Mentor definition: An experienced and trusted advisor
Mentee definition: a person who is advised, trained, or counselled by a mentor
Mentors help students and recent graduates to transition from university to working life. They can work with mentees on their CV and applications, help to identify transferable skills, develop their confidence, provide insights into job functions, industries and roles. Mentors may even introduce mentees to their networks, provide work experience or shadowing. Mentoring can help to advance careers.
But what are the benefits for the mentors? What motivates mentors to give back?
- Being kind feels good! Often people who are kind and give back to their communities reap many personal rewards. Being kind can have health benefits, it can improve your emotional wellbeing, reduce stress and ultimately boost your happiness.
- Creates a chain reaction of kindness. Giving back has the potential to create a chain reaction of kindness. Recipients of kindness are more likely to give back to others.
- Improves mental health. Connection with others is a fundamental part of being human, we do need other people to survive and thrive. Meeting new people, increasing your networks, and having meaningful connections can have immeasurable health benefits. Feeling valued and being part of a community creates a sense of belonging that can boost your mental health.
- Boosts self-esteem. Mentoring is an opportunity to give back, to show off a bit, to take-stock of how far you have come since your own student days and what you have learnt and experienced. The personal satisfaction from knowing that you have had an impact on another’s career development can be a huge self-esteem boost.
- Develops and enhances skills. To be an effective mentor requires a whole host of skills; people skills, communication skills, active listening skills. Not to mention patience, understanding, empathy plus practical careers skills such as CV and application writing and goal setting. Often communicating your own knowledge to someone else crystallises it in your own mind. Mentoring can look great on a CV, it may lead to opportunities to boost your own career.
- Understand the next generation of professionals. The University of Cumbria Alumni Association is a community of over 50,000 graduates worldwide and currently growing by around 4,000 per year. Within our network is a wide diversity of skills and experiences. Being part of the alumni community is powerful; meeting students and recent graduates can help to give fresh new insights and ideas, can help recruiters explore the potential and talent of graduates. Being an active member of the community through mentoring can bring you positive PR and increase the profile of the company or industry you work in.
Whatever the motivation, mentoring can have proven benefits to both mentor and mentee. If you would like to give back and you think mentoring could be right for you, we would love to hear from you. Be among the first to hear about our new mentoring opportunities.
The Cumbria Network is our new mentoring platform open to all alumni, students and staff of the University of Cumbria. The Cumbria Network is a searchable database of graduates with many diverse skills and experiences. The Cumbria Network can advance your career and help you to help others do the same.
Build your profile and choose how you are willing to help, the built-in algorithms allow you to search the database, find others from your industry or course who are seeking mentors.
Join the Cumbria Network today.