Finding your mentor & being a good mentee

After a little break, we're back with career-boosting content from wonderful women in Tech. In this edition, we sat down with Dr. Tina Ruseva, Founder & CEO of Mentessa to talk about her area of expertise - mentorship!

"In a nutshell mentoring is way more powerful than you think and if you want to engage as a mentor and truly help a person grow the best way to start is by starting with yourself. Great mentors are mentors to themselves, too. So be your own mentor."

Keep reading to learn the importance of mentorship, how to find your mentor, how to be a good mentee and more thanks to Tina's knowledge sharing and experience building Mentessa.

On the importance of mentorship

Is there a difference OR what is the difference between: a mentor, a friendly colleague, a manager, a friend?

Yes, there is as great mentors adopts our goals as theirs. The whole concept of mentorship is centered around the objectives of the mentee - be it to advance in their career, learn a new skills, or expand their horizons.

In an ideal world, the perfect manager or the perfect friend would be perfectly aligned around those goals, too. In practice, however, our goals often differ from each other which is described as “moral hazard” by economists.

To overcome those, mentors should not come form the direct team or the reporting line of employees. Also, they should be selected by the mentee themselves.

What is the role of a mentor for women in tech?

Women in technology are still in the minority which imposes different barriers to their development, such as access to knowledge, network, visibility, recognition, or human bias. Mentoring is a great way to help overcome those with both real industry expertise, as well as psychological support.

In addition, research has proven the critical role of role models for fostering ambition and fighting bias in both women and men. This is why women in tech, but also any other minority in the organization’s culture would benefit from a mentor.

Of course you are heavily involved in various mentoring initiatives but to sum it up, how has mentorship played a role in your life?

I grew up in a large family and graduated from a tight-knit community at high-school. When I joined university, as a female computer scientist abroad, I struggled to feel included first. I was surrounded by people I didn’t look like, I didn’t think like, and I didn’t act like. This was detrimental to my performance in the first years, until mentorship saved my career and education from potentially dropping out and changing direction.

It was not until one of my classmates, Alex, reached out and became my mentor. It was not an official program, just his interest towards me and a few meetings were enough for me to get the feeling that it mattered. Thanks to our relationship I found back the energy and motivation to study harder and graduated with excellent grades from the LMU in Munich. Ever since I have been trying to play this role to others.

How to find your mentor in tech

1. Ask yourself what do you need a mentor for?

“When the student is ready, the teacher shall appear.” they say. As mentorship is a purposeful endeavour, a pursuit of a goal, the quality of a mentor can only show its advantage based on the quality of the objective. Do you want to just meet people? Learn about an industry? Or develop a new skill? It all matters in terms of the right person to talk to.

2. After you have become clear about your expectations, stay open.

People are people, not objects. Your relationship with them doesn’t stop with the end of the mentorship. “One always meets twice” they say. Be respectful, even if you end up mentoring yourself, or after the program.

3. Exactly for this reason, reaching out to people who you don’t know, and asking them for mentoring is naive and doesn’t work.

In her book “Lean in” Sheryl Sandberg writes “Its difficult to mentor people you dont know”. So get to know people first. And give them the opportunity to get them to know you too.

4. Be honest, open, vulnerable.

Mentoring is a human relationship just like any other. It needs time and space to develop and flourish. Give it space. If your goals are urgent and you need a mentor tomorrow, maybe mentoring isn't the right instrument for achieving them.

Key mentorship advice

What advice would you give to a woman in Tech nervous to do outreach to find a mentor?

I have my own strategy of overcoming anxiety. When I find myself too nervous about something I ask myself 3 questions:

• Whats the worst thing that can happen?
• Whats the best?
• What matters?

The first one gives me a reality check and helps me manage risks. By identifying those you can better prepare - e.g. your mentorship goals, a brief motivation for the selection of the mentor, as well as you personal pitch about who you are and what drives you.

The second one gives me the motivation to overcome my fears. If you think about it, mentoring, like any other great relationship have an unlimited upside potential which almost always outperforms the possible risks (in the case of mentorship this is mostly just a “No”). Visualizing those can be extremely encouraging.

The last question helps me prioritize and understand my own drivers. Why do I want this mentor exactly, which of my values am I honouring by approaching them, how can I clearly communicate those. Life is a pitch. And starting with the why helps for mentoring, too.

What are the do’s and don'ts of being a good mentor? Good mentee?

I have written an article about what makes great mentors and mentees below

?? Read it here.

In a nutshell mentoring is way more powerful than you think and if you want to engage as a mentor and truly help a person grow the best way to start is by starting with yourself. Great mentors are mentors to themselves, too. So be your own mentor:

• Meet often
• Listen carefully
• Take yourself seriously
• Give feedback
• Open doors
• Be a role model

And to conclude, what is a mistake you have made in the past about mentorship, what did you learn from it?

I once asked for a mentor at work and got fired for being too ambitious. At first I thought I had done a mistake. Just a few weeks after it turned out that leaving a job and a company with a culture like this have been the best think that could happen to my personal and career development. Every mistake is valuable. As Gandhi says: “Life is a mystery to live, not a problem to solve.”

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Who is Tina & Mentessa?

Tina Ruseva is the founder & CEO of Mentessa, the future of work platform that helps everyone in the workforce to maximize their potential at work, and the Big & Growing New Work Festival, the biggest future of work conference in the DACH region. She is a social entrepreneur, actively engaging for diversity, empowerment, and inclusion ever since 2009, the mother of 2 girls, and the author of numerous articles and the book "Big Heart Ventures". She studied Computer Science, Journalism & Business and has PhD in Innovation Management.?

What is?Mentessa?

Mentessa’s mission is to remove barriers for learning and development for everyone in the workplace. With our AI-driven platform for mentoring and collaboration based on skills we empower individuals to learn from each other and organizations to build a culture of diversity and innovation.