Your competences as a mentee

Being a mentee isn’t about sitting back and letting the mentor do all the work. If you are going to make the most out of this powerful learning opportunity, you will have to invest considerable time and energy, both in the mentoring meetings and between them. If you can answer yes to all or most of the questions below, you will find mentoring a very fulfilling endeavour.

1. I am committed to my own learning
2. I am prepared to put time into planning for mentoring conversations
3. I will think through how I present issues for discussion
4. I am prepared to put time into reflecting on my learning from the mentoring conversations
5. I will value my mentor’s support in developing my personal development plan
6. I am prepared to let my goals from mentoring evolve as I gain a deeper understanding of myself and my environment
7. I am prepared to be challenged in my thinking
8. I am prepared to challenge my mentor’s thinking and assumptions, when appropriate
9. I will be proactive in taking responsibility for managing the logistics of the mentoring relationship (e.g. setting up meetings)
10. I recognise that my mentor will gain from the relationship, if he or she also learns from our conversations
11. I recognise the relationship will work best, if I respect my mentor and also respect myself
12. I recognise the need to act upon our conversations
13. I will seek to be self-aware
14. In the mentoring conversations I will seek to be both honest both to my mentor and to myself
15. I aim to learn from my mentor how to be a mentor myself, when the time comes

© David Clutterbuck, 2014