How To Set Up a Great Mentoring Program

Mentees are five times more promoted than other employees, with 25% of mentees receiving a pay increase according to a study of 1,000 employees.

Mentoring also has other intrinsic benefits. According to the Moving Ahead Research, 87% of mentors and mentees report that mentorship relationships increased their confidence and made them feel more empowered.  

Younger employees now want roles that enhance their growth. Offering mentorship opportunities may help businesses attract and retain the best talent. So, how can you start mentoring employees? 

The following strategies can help with how to set up a mentoring program.  

1. Design A Mentorship Program  
   

Poor planning can make for an ineffective mentorship program. That’s why it’s worth investing in a well-structured and well documented process that is scalable and repeatable with the same success levels. 

How do you structure a mentorship program?  

• Create a program outline that incorporates the goals and other specifics such as the duration, number of sessions, and timelines;  
• Identify specific topics that the mentor will touch on, for instance, leadership, skill development, productivity, or networking;
• Consider using different formats for mentoring, including remote, in-person, or group sessions;  
• Assign resources and have clearly defined outcomes of the mentorship program.  

2. Attract Participants 
   

Mentorship often tends to be a voluntary process, offered on a need basis or as a perk because of limited resources and capacities. For instance, the CTO may not have time to mentor every programmer the company employs. 

You can set specific criteria that need to be met, such as making contributions to a certain project or hitting a project goal. That makes the mentorship process more worthwhile for the participants because they have earned it.  

3. Match Mentors & Mentees 
   

Unlike coaching, mentorship focuses on building a lasting relationship between the mentor and mentee. The right match can result in a lifelong relationship. You can start by identifying the business or developmental objectives of the program. 

Mentors and mentees can share the same value systems or have other things in common to help build rapport. There should be sufficient self-disclosure for both parties to know more about each other well. You can also help the mentor choose the mentees by creating profiles or briefs or holding meet-and-greet meetings.  

You can explore mentoring software & online tools that include mentor matching & features to help streamline the process.

4. Provide Checklists & Other Helpful Resources 
   

Provide additional resources to help support the mentorship process. You can look into the possibility of creating readiness checklists, responsibility checklists, supplemental reading materials, questionnaires, and action plans to be used during membership meetings.

5. Measure The Impact Of The Mentoring Program  
   

The mentoring process should also include a component for measuring the program’s success and progress. You can measure if the mentorship is progressing well by looking at indicators such as meeting frequency, relationship duration, or total training time.

The success of the training can be measured by checking if the expected outcomes have been fulfilled. You can do this by holding interviews with the mentee/mentor or conducting a survey. Your organisation’s mentorship program should continuously improve based on feedback.  

Are you setting up a mentorship program? 

WorkPilot makes it easy to manage mentoring and training programs in just a few clicks. By using it's mentoring software you can access features such as mentor matching, goal tracking, and meeting notes to help your mentorship programs run more smoothly.