Executive Mentoring
An executive mentor can provide valuable advice, insight and support to enable you on your career path.
How A mentorship session may look
Why Work With An Executive Mentor?
Executive mentoring is a powerful form of professional development. A mentor acts as a valuable and impartial sounding board as well as sharing insight based on their long experience. They can help executives to approach complex problems, manage difficult situations, and set and achieve ambitious goals. A successful role model can also impart the necessary skills for achieving success and provide invaluable support during times of transition or challenge.
Executive mentoring often deals with the broader backdrop of your life and career. It can help you work toward goals that are both immediate and long-term.
‘75% of executives point to mentoring playing a key role in their careers’
– Source ASTD
Executive Mentoring
What will an executive mentor do?
Mentors provide confidential, situation specific advice and counsel.
They will:
- suggest different practical approaches
- clarify thinking
- help navigate corporate politics
- challenge your ‘route to goal’
- prepare you for challenges
- help deal with change and ambiguity
- envision and help shape an organisation
- be an effective sounding board
They come from various backgrounds, including FTSE 350, FTSE SmallCap Index, Limited Partnerships, PE-owned, foreign and government-owned. They are typically either still in the role or recently retired and enjoying a varied portfolio career.
Who are our executive mentors?
Our prestigious group of mentors have all successfully led large functional teams and sat at the top table of multinational, global organisations.
They are both functional experts and corporate captains who now make time to share their wisdom, experience and insight via personalised mentoring programmes.
Our mentors span a wide range of functional areas, from finance to risk, from strategy to customer, from HR to marketing and a wide range of other sectors.
Frequently Asked Questions
Have any questions? We want you to be as sure as possible about choosing us.
What is executive mentoring?
Executive mentoring often deals with the broader aspects of your career and life. Executives choose to work with a mentor who has worked in a similar function and/or industry and understands the challenges they face. They act as a sounding board and a source of much greater experience to help you work towards goals that are both immediate and long-range.
What are the benefits of executive mentoring?
Executive mentors offer both functional and industry expertise. Our clients often decide to work with a mentor when they are already established in their role but need some specific help to re-focus, re-energise or deal with times of complexity, pressure or change. Some of our clients ask for a mentor when they have been identified as a key succession candidate or are transitioning into a new more senior role and are looking for the wisdom of someone who has been there before. Executive mentors help you navigate:
- professional development
- critical life transitions
- personal growth
- career satisfaction
- creating executive presence
- preparing for your next promotion
- becoming comfortable in a new role
- keeping life in balance
- gaining greater leadership mastery
What questions should you ask an executive mentor?
Questions around their career history, their achievements, and the specific challenges you are facing are the most important questions to ask. You may also find out about their experience of mentoring and the types of executives they have worked with. If you are keen to be connected to people in your role/industry, you’ll want to ask about the mentor’s network and/or membership of relevant professional bodies.
What’s the difference between an executive coach and an executive mentor?
Think of executive coaching as focusing on imparting skills or changing behaviour, whilst executive mentoring focuses on imparting wisdom in using your skills.
Compared to an executive coach, your mentor may meet with you less frequently, but mentoring sessions are normally longer and more far-ranging than coaching sessions.
Executive mentoring is generally less structured, broader in scope and pursues a more open-ended agenda than executive coaching.
How does executive mentoring work?
Mentoring packages are completely flexible to suit your needs. Typically, a minimum of 6 hours is recommended for the relationship to build, to fully understand your individual context and challenges and to provide the necessary level of support.
We will recommend an initial bank of hours, this can then be extended if appropriate. Ultimately you choose the level of support to suit your needs and budget.
The number of meetings arranged and their duration is then agreed between you and your mentor. Meetings are often between 1-2 hours and are either face-to-face or virtual.
An effective mentoring relationship is just that – a relationship – together with your mentor you find your own, appropriate level of contact.
