Formal Mentoring Program Improves Culture [464 words]

Lead at Any Level LIVE! featuring Yalonda Brown

Are You Ready to Implement a Formal Mentoring Program?

When Ms. Brown is exploring options with potential clients, she typically asks:

• What are you doing now to provide meaningful connectivity amongst staff and team members?
• Are there groups within your organization that you can’t develop fast enough?
• Through what lens are you identifying high potential team members for promotion, training, and development opportunities?
• Who is not being served well?

Typically, says Ms. Brown, companies who come to her already have Employee Resource Groups in place. Then, their member surveys reveal a high demand for formal mentoring. In one instance, more than 200 employees requested mentorship. But the organization only had the capacity to accommodate twenty of those requests. “What about the others?” she wondered, “What happens to them?”

Outsource Your Mentoring Program

Running a mentoring program often falls under “Other Duties as Assigned.” Typically, someone in the HR department does the best they can with a spreadsheet and limited time. But programs without sufficient capacity, expertise, metrics, and accountability often fail. Engage Mentoring recommends instead outsourcing the initiative. Ms. Brown says it’s especially important to choose a partner who understands the program’s goals, tracks data, and can measure a return on the company’s investment.

Benefits of a Formal Mentoring Program

According to Ms. Brown, a company can expect great results from a well-managed mentoring program:

• Improved productivity
• Better cross-cultural awareness and stronger relationships
• Higher employee satisfaction
• Lower unwanted employee turnover, especially among historically excluded employees who represent the highest “flight risk”
• Expanded diversity among leadership, which promotes innovation and resilience
• Lower recruiting costs
• Stronger company culture

How to Get Started: Talk to Engage Mentoring

Engage Mentoring’s proprietary software platform delivers a highly structured, seamless experience for mentors and mentees alike. Participants can complete training modules, match with a partner, schedule meetings, and more, all from within the platform.

While Engage Mentoring works with companies of all sizes, most of its clients employ between 50 and 500 people. Client companies span a variety of industries. The solution scales up to serve global companies of all sizes.

Would you like to learn more about Engage Mentoring? Do you want to see a software demo? Contact Yalonda Brown at yalonda@engagementoring.com today for more information!