The Invisible Mentor

Archive for the ‘Article’ Category

For National Mentoring Month, consider creating your Personal Board of Mentors. Having one mentor is seldom ever enough these days, because no one person can assist you with all your mentoring needs. It is your responsibility to ensure that all your needs are taken care of. Your Personal Board of Mentors is similar to an organization’s Board of Directors, except in this instance, you are the organization. You don’t have to meet with all the members on your Board of Mentors like an organization’s board would, but you do have to be in contact with them.

Before you choose the members of your personal board, you have to first assess your needs based on where you’d like to end up in life. Whatever you do should be a part of your life plan and subsequently take you closer to achieving your big goals.

Mentoring Needs Assessment

1. What are your vision, mission and purpose in life?
2. In the next three years, where would you like to be in your personal and professional life? Are you committed to achieving your personal and professional goals listed above?
3. Think about your professional goals, what gaps exist between where you are now, to where you would like to be in the next three years?
4. What actions do you have to take to fill those gaps?
5. Who are the experts that you can learn from, and what are their areas of expertise?
6. Of the experts that you identified, which ones do you respect and are respected by others?
7. Why do you need a mentor? What can a mentor help you with?
8. If trusted friends could introduce you to five people who would be ideal mentors for you, who would you choose?
9. Would your ideal mentors be similar to the experts you identified above?
10. Could your ideal mentors assist you with achieving your identified goals, and close the gap you identified above.

After you have answered the questions above, you are in a better position to find the appropriate persons to assist you in filling those gaps. There are also specific types of people who you should have on your Personal Board of Mentors.

• Connector: A well-respected person in the community who has influence, authority and access to an extensive network of people.
• Industry Expert: Someone who has already traveled the path that you are now on, and is willing to share her experiences, both good and bad with you.
• The Listener: Someone who you can call when you are having a down day, who will allow you to rant for a while, to get things off your “chest,” so that you can focus on your next steps.
• Tough Lover: An objective person who is willing to tell you like it is, holding you accountable to keep your promises and remain on track to achieve your goals.
• Sponsor: A senior level person in your organization who will open doors for you. But the catch is that you have to make yourself memorable so that he will choose you. Typically you choose your mentors, but sponsors choose you. An example of how to make yourself memorable is to take on difficult projects that others do not want, then do them successfully.
• And one other person who will also help you to achieve your goals based on the needs you identified above.

All the people on your Board should care about your success, and be willing to accept a quick call from you. Be very honest and clear with the members of your Board, let them know exactly what you require from them, and make it very easy for them to help you. Mentoring is about give and take, so find ways to give back to your mentors, and always let them know how much you appreciate what they are doing for you.

When you have decided who you would like to be on your Board, ask them if they would be willing to mentor you, and explain what’s required. It goes without saying that you should take some time to get to know them first before asking for a favour. And it is even better if there is someone who could provide an introduction. With social media, this is a lot easier to do today than it was five short years ago.

Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Related Posts

• Adventures in Learning: DIY Mentoring Program
• Adventures in Learning: DIY Mentoring Program, Episode Two
• Adventures in Learning: DIY Mentoring Program, Episode Three
• Five People You Need On Your Personal Board of Directors
• Forget Mentors: Employ a Personal Board of Directors
• Looking Out for Number One
• Create a Personal Board of Directors
• A Personal Board of Directors

I have pulled together an assortment of blog posts with information to help you in a variety of ways.

M.I.T. Game-Changer: Free Online Education For All: Lifelong learning is a fact of life for any professional who expects to succeed. There are many ways to learn, however, for those who want to take university courses for professional development, the price can be prohibitive. In this article, MIT will be announcing a new initiative, where anyone with an internet connection can take free courses online, and will we awarded a certificate of completion at the end. This certificate will not have the same weight as the paid MIT program, but it’s still a noble gesture.

Learn to Code with Codecademy & Scratch: This is a very short post which introduces us to Codecademy, which I signed up with today, and will be taking the programming course. If you decide to join me, please let me know so that we can support each other.

10 Useful Chrome Web Apps and Extensions for Teachers and Students and more: Though this blog is for teachers, I like it because I learn a lot and am introduced to tips and resources that help me in my work. You will find many of these apps useful. I have downloaded many of them and have started to use them already.

Bookboon – More Than 500 Free eTextbooks: If you have children in university, this is a must-read blog post for you!

Interesting Post

Getting an Education Through Content Creation: I like this post because it is consistent with what I believe. And when you learn something new, teach it to other people so it becomes clearer in your mind.

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

Over the past month, I have been paying close attention to the analytics for The Invisible Mentor blog, and I am sometimes amazed by what landed readers on the site. Today, I want to highlight some of the posts that landed people on the site from search engines. Next week we’ll return to the regular schedule: Adventures in Learning, Booked for Mentoring, Wisdom of Life and the Invisible Mentor Interviews.

Cover of The Prophet

1. Einstein Distraction Index: A Method of Deep Focus
2. Review: The Rubáiyát of Omar Khayyam, Translated by Edward Fitzgerald
3. Summary of A Technique for Producing Great Ideas by James Webb Young
4. 2011 Interviews for Mentoring
5. 2011 Books for Mentoring
6. How to Analyze Information
7. How to Master a Subject
8. What Did Napoleon Hill Omit? Invisible Counselors vs. Invisible Mentors
9. Wisdom Wednesday: Charles Babbage, Father of the Computer
10. Review of The Prince by Niccolo Machiavelli
11. Enchiridion By Epictetus: A Book Review
12. Review of The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran

In 2012, I will work harder at integrating ancient and modern wisdom to serve you better. The ancient wisdom will be in the people I profile and some of the books I review, and the modern wisdom will be in the people I interview and some of the books I review. If you have other suggestions, please let me know. Please write your thoughts in the comments section below.

Amazon Affiliate Links

The Prophet, The Prince, The Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam: The Five Authorized Versions (Classics Club).

My mantra for 2012 is living fully.

For the past few years, at the start of each new year, a few bloggers name three words that will guide them for the upcoming year. Yesterday, Chris Brogran and Susan Murphy wrote their three words for 2012. I must admit that twice I wrote three words but didn’t do much with them. I suspect that I didn’t spend as much time as I should, choosing my three words.

After I read All Fall Down by Megan Hart, which I will talk about tomorrow on Booked for Mentoring, while I was having a delayed reaction to the book, living fully seeped into my consciousness, and it seemed appropriate that that’s what I should be focusing on for 2012. I knew without a doubt that living fully is my guiding light for 2012. I often hold myself back and play it safe, and now is the time to step out in a very big way.

I don’t know precisely what living fully will look like for me, but I will figure it out as I go along. Though I tremendously respect the bloggers who are using their three words to guide them for 2012, I’m going to be zagging and instead focus on my phrase living fully. That’s what I need in my life right now.

What will be your guiding light for 2012?

How can you use this information? What do you have to add to the conversation? Please let me know your thoughts in the comments section below. Many readers read this blog from other sites, so why don’t you pop over to The Invisible Mentor and subscribe (top on the right hand side) by email or RSS Feed.

This is a guest post by Genny Silvera, and even though the headline says finance candidates, the advice works well for other job seekers.

Finding a candidate to fill a position in your firm takes more effort than simply posting an advertisement in the classifieds or on an online job website if you want to do it the right way. You want to create a pool of the best candidates. Who you recruit to fill a position hinges on what criteria you use for recruitment.

Whether you find your candidates on your own or employ a recruitment firm, your recruitment efforts should center on these essential elements:

Determine Your Expectations

Knowing what qualities you want to find in a potential employee starts with defining those qualities before you recruit candidates. Defining what set of criteria is important because it helps focus what choices you make in the hiring process.

Keep these three key thoughts in mind when determining what candidate you want for a position:

1. What skills are required to function in the job?
2. What educational credentials are needed for the job?
3. What attributes are essential to performing well in the job?

Once you can answer these questions, you can begin to seek for the right job candidates. Going forward without firm answers can mean wasted time and money down the road.

Study Applications and Resumes

Carefully examine each application and resume you receive for a position. Some of them will not come from viable candidates. There are always a certain percentage of people who apply for any job opening whether or not they even meet the basic qualifications. Working with a finance staffing agency can eliminate some of these superfluous resumes and applications and leave behind a pool of qualified candidates.

Each resume and application should be checked to see if job candidates align with the qualities important to the position through their skill set and professional experience. Take your time to figure out if a candidate meets this key criteria. It can mean all the difference between making a good hire and a bad one.

Make Interviews Count

When a candidate comes in for a job interview, it is a time to really see what makes them tick. An interview is the perfect time to get a good read on everything from their communication skills to their problem-solving abilities. You should walk away from an interview with a good idea if a candidate is a perfect fit for your company.

Use the interview to your advantage. Ask focused questions that probe how the candidate thinks or reacts when placed in situations that mirror what they would face working in your company. Their responses will allow you to see how closely they match with the important criteria you defined before the search began.

About the Author: Genny Silvera loves the interview and hiring process but knows that it can be stressful. Groups like Accounting Principals finance recruiting can cut the work and the stress in half for employers who need to remain focused on their customers.