The Client
The client was matched with a 10Eighty mentor via the CIPD mentoring scheme in 2020 when she sought support for her HR career.
The mentoring switched expertly from career coaching, to mentoring depending on the nature of the challenges the client encountered. Mentoring helped the client to reach solutions and new ideas insight and guidance to guide her in her professional development.
The Programme
The mentoring arrangement consisted of regular meetings to discuss professional goals and career plans. The mentor acting as trusted advisor and as a valuable sounding when addressing barriers, challenges and difficult decisions.
The programme allowed the client to explore new perspectives and approaches to her career path which enabled a lot of progress and purpose to the mentoring sessions. The result was evident in tangible value added for the client, and her employer through an enhanced understanding of her development options.
Effective mentoring encourages mentees to think and act beyond their current level of understanding in focused and professional conversations. Mentees are helped to reflect and learn from their actions and to develop coping strategies. Mentoring requires mutual trust and commitment in a challenging and supportive environment that involves active listening and questioning.
Outcomes
The client found her external mentoring support invaluable to me in providing a fresh perspective on challenging situations that she faced at work, which she feels she would not have been able to unpick objectively with a mentor from within her organization. The client developed resilience and optimism in her approach to her career path.
There is a great advantage in knowing she could bring sometimes emotionally charged matters to the mentoring sessions, and this was a significant help in managing her own mental health and boundaries at work. Our mentor’s extensive HR skill and experience was instrumental in equipping the client with the skills to navigate and balance internal politics, ethics, legal situations and the many grey areas within the realm of people management/HR; skills she feels she could not have learned from in a textbook.
The programme supported the client through many career milestones, from moving jobs to the Covid pandemic, to a promotion to HR Director, a career goal for many years. The mentoring helped the client to achieve her goals and she is inspired to pass on the gift of mentoring to others. Mentoring is a valuable and flexible solution for many organisations.
Click below to read about how we supported the client through many career milestones.
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