A recent study conducted by the US Trade Schools, Colleges and University, an online career training resource, has found that about 80% of the respondents did not follow through on the career path which they had dreamed about when they were six years old. That means their childhood imagination or their childhood dream remained just that.
There are many reasons why the dreams did not come to fruition. One of them is not having a mentor. To sustain one’s passion, one must have a support system to guide in the right direction and mentorship does exactly that.
As mentorship is a relationship in which a more experienced or more knowledgeable person helps or guides a less experienced or less knowledgeable person in one’s chosen field, the mentor eggs the protégé or the mentee to stay on course. He/she fine-tunes the protégé’s passion and generally guides on the direction that needs to be taken. The mentor is not a tutor, but a guiding force. Social media accelerates mentorship. Finding mentors is not difficult in the age of the internet which cuts across geographical barriers.
Unlike in the pre-internet/ pre-smart-phone era, where one had to travel to the location where the mentor was or be on voice call with the mentor, the world now certainly is a more ‘connected place’ where things are instant.
Social media has helped accelerate mentorship programme in a large way and more efficiently and more rapidly. As mentorship entails informal communication, usually face to face and over a long period of time, thanks to internet all this can happen by the click of a button on one’s smart-phone.
One can get mentorship from anywhere in the world without even stepping out of one’s place. For example, Tiger Woods can be a mentor to a golfer in a place thousands of miles away, provided both hit it off. Mentorship comes at various levels but it is not a 24/7 programme.
Yes, the value of face-to-face mentorship is still very high as it touches various chords – mental, emotional, spiritual and the like. However, in the digital era, communication, which is the crux of mentorship, is almost instant and direct.
A video call between the mentor and the protégé is enough to keep passion alive and kicking. As Glenn Rideout of University of Windsor points out, “A good mentor encourages the protégé to acquire the ‘tools’ to reach their goals. A good mentor does not ‘feed’ information and answers to the protégé, but makes the protégé think and assess.”
And with technology, the mentor and the mentee now have so many different sources to dig into to add depth to mentorship. Digital technology is dynamic and flexible and it has certainly come in play as a platform for mentoring. Electronic mentoring initiatives are quick, cuts across borders, are available 24/7 (provided you have internet connection), is effective and above all is in tune with the times, easy adaptability for the next-generation.
Effective tool
The e-mentoring is an effective tool to support novices who may be hesitant in the beginning for a face-to-face interaction. Studies have shown that mentorship renews the mentee’s desire to learn. There have been many instances of how mentors role-model, motivate and influence career directions for mentees.
Understanding the importance of mentorship, many digital platforms have come up which helps individuals nurture their passion and take it to the next level. Individuals wanting to pursue their passion can link up with mentors, many of whom are there on their board solely to keep passion alive in individuals.
Each member is matched thoughtfully with a mentor who help the member reach his or her personal and professional goals. Importantly, each individual’s ideas, passions and mentorship needs are taken into account when pairing them with and accomplished and inspiring community member.
Besides mentors, these digital platforms give access to peer groups and also provides ‘curated’ content in sync with the individual’s passion or talent. The approach is multi-pronged while it is for the individual to take that first step and digital platforms help the individual in taking that first crucial step.
(The writer is co-Founder and MD, Passion Connect)
Published 13 July 2017, 19:39 IST