How can you evaluate the effectiveness of your mentoring when your mentee is struggling?

By creating the atmosphere to help the mentee to provide feedback comfortably at all times. The open communication between mentee and mentor helps to understand and solve what might be the issue that is bothering the mentee - be it professional, personal or something related to mentoring.

This is a sensitive dimension of mentoring and assessing the effectiveness of mentoring becomes crucial when a mentee faces challenges. Understanding that mentoring is about creating a future, not recreating the past, the initial step is to establish a genuine connection with the struggling mentee. Transparent communication is key. Express a sincere interest in their challenges, actively listen to their concerns, and provide guidance aligned with their goals. Acknowledge their struggles and work collaboratively to set realistic expectations for improvement.

Assess your mentee's progress through open communication, feedback, and regular check-ins. Identify challenges, provide targeted support, and adjust mentoring strategies. Measure success by observing improvements in skills, confidence, and overall well-being.

Assess your mentee's progress through open communication, feedback, and regular check-ins. Identify challenges, provide targeted support, and adjust mentoring strategies. Measure success by observing improvements in skills, confidence, and overall well-being.

I had the experience of working with a mentee who was finding it difficult to express himself in English. This hindered his ability to ask the right questions and understand the technical details regarding his project. I adjusted my approach to resolve this barrier and started engaging him in simple day-to-day conversations. This helped him relax a bit and open up and he mentioned that his schooling was done in his native language, hence his English foundations were not very strong. I suggested that he read simple novels and stories and watch movies with English subtitles to help bridge the language barrier. These suggestions helped him improve his communication a lot by the end of his internship and he was able to get an offer.

One size does not fit all. Yes, there are proven methods and we all have what works with our clients. Many times it's the "fit" between client and coach/mentor that makes the biggest difference. We need to adjust, find out why something isn't working if possible and pivot, sometimes we need to pivot more than once to move towards their strengths while we are helping them address the weaknesses they are looking to change/challenge. While raising 4 children, there were things that worked across the board and often I had to work to understand the essence of each child to best help them learn/succeed and overcome. Adjusting the approach takes presence on the mentor/coaches part and the adaptability of not only the mentee/client but the us.

This is quite a common challenge and one I experienced several times within each cohort of ILM Leadership Skills at Intro and Certificate level. Regular meetings with students is a must. The result of these meetings will normally be lead to the setting of agreed targets, i.e. milestones to be achieved within certain time-scales. On-going encouragement and verbal/written support is essential and sometimes asking other students and mentors for support and/or advice can be useful to all parties. In cases when other parties are involved a high level of discretion is required.

Stay patient and offer positive reinforcement. I try to understand if there is a skill gap and explore if there is a blockage that the mentee is unable to overcome. If all that is more or less clear then offer positive reinforcement and give it time. When the person is struggling, additional pressure doesn't help. Hence, support is critical.

I keep notes on every mentee I talk to. When I am on a subsequent call, I review what we talked about on the previous call and cover whether any of the prior advice / homework was of help. Sometimes, when they say they are struggling, they will say they did not follow through on the prior advice they were given. In these cases, we cover the steps again but I cannot do the work for them. They have to own their journey. Normally, all mentees leave the call more energized than when they started the call!

When considering the effectiveness of mentorship, focus on the inputs and process that the mentee has gone through in their effort/decision. This can help you inspect for adjustments that need to be made there. If we only look at the outcome, we may incorrectly look to adjust the inputs/process whereas it was due to externalities that are uncontrollable. This also helps boost the mentee's confidence in their progress.

Be careful not to assume or project your biases, respecting the mentee's time and emotions is essential during this phase. Stay focused on addressing specific issues during mentoring sessions, efficiently utilizing the time available. Additionally, encourage open dialogue, ensuring the mentee feels comfortable sharing their difficulties. In essence, evaluating the effectiveness of mentoring during challenging times involves maintaining authenticity, open communication, and a collaborative approach to overcome obstacles and guide the mentee toward a more successful path.

The struggle of the coachee is an essential aspect of the coaching journey. It's within these struggles that real growth and learning occur. Challenges, obstacles, and uncertainties are in reality opportunities for self-reflection, discovery, and ultimately, transformation. And this applies for both coaches and coachees.