Running header: THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 1

The Continuous Development of a Mentor

Mackenzie Glaser

Minnesota State University, Mankato

THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 2

“The delicate balance of mentoring someone is not creating them in your own image, but

giving them the opportunity to create themselves” (Spielberg S.) was one quote that has really

embodied my mentor philosophy that I have developed. In this class, we have looked what is

needed in order to be an effective mentor. Throughout the semester we have looked at different

aspects such as what knowledge is, emotional intelligence, and different mentor styles. During

this semester, I have had to look at a lot of different styles of leadership as well as different

aspects of those styles. Now, in those styles, I have also reflected on what my personal mentor

philosophy are and what aspects are important to me. The most basic aspect I had to think about

was what a mentor was. Reflecting more and more about it gave me the conclusion that being a

mentor is being able to effectively communicate expectations with the other. This requires some

sort of acknowledgement from both sides as to if they are in a mentoring relationship to one

another. I also want to state that being a mentor is a relationship between two or more people

where information is gained on either side of the equation. Creating an environment where a

successful mentor relationship can flourish is what I believe to be a personal mentoring

philosophy that works and is important to me. My mentor philosophy is concentrated on being

able to acknowledge personal truths, having clear expectations, as well as being able to

acknowledge that being a mentor is an ongoing process.

The first important aspect of my mentor philosophy is the importance of acknowledging

others personal truths. This outlook on knowledge can be very subjective and unpredictable, but

being objective and not acknowledging how someone feels, even if it is different than the way

you feel, is far worse. While Dewey believed that knowledge should be objective and to

look at knowledge from an outside perspective, I side more with Plato who says that personal

experience can be a form of knowledge and should be treated as such. When they both try to
THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 3

pinpoint what “the real object” (Dewey J., 1981) is, Dewey takes more of a literal approach and

does not believe that a person’s point of view is knowledge necessarily. They both look at how

experience plays into how it can be evaluated as knowledge. This was intriguing because

experiences can be perceived differently by anyone. In mentoring, both of these views can have

their time and place but can be looked at as insensitive or as too clouded by emotion depending

on the situation. When you have an experience that is different than someone else’s, and that

person disregards your feelings, it can damage a relationship severely.

One example of acknowledging others’ personal truths is starting college. I was super

excited for college to start and I know some other people that were too. I remember specifically

about halfway through the semester one of my friends was not having a great time. I tried to get

her to go out and meet people and get involved but it did not work and it was lost on me how two

people could have such a different experience in college. I wanted to bring this into my mentor

philosophy because of the fact that in this instance two people in the same circumstances can

have such different experiences. I also learned from this experience and in class to be able to be

more empathetic and be there for others regardless of my experience. This kind of fed into my

mentor philosophy due to the fact that through these close experiences with others and

acknowledgement of their troubles allowed myself to form a closer bond and to be more

understanding as to meet expectations of all people involved.

Another activity that helped me pinpoint this aspect of my mentoring philosophy includes

when we read the emotionally intelligent leadership booklet. This helped me reflect on my

mentoring philosophy because we looked at our strengths and weaknesses in various aspects of

being emotionally intelligent. When I looked at my strengths, I found that I am an extremely

empathetic person, which I use in my mentoring. It made me reflect on myself and my strengths
THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 4

and weaknesses because of the fact that my friends/other people in the class had such different

strengths and weaknesses, such as others’ lack of empathy. When so many people that I have so

much in common with, have such different strengths and weaknesses, then why wouldn’t

mentors and mentees? When thinking about the mentor relationship I thought of how much two

people differ from each other even if they hold some of the same values and are from a similar

background. Even in my friend group alone we have people from different places, with different

drives, motives, and personal philosophies. For this reason, it is notable to include in my mentor

philosophy due to the great amount of diversity in people in different positions.

This brings me to my next important aspect of my mentor philosophy which is having

clear expectations in a mentoring relationship. This is an important part of my mentor philosophy

due to the fact that if there are not clear expectations, then each side of the relationship can feel

as if their needs are being ignored or not met. This can spark distrust and an ineffective

relationship. The crux of this issue is the skill of being an effective communicator. For example,

without communicating what you want out of the relationship (support, specific professional

expertise), the mentor relationship will not be as successful.

One example of this distrust is when my friend had a mentor in the past who could not

communicate with her frequently, which was something that she wanted in a mentor. However,

this was never communicated so both sides felt unfulfilled. Since both sides felt this way, the

trust and bond between these two was lost, which is a shame due to the fact that if it was

communicated, then it would have been solved. The ineffective communication also stops a

deeper bond and trust from being formed which is a huge factor in being an effective mentor. If

you do not create a personal connection with the other person, then your surface level issues and

questions can be faced but delving deeper is highly unlikely. This seems as a missed opportunity
THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 5

due to the fact that a deeper connection can harbor a sense of trust and can have both parties

learn things from one another.

This important piece in my mentor philosophy was also supported by things that my

interviewee Pam said. She stated that clear expectations make the interaction meet everyone’s

needs and promotes building a connection. I have also experienced this in my own life while

working at coffee and bagels. I have had the experience to kind of informally train new

employees and creating a connection with them is an easy way for me to be able to help them

improve or help them with any questions they have. This has given me a lot of success in helping

others and this along with reinforcement from others, is a huge reason as to why this is a big part

of my mentor philosophy.

Lastly, I believe that, as in anything, it is an ongoing process. I think that a huge part of

being a good mentor is always learning and never assuming that you know what is best for others

without knowing their current situation on a deeper level. Thinking that you do not need to learn

can be a huge barrier between you and your mentee because they might see you as not willing to

cooperate and are not invested. In our Buddhism reading, it states that “we must know that the

human being is but a temporal fictitious mixture” (Shien, G.M.,1953, July). In this quote, it

means that a person is just a mixture of changing and unreal aspects. This elaborates on the fact

that people change all the time and so do situations, so even if you think you know what is going

on one minute you need to evaluate everything as it comes.

A specific example of this was while talking to my community leader, Pam. She

currently is a high official of a major health corporation as well as was my Girl Scout troop

leader for about 10 years. She stated that as she gets older, she thinks she knows the answer but

knows to reflect more to try to overcome that challenge. That scenario also made me think about
THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 6

my own life such as thinking about age differences in mentors and mentees. Evaluating learning

and age difference I thought that a mentor could be younger than the mentee because of the fact

that they have as much of a capability of learning as the next person. They could also have a

higher skill level. I also reflected how little I interacted with younger people in a leadership role

and realized that I did not see them as a person I could learn from. I wish that I could say that I

applied my conclusion I made in class, in my everyday life. This made me reevaluate the way

that I look at younger people and see how much they could teach me. These resources made me

come to the conclusion that being a mentor can mean you are at many different levels. It also

helped me realize that being a mentor is a learning process where many people are at many

different places with.

In this class, it has opened my eyes to the many different ways in which someone can be

a successful mentor. These topics and articles that I encountered in this class made me think

about how I want to proceed in my mentoring relationships in the future. The three aspects that

stood out the most for me were the aspect of always learning, acknowledging personal

experience, as well as having clear expectations and meeting them. These were of significance

because they seemed to be woven into a great deal of class activities as well as in my personal

experiences and in other successful mentors. Within my mentor philosophy I also found that

these three aspects seemed to interact closely together. In order to have a successful mentorship

you need to know what kind of things they want out of it. The way you find out what They want

is talking to them and actively learning from them. In order to do that you need to have clear

expectations so that they feel comfortable with you and feel as if they care about their success.

With my interactions, with my interviewees, and in my personal experiences, I have found that
THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 7

these three aspects usually foster a successful mentor relationship. I plan on incorporating into

my mentoring interactions that I already do experience and in the future.

THE CONTINUOUS DEVELOPMENT OF A MENTOR 8

References

Allen, S, Miguel, & R, Shankman. (2015). Emotionally intelligent leadership for students. San

Francisco, California: Jossey-Bass.

Dewey, J. (1981). The Need for a Recovery of Philosophy. (McDermott, J.). Chicago, Illinois:

University of Chicago press. Page 88-97

Shien, G.M. (1953, July) The Epistemology of Buddhism, Taoism, and Confucianism, Volume

28, Number 106, pg 260-264

Williams, B. (Eds.). (1992). Plato Theaetetus. Indianapolis, Indiana: Hacket Publishing

Company, Inc.