Help Your Employees Help Each Other

By Julie Kantor, CEO Twomentor.com

Think about it. Your employees and team members are home. There is no gathering around the water cooler. No coffee breaks in the cafeteria. Gossip is at an all-time low. So is laughter and innovative group-think. Employees with small children are double-taxed trying to get work done (with an 'I need to hold onto my job' new fears) and the added pressures of being an entertainer- in- chief and teacher to their restless prodigy. 

So many of us are in the same boat, and once we can 'let our hair down' and talk 1:1 we find and build a community of support. Trust and empathy are the foundation.

Have you had a Zoom webinar recently? Well, you will know that only 1-4 or 5 people are doing the talking. 40-50% of attendees are hopefully engaged and not checking CNN, Fox or what to watch later on Netflix while attempting to quiet Fido who wants to chase the brown stuffed squirrel for the 17th time. 

Do you want to bring out the best and support your employees in helping each other? Now is the perfect time to stand up, launch, re-launch or boost a mentoring initiative. 

What mentoring can do for you... and them

1. Drive human connection for remote workers. Physical isolation yes, not social isolation. 

2. Give employees a road map towards helping each other in a mutually beneficial partnership over the next 3, 6 or 9 months (estimate 10 - 15 hours)

4. Opportunity to solve for multi-generational connectivity, knowledge transfer, the elevation of women and diversity through inclusion mentoring, sales growth while driving up engagement and retention. 

5. Project-based mentoring and sponsorship/ advocacy for high potential employees. 

Here are 8-Steps to get you launched in the next 3-4 weeks:

1. Set a timeline + segment. We are going to start this initiative on i.e. May 4th and open it up to [pick a segment] i.e. all managers, our women's ERG group, employees that have been with the company less than ____ months, anyone who wants to participate. I would recommend, given the times, that you set up a 3-month initiative with weekly 45-minute touchpoints ( 10-14 hours in total)

2. You gotta train them. Mentees, what is your role here? Do you have goals your mentor can help you with? How will having a mentor these next 12-weeks help you get focused, more balanced, saner, more productive? How will you take the lead and managing the relationship and track your growth? Mentors what impact have mentors had in your life? How can you pay- it -forward without using the words 'you should' or 'I would'? Can you help your mentee towards achieving his/her goals? Will you make yourself available weekly and maintain strong confidentiality to establish trust? 

3. Make me a match. If mentees provide goals and what they are looking for in a mentor, and mentors provide their areas of capabilities and strengths you can make some matches here. HR, L & D execs can weigh in too. You can also use software that's readily available to help facilitate connections. I personally love to use 4-5 flash mentoring (think speed dating) sessions as a launching pad. Executives are paired with 97% engagement rates to 16 - 20 others. They then 'apply' or ' come to the mentoring program table' with 2-3 executives they most want to work with. More info HERE.

4. The first call shouldn't be a call. It should be a video teleconference using Zoom, FaceTime, Google Hangouts, Skype. Mentors and Mentees connect and we recommend they do some 'getting to know each other' discussions for this first session. Find commonalities. During Zoom training we provide a mentor action guide to all participants. A roadmap of expectations and dynamic discussions and activities to do together. It is helpful when you give your employees some clarity of what this all looks like for the next 12 weeks or more. One thing we love to do is create a session where the mentee mentors the mentor (becomes the mentor)- we call this reverse mentoring and by the way, we view mentoring as a collaborative partnership.

5. Don't miss the big opportunity here. Special times call for special mentoring. The beauty of having a mentor or a mentoring program right now is - it is an unprecedented time of change personally, professionally, globally. Don't skip these important conversations in your plan. Here are a few conversation topics to consider...

1] How have you handled times of change and ambiguity? 

2] What has helped?

3] What are three things you've learned since COVID-19 that you didn't know a few months ago?

4] What are some strategies for better managing a remote workforce?

5] How can I lead my team when I don't have all the information I need for decision making?

6] Any thoughts on getting along better with your spouse and loved ones?

7] How do I set up an in-home jail with sound-proof walls for my 17-year old kid? (kidding!)

8] How do I turn it off (work at the end of the day, 24/7 news)?

6. It is not business as usual. We are in a 'Who Moved My Cheese' time of change on many levels. This is a great time for pivoting and innovation. Perhaps your mentor-mentee pairs could look at new ways of doing business. How to apply an entrepreneurial mindset or a growth mindset to turn lemons into proverbial lemonade. These conversations could be a gamechanger, especially when there is a way to integrate PURPOSE + MAKING A DIFFERENCE in that vision. So many want to be productive and feel they are contributing to being part of the solution here. Use and value their talents.

7. Build an internal mentoring community at weeks 4, 8 and 12. Bring mentors together to connect, mentor and learn from each other and do the same for mentees while maintaining confidentiality. We did this for diversity practitioners a few weeks ago and the community around the theme mentoring is filled with warmth + higher-order learning. Also, be willing to help any pair troubleshoot any issues that arise.

8. Evaluate the program and get input for Version 2.0 or your second cohort.

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WANT US TO DO THE HEAVY LIFTING? Want to delegate 90% of the work to us and launch in 2-3 weeks? Here are some client testimonials. Contact [email protected] or [email protected] to talk through logistics. You can also learn more about our managed mentoring + virtual mentoring-in-a-box services here. 

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