a monthly
thing it doesn't have to buy a monthly
thing you can message them quarterly or
yearly or it can only be a one-time
thing it really depends on the
relationship and what went down on
in that meeting so after the mentorship
is done the last thing that i emphasize
and you should all
do is send a thank you note i think this
is something that so many people don't
do
and it makes you stand out when you
actually do send a thank you note
similar to when you have an interview
and you send up a note thanking them for
having an interview with you
send a follow-up note after your
mentorship meeting just
saying thank you so much for meeting
with me i learned a lot during this time
and i'm excited to meet with you
on xyz day even if you're not meeting
with them again
still send a thank you note it is the
least you can do
always express gratitude because they
really didn't have to give up their time
for you i hope these tips were helpful
if you have any other questions about
mentorship leave them in the comment box
below
and let me know what you want to see
next regarding mentorship finance
fashion anything that you want thank you
so much for watching
have a great day everyone bye
[Music]
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