Mentoring: a mutual partnership to create a meaningful life

There are many reasons to become a mentor: the opportunity to share knowledge, make a difference in someone's life, give, and receive in return, and forge new relationships.

For me, because I believe that I have been blessed in my personal and professional life, it is a way of "giving back" what I have received: I see #mentoring above all as an altruistic action.

Mentoring: the Heart Intelligence

This method is very close to my heart because it is based on goodwill! It is a way of sharing and transmitting knowledge and values for the well-being and development of individuals, based on caring. The mythological character of Mentor has advised Ulysses, then his son Telemachus, out of friendship... Mentors genuinely want to see their mentees succeed!

Having had the chance to experience mentoring for myself, I know just how beneficial and enriching it can be. It is a space of freedom to ask questions, share your needs, sometimes your errors, talk and confront. It is tailor-made support that fosters trust, focusing on the approach and not the judgement of the person mentored.

The exchange is so fruitful because both protagonists are in a position to listen and being listened to. Both sides progress and develop thanks to the learnings from each other's experience. Mentoring is a reciprocal and collaborative way of sharing and nurturing mutual support.

It requires more than a touch of modesty and generosity... but that doesn't stop us from feeling proud of how we encourage self-reflection in others through our ability to listen. And by offering advice, we learn from others!

As a mentor, by focusing on the growth and well-being of my mentee, I can make another form of contribution to my company by fostering the development of their talents. The well-being of the people within it enhances the well-being of the company as a whole. Mentoring is a substantial tribute to the society we live in.

Mentoring: the Collective Intelligence

I entirely share the founding, fundamental and unifying values of our Group, initiated from the outset in 1991 by Claude Bébéar, founder of 安盛 . As a responsible corporate citizen, AXA strives to play a positive role in society, cultivating and promoting a culture of volunteering among its employees. This enables us to understand our societies, along with the risks and challenges people face in their lives.?

This is why I, my teams, my colleagues and the other members of the Board of Directors are involved in several initiatives within the various AXA entities and through #AXAHeartsInAction . And that the purpose that we have given ourselves, to act for human progress by protecting what matters, is alive and well!?

Thanks to exciting programmes, either entirely under our flagships or with different think-alike partners (among which: Exchange and Valuable 500 - dealing with disability - Thrive and Raising Talents - promoting parity...), I am involved in initiatives with societal progress objectives: gender equality, inclusion, diversity... And every time, I realise how much mentoring stands for collective intelligence in action!

Alongside these inspiring programmes, I am delighted to be supporting, in a personal capacity, the Association LAZARE in developing solidarity-based roommates between young active volunteers and former homeless people.

#Volunteering a little of my time to bring experience and network to a person in training, taking on a new professional challenge, arriving in a new country or carrying out a project... allows me to act for society, solidarity, for entrepreneurship in all its forms. I want to devote time to supporting those with abilities, or even just good intentions... We can help create the ‘opportunities’!

Mentoring, the Solidarity Intelligence

One of my beliefs is that to be a good leader, you have to love the people you work with, want them to do well, make them grow. You have to find ways of achieving this. And that, to me, means being a mentor to my teams too.?

I believe I owe this conviction to one of the most intense experiences of my professional life. I was the age of 32 when I left my job at AXA headquarters to join the AEP network (then known as Epargne Populaire). Coming from finance, I was completely lost in a world with different codes and issues!

It was a journey with challenging moments, out of my comfort zone. My director at that time, Rémy Duval, became my mentor. I was his Deputy, and he guided me with full generosity. Thanks to him, I learned to know myself better, to adapt to new situations. It was an experience that marked me for life and made me realise the importance of mentoring: if you give time, attention and faith to your teams to learn and grow, they will be ready for whatever the future holds.

Our world is changing rapidly and the skills we have today may not be enough tomorrow. Mentoring can help fight our fear of stepping out of our comfort zone. There are valuable lessons to be learned from sharing “how I did it right” and "how I did it wrong" stories - and that's not all.

In a world where competition has become the norm, solidarity is an essential concept in our modern societies and mentoring is one such expression, helping people to unleash their #potential .

I am so convinced of the benefits of mentoring that I think it can go beyond its conventional framework. For my part I apply it in my day-to-day relationships and with people I meet. It is an approach, a way of being, that enables a closer exchange with others, their own aspirations, and the desire to reveal what success means to them and how to get there.

I truly believe that the meaning of life is to progress. This means being useful to others: you have to pass on what you have been taught, and fight for equal opportunities! Life is full of opportunities; they must be seized!