Where Have All the Mentors Gone?

Here’s a fun tidbit, if you want a song stuck in your head, sing the title of this to Paula Cole’s Where Have All the Cowboys Gone. You can thank me later.

All joking and parodies aside, I think the title of this article is an appropriate question, at least in my experience. Throughout my career thus far, let’s say 15 years, I really have yet to find a mentor in any of the positions I’ve held. It makes me wonder why this is? Is it because the person themselves had no mentor capabilities, or is it because organizations no longer truly cultivate the mentorship of their workers?

The first half of that question is easy, there are some people who simply do not have the ability to be a mentor. Whether that is because they’re too focused on trying to squeeze out results and productivity or if they’re worried that passing on knowledge will jeopardize their job or that they’re simply toxic people, we simply do not know. My advice for these people, learn how to mentor, because when you can teach your job and what you do, then you’re really beginning to get a grasp on it.

As for the second half of the question, that is a bit harder to answer. I don’t have an answer per se, but I have some thoughts. The first of which is, have organizations made employees become too task oriented to provide a ground for learning and mentorship? In the jobs I’ve held, it seems that employees are continuously jumping from one task to the next or from one meeting to another. The companies I have worked for certainly have not promoted mentorship. They keep everyone so busy, there isn’t the time to do it. In addition, they have created a practice where people hired should already know how to do their job, and that they’ll learn on their own. Some certainly will, but on their own time.?

Learning should still be a key component of any organization, and I don’t think it’s kept up. And I want to clarify, I mean legitimate teaching and learning. Not selecting a book to read then going over a chapter once per week where the leader doesn’t provide any sort of guiding questions and the team merely provides superficial answers. That’s checking a box on a corporate agenda, and nothing more.?

No one is passing on knowledge. Instead companies run down their employees as though they were cogs in a machine and replace them when they break. It didn’t used to be like that. People used to take others under their wing and teach them their craft. That’s right, those were crafts people held, not jobs. The blacksmith, the tanner, the seamstress. All these people were masters of their art, and passed on their knowledge to others who wanted to learn it.?

However, organizations today have become so specialized, so segmented, that there are no longer crafts, but tasks and jobs that need done. And here’s where a mentor could aid the organization. By passing on what they know and what they’ve learned. By taking on someone who thinks they’re just a link in the chain and showing them the entire chain and how that chain connects and interacts with other chains within the organization and its mission.

It’s sad when an organization turns knowledge into power and wields it for their own, personal benefit. I find it laughable that companies that feel they have a good “culture” make gatekeeping knowledge one of their core practices. The term “culture” is defined as “the customs, arts, social institutions, and achievements of a particular nation, people, or other social group.” One of their key components was developing a community that shared with each other, passing on knowledge to keep that culture alive.?

Organizations don’t do this. Knowledge is to be gained alone. There is no longer someone teaching new employees the ins and outs of a particular corporate job. How can organizations expect to have a cohesive culture when the key element of connecting and uniting employees is shrouded in a mist of confusion because no one wants to share what they know?