The end of Spring is a great time for relaxation and enjoyment. It is also a good time to check in with yourself over your priorities and what is really valuable to you. Though that’s only possible when you create space to stop being in ‘busy mode’ and actually take time to listen to yourself. Time out like this is actually time in!

As leaders we are often busy listening to others or listening to our inner voice which constantly says, ‘what’s next?’ Time invested in listening to yourself will add immense value to everything you care about.

So how good are you at really listening to yourself fully?
We have been covering this area recently with clients in our Leading Yourself & Others Training and our Career Crossroads service, so this lovely fox photo really made me think.
 
We have identified the top 3 ways that our clients have found make it only too easy for them to forget to tune in, check in and listen to themselves.
 
Deadlines
This can work two ways: you can be energised to finish something that you find pleasure in or it can be a deadline that you are dreading. However, both can have an impact you do not want. This can be shown in the following examples with some of our clients:
 
A leader in a fitness-based company took on an additional sport challenge. He wanted to champion it to help his team’s understanding and awareness of one of their new fitness products. He was enjoying it, wanted to do well and ended up overtraining. This resulted in him not being able to undertake all his normal work, including travelling to all his team locations, as he injured his shoulder. His inner drive to get a result meant that he did not listen to his body’s needs.
 
A lead architect had an urgent job to complete. The tight timeframes that he had agreed with his client and the complexities of the site made the work more difficult. He wanted the design details to be just right, especially as it was an important building to the town. However, if he could not speed up his work, his client would not be able to move premises in time which would cause significant business issues for them. He was grumpy, tired and was starting to make minor mistakes. It was only on his leadership training with us that he realised the situation he was in and came up with ideas on how to resolve it.

When we push through on deadlines, we often stop listening to ourselves. The watchpoints here are ‘I have to’ or ‘I must’. In business there are usually compromises to be found as urgency is often created when it is not fully needed. A sense of urgency with a deadline rather than a paced efficient approach results in a stress response. A stress response means less capability as your problem solving, creativity and communication skills will all be significantly depleted.
 
Key questions to ask yourself:

• Are you looking at all perspectives?
• Are there any other solutions that do not impact negatively on you?
• How can you renegotiate the deadline with yourself and with others?
• What have you learnt about your own approach to deadlines?

 
People Pressure
If someone else expects you to behave and think in a certain way, then often over time you can lose track of what you are really thinking and feeling as opposed to what they want. This can lead to considerable ill health and stress.
 
One of our clients had joined the family business and was trying to work hard. His father was very proud that he had joined as he had developed a successful business from a tiny start up. However, our client was struggling to learn and progress his skills and knowledge. He was bright but his passion lay elsewhere and the professional service area he was working in did not suit him. He attended our mentor training programme which we ran for the business and realised through that what he was really feeling and why. The value of seeing things through different perspectives really made a difference to him.
 
When our values and needs are being compromised over time in order to meet others’ values and needs, we stop listening to ourselves. What happens is that we simply disengage on a subconscious level. This leads to strained relationships and poor business results alongside health issues.
 
Key questions to ask yourself:

• What do you really want from your business/career?
• Is your current role fully meeting your needs?
• Are these your goals or someone else’s?
• Have you explored all options that are important to you?

 
Culture
This is where you stop listening to yourself because ‘that’s the way we do it around here’ culture exists. There is a strong need to fit in and it can be only too easy to not even realise any negative affect it is having on you. For example, a long working hours culture can easily become the norm, however, all the latest research shows that working longer hours and not taking breaks is simply unproductive. Equally worrying is the research over multitasking which is showing the longer-term damage it does to our brains.
 
Our client was very excited to start her new role leading a bigger team across three areas in the bidding profession. She had a prior track record of high performance and great team engagement. However, she had not realised that the overseas merger that was mentioned at interview was changing organisational culture. Originally the company had been promised a stand-alone set-up, but one month later that was no longer the case. All her prior research into company ethos, culture and values was therefore not relevant.
 
The culture became extremely top down and metric driven with a lack of engagement. Our client became increasingly concerned over staff morale and turnover, however, she felt that she ‘should’ fit in. Direct guidance from her Line Manager over managing a ‘lazy’ team and refusing emergency leave for staff cut across her own values and beliefs. Instead of listening to herself she was becoming increasingly stressed trying to manage her team as they wanted her to.
 
Through our Career Crossroads service, she was able to identify why the new role was not working for her instead of trying harder and harder to fit in and feeling like she was failing. She was then able to gain what she wanted from the role whilst creating a platform to exit at the right time for the right role.
 
Key questions to ask yourself:

• How can you create a better culture for yourself and your team?
• How can you best respect yourself as well as others?
• How can you best look after your body and mind?
• What is the most effective way for you to work?
• Have you got your balance right?

It is often hard to listen to yourself when you have not done it for a while. Investing time to do this means you are on the right track for you, and you are protecting your time, your energy, your relationships and your professional career.
 
Mentoring and leadership training solutions work brilliantly here to create a helpful and supportive space so you can decide your priorities and solutions for yourself.

So, here’s wishing you a lovely summer ahead and lovely time out to check in with yourself. 😊

What is Career Mentoring?
Career mentoring is where the focus of the mentoring is purely on career development. This usually means a strong focus on career stepping stones and on team members who are new or team members who have high potential.
 
I see career mentoring best used when the wider aspects of all career needs are included. This may, for example, include career enrichment, career secondments, career changes, returners to work, new leaders or senior team members wanting to achieve more impact in the same role.
 
We miss opportunities to help people when a mentoring programme isn’t inclusive of all our team’s needs. When we design mentoring programmes, we help the exploration of behaviours and thinking patterns. These wider issues can be missed if the focus is on stepping stones and this exploration acts as a practical enabler. This is why mentoring is such a brilliantly practical way to help people at any stage of their career journey. 
 
How does Career Mentoring Work?
Some organisations create a full in-house internal mentoring programme where more experienced employees support other lesser experienced team members to ‘show them the way’ This is often more of a training role rather than a mentoring one. This type of career mentoring programme needs extra care in planning and development to support people in the right way and to protect against conflicts of interest. In these cases, we help to plan and design programmes to include training the mentoring programme leader and the mentors and we give tailored guidance to mentoring programme ambassadors to ensure the programme is sustainable and successful.
 
Other organisations have totally and partially outsourced their career mentoring programmes to organisations like ours. We can provide guidance on every aspect of design and delivery. This includes tailored training and career mentoring to nominated individuals and individuals can, of course, seek external support such as our Career Crossroads Service.

The decisions over these flexible career mentoring programmes are about choosing which elements are to be outsourced. These elements can cover the full range of areas from pre-launch activities through to launch and then ongoing matching, communication and management responsibilities.
 
Benefits of Career Mentoring Programmes
By creating a mentoring programme you can increase the following for both mentors and mentees:

When a mentoring programme is created with the appropriate frameworks and protocols to protect all parties, it is practical and impactful investment in the growth and development of all involved.
 
Mentoring versus Training versus Support
One key area of strategy here is deciding exactly what team members want and need.
If we take the example of the mentoring programmes set up for employee next level professional accreditation purposes, then the mentee often wants:

Mentoring cannot cover all these areas and indeed some of these areas are outside the Code of Mentoring Conduct. As an example, you cannot fulfil an independent mentor role with no conflict of interest if you are also responsible for your mentee’s assessment for their next career role.
 
There are lots of protocols to consider here too. For example, acting in the mentee’s best interests and confidentiality could come into conflict with your role and responsibilities, if your mentee shares that they are considering leaving/taking time out/not completing the next stage of their career. An example we see frequently is that a mentee has sought mentoring because of a perceived lack of support from their Line Manager or, on occasion, difficulties with their Line Manager. That means extra care with designing protocols is very often needed for in-house programmes.

In programmes like this, mentoring often works best as part of a blended holistic programme including training and access to an experienced training colleague for knowledge and technical help to support overall. Mentoring can additionally be a really helpful intervention after training to help the mentee put the training into practice over a longer time frame.
 
Career Mentoring versus Overall Mentoring
The reason I am often concerned about positioning career mentoring programmes is that I honestly believe mentoring works best for everyone when it is a holistic development.

The focus on the career step result can make for very narrow mentoring interventions which may lead to less value being added. Whereas if you take extra care to position that mentoring is for overall career success (whatever that means to the individual staff member), then this will work better.

The positive boundary of the programme will need to make clear that this is holistic career support which is different to personal mentoring or indeed counselling. The full understanding of the differences of all support roles and, therefore, what the mentoring can and cannot help with by everyone involved are very important.

Top 3 Things to Consider in Introducing Mentoring Programmes
Inclusivity
If the programme has been created for a specific sector such as new entrants, then how do other employees feel? Only providing support to certain employees can result in resentment building over time, as team members feel that they have not been invested in whilst others have.
 
A recent Investors in People survey found 60% of UK employees were not happy in their jobs, with a lack of job satisfaction being cited by 48% of these and feeling undervalued by 30%. So, creating a positive mentoring programme for a few and not considering inclusion could create even more disengagement.
 
Mentoring can and does help at all career stages. Senior staff, for example, can gain enormous amounts of value from being mentored, as they can then potentially see the impact of long-standing mindsets or approaches through different perspectives. Those in senior positions then have wider opportunities to add value to their teams and the business.
 
Training and Support for Mentors
Clearly, I’m biased 😊, however, after supporting the training of hundreds of mentors I have yet to find someone who regretted taking the time out for the training.
 
However, just because someone is experienced and skilled in their role, it doesn’t mean they will naturally make a great mentor. Even where mentors have had previous leadership and senior experience, the mentoring means that they now need to use those skills in a unique way. In fact, some of the skills that are needed to be highly focussed and successful in some roles are the ones that are unhelpful in mentoring roles.
 
If you take a sports example here, then the best coaches are not necessarily the best sports achievers in their field. This means it is very important to consider the application process to become a mentor to ensure only the right people who can give the right support get involved.
 
Once the mentor training is completed then that’s only the start of their journey. It is critical to build in ongoing training, support and peer learning to develop your mentor’s confidence, engagement and skills. This ongoing support protects everyone involved and ensures the programme is a sustainable one. It means any issues or mentoring practice concerns get supported quickly and appropriately which increases impact and retention of your mentors.

The investment in mentor training here will help your organisation in so many ways. Mentor training means high levels of employee engagement which is, of course, crucial to boosting business profits. However, training also contributes in another way. It is only logical that by improving your team members’ skills, they are going to be better at their jobs.

The special thing about mentor training though is that it boosts confidence, communication and emotional intelligence skills which leads to a much better working environment for all.
  
Mentee Guidance
This stage often gets ignored and it can cause real issues. It makes a real difference that well before the mentoring starts the mentee fully understands what to expect. The Mentoring Code of Conduct comes in useful here as you can use it as a discussion point. I’ve found that reassurance over confidentiality and being very clear on boundaries has been especially useful here.
 
The mentees also need a central point of reference for any issues and of course sharing success! This is also a great opportunity to bring together communities within your organisation with ongoing mentoring events or mentoring cohorts who then stay in touch as cross-organisational support.
 
Mentoring Next Steps
I do hope this blog has helped you to think through your own options. Mentoring really does make an amazing difference to individuals, teams and organisations, so it is definitely worth doing!
 
If you want our help at any time, then we would love to hear from you. We have a flexible support for Mentoring Programmes and various training and qualification options for mentors.
 
Happy mentoring! 😊

As mentors our listening skills are the most important skills that we have. Closely listening to your mentee helps you to observe how your mentee is seeing issues and opportunities. Listening gives you insights into how best to support your mentee in understanding themselves and in turn moving forward. The best mentors are the ones that have the right questions - not the right answers.
 
Listening is an invaluable life skill and the cornerstone of high emotional intelligence. Many new mentors tell me they now realise how useful this skill is. They see that listening is transferable to their leadership roles, as well as helping with their professional and personal relationships.

So here is a quick insight into 5 key areas of listening that I hope will help you personally and professionally, as well as sharing what mentoring can involve:

1. Focus
As humans we communicate a lot so you may assume we are naturally good at it. Sadly, that is not the case! Part of communicating is listening which is a skill that can be learnt, practised, and continually improved.
 
Research suggests that we focus and remember only between 25% and 50% of what we hear.
That means that when you talk to people that are important to you, including your family, on average they will be taking in less than half of the conversation. The added challenge is you won't know which of the 25-50 percent they have missed!

As a mentor it means that unless you are aware of this challenge and continually focus on improving your skills when you are in a conversation with your mentee, you will not be taking in all of what your mentee is saying either.

In addition, our life mentor specialist, Adam, likes to remind us: “Whatever you focus on expands.”
In other words, if you are looking for particular themes or confirmations you will only listen and look to the part that reinforces your focus. That focus then becomes utmost in your mind and has a greater impact for you. Clearly, if you are using this knowledge to focus on positive outcomes this can often be a very useful way to listen and communicate. The issue here is that humans are very good at focussing on negatives not positives.

2. Emotion
To get the best out of a conversation, it is necessary to connect emotionally. My friend, Professor Kiran Trehan, reminded me of this at one of her lectures quoting Maya Angelou: “People will forget what you said and did, but they will never forget how you made them feel.”
 
Listening shows how much you value someone. By listening carefully, you make them feel their views and opinions are important to you and that you care. This includes all your relationships, professional or personal. All of these will work better if they connect with you through communicating on an emotional level.

This can be difficult for some mentors, as they feel that they need to be senior and be the guide. That isn't mentoring and having an ego in mentoring is unhelpful to you and your mentee.
To connect with people emotionally as a mentor, you need to be just you. There is only one of you and people will feel when you are being authentic.

3. Interpretation
Whenever someone is talking roughly 7% is speech; and 38% is pitch, emotion, speed, volume and tone. So the majority, the 55 % left, is body language.

Your ears can only pick up the sounds of language, not its physical expressions. Your ears can only hear what is being said; they pass on the signal to the brain. Hearing what is NOT said only takes place in the brain itself. Your brain simultaneously processes and works out signals from the eyes and the ears, picking up these so much faster than conscious thought.

So, what is your mentee really sharing with you? Listening needs to include all your senses. Start thinking:

• What is being said?
• Is there anything not being said?
• What hidden messages are there below the surface?
• Do the non-verbal signals match the words being said?
• Why did they say something?
• Has anything been left out?
• Do you feel your mentee is being authentic, transparent and honest?

Your personal and professional instincts in mentoring are very powerful tools that are really helpful to you here. So by being observant and focussing on using all of your wider information tools, you will becoming better at understanding unspoken messages and therefore become a much better listener and mentor.

4. Personal bias 
Everyone has biases and to be a great listener it is critical to have an awareness of these biases.
We apply bias without realising and sometimes this is just in a small way. Any bias however will be both damaging to you and those that you support through mentoring. It is therefore important to consider:

• Have you accurately interpreted what your mentee said?
• Is their meaning clear or have you added your own translation? 
• Are you so focused on hearing what you want to hear that you have missed something important?

 
One example is with closeness communication bias. People frequently overestimate their ability to communicate, especially with people they know well. Research shows that people who know each other well understand each other no better than people who had recently met! Our problem in communicating with people we know is that we have an illusion that they really know and understand us to the extent they can ‘fill in the gaps’. In other words, when we speak with people we know well, we make assumptions about what they understand.

So in the mentoring world you need to take as much care with a mentee that you have been working with for a long time to continually check your and their understanding as you would with a new mentee relationship.

5. Active listening
“You have been given two ears and one mouth, so you should use them in that proportion”.

The way to improve your listening skills is to practice "active listening." This is where you make a conscious focussed effort to hear the words that another person is saying and critically focus your attention on the complete message being sent. To make this work as a mentor you will need to use your brain and concentrate a lot! That is because you need to use all your senses and all of your awareness.

How to improve listening with your brain

The great news is once you appreciate that something you have done naturally for your whole life can be enhanced by mentoring practice and awareness then it is easily improved. Here are 10 quick practical mentor actions:

Simple steps like these will really help you, your leadership and your mentoring.
They all make it clear that you value the other person and your relationship with them.

Happy listening!