Ronald Cushnie is a mentor in the North West London Education Business Partnership project. The project places adults with pupils from local schools to help them develop and life and workplace skills. Ronald talks about his experience as a mentor:
“When I decided to become a mentor I had no idea about formal mentoring. However, as someone who was always been open and prepared to explore solutions to others problems I felt that I had been informally mentoring for sometime."
Being an effective mentor
As an experienced mentor Ronald shares his view on what makes an effective mentor
“I had an induction during which I received advice on how to approach the mentor/mentee relationship. However, I soon realized that my life experiences were at least as important as anything that I could have been advised of during the induction.
A mentor has to view each mentee as an individual who has an inherent potential to make a positive contribution to their own life, their community, and society as a whole.
An effective mentor will leave the mentee with the impression that:
- They care whether or not the mentee responds to their efforts.
- The mentee has a degree of ownership of the process.
- The mentee should respect the relationship and appreciate the extra support they have been given.
Getting support and advice
Ronald has found that the support a mentor receives is vitally important to the success of the relationship
“A mentor can always seek advice from their mentoring coordinator if they are unsure about any aspect of the mentor/mentee relationship. Having the opportunity to feedback experiences and to hear about other mentors’ experiences is very beneficial.”
Developing skills and gaining fulfilment
Being a mentor isn’t a one-way relationship. As Ronald discovered, the mentor can often get as much out of the relationship as the mentee, whether it be learning new skills or gaining a sense of fulfilment.
“The knowledge and skills that I have gained while mentoring are too numerous to mention but the main ones are:
- enhancing my ability to communicate,
- the ability to identify which strategy is likely to work in different mentor/ mentee situations,
- learning how to make effective use of time to inspire or empower someone,
- the acceptance of the fact that the mentor/mentee relationship gives me as much of an opportunity to learn as the mentee.
One of my most fulfilling moments was persuading a pupil who refused to attend a particular class to go. After talking to him for almost an hour he confided in me that he didn’t want to go because the tutor would make him take his hat off. He hadn’t been to the barbers in a while and thought his hair wasn’t fit to be seen. He eventually agreed to go to the class if I went with him to make sure the tutor didn’t harass him. With the tutor’s agreement we did just that. I consider that to be a breakthrough, as no amount of persuasion or threats had got him into that class for quite a long while.”
