St.Louis Business Journal
MENTORING IS NOW A TWO-WAY STREET BETWEEN YOUNGER AND OLDER WORKERS

By Anna Navarro

January 2008  

Author's note: Client stories in this column are based on actual situations fictionalized to protect privacy and told with permission.



We usually think of mentors as people who are older than we are. But given how fast the world is changing, seasoned workers today can often benefit from mentoring by their younger colleagues.

Madge joined a small advertising company in her hometown shortly after graduating from college with a B.A. in Communications. She expected to be a gofer for a few years while she learned the business. But she soon discovered she had more to offer.

She was invited to sit in on a brainstorming session for a client where the project team was discussing new ways to reach a target market. As she listened, she realized she might know more about blogging than her older colleagues. She was too unsure of herself to say anything during the meeting, but afterward she mentioned to her supervisor that she had written a blog for a time, and that she read several blogs on a daily basis.

She was promptly added to the project team and found herself tutoring co-workers with many years seniority about the fine points of blogging. From them she learned a great deal about developing the larger marketing strategy, but she had a great deal to add about blogging. The learning process became a two way street.

Harvey was a young man with an interest in becoming a successful residential real estate agent. He’d started working for a well-known brokerage firm just as the housing market started to go soft.

Some years prior, the company had invested in a canned system that would allow clients to “see” a property in 360 degree detail. It allowed agents to make videos of the properties they listed and upload them into the firm’s on- line offerings. The system had languished in the boom time because many homes sold in less that 48 hours, and everyone was too busy to bother with learning how to do it.

Now that business was slow, the agents were interested in anything that would give them an edge, especially with the corporate relocation market, where demand remained stronger than other sectors. The on-line 360-degree videos were a particularly effective tool with this group because it allowed potential customers in other cities to view listings.

Harvey had extensive self-taught computer experience and easily mastered the video system. When the older agents figured out how skilled he was, they clamored for him to teach them how to do it. He developed collaborative relationships with many of them, learning from their experience even as he mentored them in the video system.

As a direct result of these relationships, Harvey was often offered the opportunity to partner with a senior agent on a listing, receiving a small percentage of the fees when the property sold if he would tend to the listing when they were out of town or busy.

Larry was a first year associate in a law firm, doing all the usual drudge work that was expected of him. In law school, he’d often listened to podcasts of lectures. He also was an avid music buff, and listened to many obscure music radio shows he’d otherwise miss in a podcast format.

The partner who was supervising him happened to mention that the firm was putting together a new website. Larry asked if the firm had ever considered doing podcast seminars by senior partners to demonstrate their expertise to potential clients. The partner admitted he didn’t know much about podcasting, but when Larry explained it, he said it sounded interesting and he’d pass the idea along to the group that was working on the website.

Podcasts by senior partners became a major feature of the firm’s website. Larry’s supervisor thanked him for bringing him up to speed on the idea and suggesting it for the website.

Larry was able to make a contribution that was recognized even though he didn’t know anything about the technology of producing a podcast. He was strictly a listener who had benefited from listening to them. But sharing his awareness of the medium had helped him make a valuable contribution.

Two-way mentoring between older and younger colleagues can be very mutually beneficial, as these examples illustrate. We have long been aware of the benefits of seniors mentoring juniors, but awareness of the benefits going the other direction is just beginning to emerge. It’s time for older workers to begin to cultivate those relationships as intentionally as younger people.

Anna Navarro is the founder of Work Transitions, a nationwide career consulting firm that trains independent career strategists and consults with individual clients.

This column was originally published by the St. Louis Business Journal. The actual title of the column and date in which it appeared in the Business Journal may be slightly different from what appears on WorkTransitions.com.