Quick tips for Mentoring Monday

Buffalo Business First's Mentoring Monday is coming Monday February 28th, 2022 and I wanted to share some of my tips to maximize your time. I've gone to this before and gained immense value from it in the past.?

I started writing this as a LinkedIn post, and quickly reached the character limit- so here's the tips for you to read in this format... please leave a like or a comment if any of them helped you out!

BEFORE THE IN-PERSON EVENT:

• Research the women attending the day before- pick 3 you really want to speak with. Make use of LinkedIn to research them, but consider WAITING to connect with them until after the event (I'll tell you why later). Consider jotting down a few interesting things you might ask them about or facts you admire so you can remember them instead of being star-struck when you arrive in front of them.
• Review the agenda/ time-table / order of events.?This helps you be where you need to be before you need to be there. This has helped me grab a great seat for a talk or be in the first groups for food, so I could spend time networking around a room vs waiting in lines.
• Bring copies of your resume- but add a post-it to say that you are NOT looking for a job, but you DO want to develop a relationship with the mentor of your choice, and the paper document is a start so they can know/remember you after the event.
• Write out your personal & professional goals in clear bullet points. Make a plan to address ONE of each bullet points with each mentor.
• Have a clear ASK/WISH for how a mentor might be able to help you advance related to one of your pre-defined goals in a perfect world.
• Layout your outfit and dress for success in whatever makes YOU feel confident and at home in your own body. Remember that #IAMPROFESSIONAL just as much in a suit as you are in a bright & colorful top and pants.
• Bring a purse that is big enough to carry your resume and ~8 oranges, a mini water bottle, breath mints, a pad of paper & 2 pens and still be closed. Don't bring the oranges, but that's for space you might want free- if they have swag at the event. More on this later!
• Wear a watch that you can easily see time at-a-glance, without being obvious.
• Take a small notepad and pen with you
• Update your LinkedIn profile & photo!
• If you have business cards- awesome! Bring those with you. If not, write out your Linkedin profile URL on some slips of paper to have ready in advance if a peer you meet wants to connect. If you want to go FANCY make yourself a QR code to tape to the back of your phone that links directly to your LinkedIn URL.
• Consider sending your boss a summary of the upcoming event, who will be there, what you hope to learn, and promise to share your experience of the event, so they can judge if they want to send others in the future.

WHEN IN FRONT OF YOUR DREAM MENTOR - within 5 min:

• Introduce yourself clearly and slowly. If you have an unfamiliar or unique to the region name, provide the mentor an opportunity to say it out loud to get to know you. Make sure you are able to do the same and pronounce their name correctly.
• During non-pandemic times a handshake is usually appropriate. Currently I'm going old-school with a part bow/ part head-tip incline/ part curtsy when first meeting someone and making sure my smile reaches my eyes if I'm wearing a mask.
• Provide your resume and verbalize that you are NOT seeking a job...(See note above from advance prep).
• State one of your prepared goals. "Thanks for meeting with me today. I thought with your background/expertise/experience in ________ you could relate to my personal/professional goal of _______."
• Say, "Now if I had a magic wand, today you'd be able to help me navigate ______". The blank you fill in with an ASK you pre-prepared.
• PAUSE TALKING AND LISTEN TO THEIR RESPONSE, while also taking notes. After all, you came to hear their perspectives, right??
• Keep an eye on time. If you start getting towards the last 2 minutes of your interaction, you can kindly cut in with- "NAME, I'm loving this conversation and want to continue it- but I want to honor the time of the person behind me and the bell is going to ring momentarily. What is your preferred method of contact, and when do you recommend I reach out to continue our conversation?"

AT THE EVENT:

• Arrive semi-early to do a quick loop of the room, use the facilities, find where your "targets" are spatially located, and grab some coffee / food and settle in. If at a table, avoid looking at your phone and if someone passes by- look up and smile warmly to invite conversation.?
• If there early enough, engage with the organizers and thank them for putting the event together! Tell them why you decided to come and who you'd like to meet, and verify the posted agenda / timeline is still the same. Ask them if they have any tips or "don't-miss" parts of the event. If you are lucky, you might get brought over to meet one of your dream mentors before the event even begins!
• Remember, at this event, it's not just the mentors that are full of good advice, it's the ROOM of women who are bright, enterprising, and excited to be there. ENGAGE THEM. As you wait in line, as you are having coffee. The girl to the right of you might be able to offer you just as much or more than any of the seated mentors. This is how I met my dear friend Maggie at an event.?
• Talk to vendors early and be genuinely interested in the PERSON behind the table, and not just the free swag. You'll know when it is/isn't right to get some freebies. If you do get some swag, put it in your bag, and maintain that confident executive look you crafted?vs a passenger boarding an airline who just bought last-minute gifts in the terminal before boarding???. This is all optional & fun. I've done the latter PLENTY of times before too. And early in my career- and sometimes to this day- I legit need that freebie water bottle okay?

AFTER THE EVENT

• As soon as you get home (or as soon as you reasonably can) make sure to reach out to connect on LinkedIn. Do this on a desktop computer (if possible) so LinkedIn gives you the option of "send a message?" when making a connection response. DO THIS. Say who you are, how you met/day/event and that you enjoyed talking about ____. Thank them for their time. Then ask to continue the conversation. That way, whenever you have Linkedin conversations with that individual in the future- both you and the mentor can scroll up in your message history and remember how/when you connected in the first place.
• If you DID NOT get to see a mentor of choice (line to long, fate, w/e...) Send them a message on LinkedIn using the method above and let them know you are bummed you missed them and would like to connect!
• As soon as feasible: E-mail yourself photos or scanned copies of the business cards and notes you took that day. These come in handy 1-2 years down the line and you are thinking about a particular mentor, but you might not have talked to them in a bit. This is okay!
• Consider if it's feasible to mail them a physical thank you note, and mention in the note you invited them to connect on LinkedIn, and you plan to follow up at the time you agreed before. Make sure to add your contact info & LinkedIn URL in the note. I haven't met a generation yet that didn't like this.
• Mark your calendar with an event to follow up with your mentors at/around their desired time. This is a note for YOU only to reach out again to them (anywhere from 2 weeks to a month in the future).
• Don't forget to reach out to the amazing "unofficial mentors"?in your peers you may have met that day. Follow through and invite them for coffee or make a plan to regularly engage on LinkedIn with each other's posts.
• Last but not least, consider sending a follow up thank you note to your employer for allowing you to attend, or if you took PTO to attend (I see you!) send them a summary of what you gained from attending the event. Attach pictures or screengrabs of the people you met (if you feel comfortable sharing). If the employer is wise and in a position to do so- they might even re-imburse you for your ticket and your time. Sadly this isn't always the case- but it's worth a shot!

MY STORY:

Using these tips, one of my favorite memories was meeting a mentor, stating my goals and my ask, and she immediately was able to dive into helping me and providing me counsel. I told her one of my goals was to make the Buffalo Business First 40 under 40 list by 2025. I wished to be recognized for my contributions to health care, emerging leaders, and to the local data / analytics communities in Buffalo. I asked her if she had a magic wand, how she might be able to help me achieve this. We had a wonderful discussion about each of my items that I wish to be a leader in and before we knew it, time was up and we exchanged contact info.

To my surprise, towards the end of the event, she sought me out and walked me over to meet some different people from Buffalo Business First herself. They were a little busy at the time to make a real connection (again, EARLY in the event is the best time for real person-to-person bond building- not at the end when everyone is mentally fried), but that mentor in my mind moved from the "mentor" position and acted as a "sponsor" for me.

Now, I still have not yet met my goal, but it's also not yet 2025, and I've been honored with some other national awards I didn't even see coming in my pursuit of Buffalo Business First 40 under 40. I've kept in contact with this mentor and a few others, speaking to them as recently as last month! I'm so thankful to have gotten to participate in these types of opportunities and I hope you will consider doing it too.

Happy Mentoring!

Kim Herrrington, MS is amentor and Data Journalist. Kim helps people SEEK, SOLICIT, and SPEAK data & information in SAFE to SHARE environments so they can apply it to what matters through her free networking group #BuffaloBusinessIntelligence. She is an advisory board co-chair for the Amherst Chamber of Commerce and their Emerging Business Leaders program which is now accepting applications until 2/25/2022.