Summarising is one of the key learning processes of a learning conversation strategies a mentor needs to develop and is a crucial part of any mentoring conversation for several reasons.
It provides an opportunity to:
- Step back from the dialogue and review how it has evolved
- Capture key points and ideas so as to minimise note taking during the flow of conversation (taking occasional interludes for summarising and note-making are valuable)
- Check each person’s understanding of the issue so far
- Establish boundaries between different stages of the conversation
- Identify what has not been said
- Reassure the learner that you have been paying attention
- Consider how the learning process could best be pursued in the next phase of the conversation
- Regroup when the conversation doesn’t seem to be going anywhere
The point of summarising is not just to condense what has been said. It is just as important as a process for examining the issue in a different, more structured way than in the normal flow of conversation.
When to summarise during mentoring conversations
Within a mentoring conversation, there are always at least two places where it is essential to summarise.
First, once the mentee’s issue has been explored and the mentor feels it is time to move the focus of the mentee to solution mode. A vital part of moving on in any conversation is checking mutual understanding. Progressing dialogue without doing so carries a number of risks, for example dealing with only the presented issue or steering the mentee towards an inappropriate solution. At this point, it is important for the mentor to take the lead in summarising, to ensure that all the information is available that can be available, and that it is structured in a way that is meaningful to both parties in a similar way.
Second, once a solution or course of action has been identified for the mentee. At this point, it is important that the mentee takes responsibility for summarising. If the mentor does it, they “take the monkey back onto their shoulders” i.e. they risk taking responsibility for the solution and its implementation, which in turn may reduce the learner’s commitment.
In practice, an effective mentor will summarise or encourage the learner to summarise whenever they see an opportunity to reinforce learning and check understanding.
Other useful points, at which to summarise include:
- At the beginning of the session, when the mentee first explains what they want to achieve from the conversation
- Whenever the conversation has been going more than around 15 minutes and there is a suitable pause in dialogue
- When the mentee is having difficulty articulating their thoughts or reconciling conflicting ideas
- When the mentor feels confused about the issue or what the mentee is trying to say
- When the mentee appears to be contradicting themselves, but is not conscious of doing so
- When there is a need to clarify options and the pluses and minuses of each of them
How to summarise
Practical guidelines for summarising include:
- Choose the moment carefully – don’t interrupt a when the other person is in deep thought
- Be clear about why you are summarising at this point (e.g. “I think it would be helpful if we paused to check our understanding so far.”)
- Make summarising a mutual It is important to feel that summarising is a process that takes place with, and not for an individual.
- Take notes, if necessary, but put more emphasis on visual means, such as diagrams or flow charts, because it is easier to use these to structure the next part of the conversation and to make sure elements don’t get missed out.
- Summarise at more than one level. For example:
- For content (what was actually said – and not said)
- For emotion (what the learner feels and the values they are applying)
- For intent (are we still clear about what we want to achieve?)
- Beware of “summarising into submission”. Give the learner frequent opportunities to amend or reject a summary (giving someone sufficient time to think about what you are saying is an important part of this); let them take control of the summarising process whenever they feel able.
- Use the summary at one point as the starting point for summarising at the next. E.g. “When we summarised a while ago, we concluded… Have we changed our thinking about that?”
Useful questions and statements to include when summarising:
- Would it be helpful at this point to summarise what we do and don’t know about this issue?
- What have we learned so far?
- Let me run through what I think I’m hearing
- What do you think we have agreed?
- So what you are saying is…
- Let’s list the choices you have
Reflective exercise:
After your next mentoring session, reflect upon:
- When and how often did I initiate summarising?
- How much of the summarising did I do and how much did the mentee do?
- How did the summarising help?
- What could I have done to make it more effective?
- If appropriate, obtain feedback from the learner, to use in your own reflections.
© David Clutterbuck, 2014