If effective leaders can be made, what is the best way to make them? A first-of-its-kind study suggests an answer writes Steve Smith of the University of Nebraska-Lincoln in a web article announcing the findings of a recent field experiment on mentoring (http://newsroom.unl.edu/announce/todayatunl/710/4275).

According to Smith, researchers found that pairing a seasoned pro with a promising prospect in an informal mentorship was significantly more potent in developing strong leaders than formal group training. The process, however, was effective only if protégés fully trusted their mentors and were willing to handle blunt criticism, not just empty praise. This is music to our ears.

The findings reinforce the notion that the more organizations can move away from one-size-fits-all training toward one-on-one mentorships characterized by trust, the better their chances for building strong leaders will be.

“Organizations in the U.S. spend billions each year trying to develop better leaders with mixed results. This study is important because it explains why so many programs may be falling short of expectations,” said Peter Harms, assistant professor of management at UNL and co-author of the study. “Our research demonstrates that if leadership training efforts are to be successful, the targets of such interventions must be ready to develop. And the foundation of such readiness is an atmosphere of trust…”

The research was conducted over six months and involved hundreds of cadets at the U.S. Military Academy at West Point. Researchers randomly assigned cadets to either a tailored, structured mentorship program or a comparison group that participated in group leadership training in classrooms. Results showed that cadets participating in the semi-formal mentorships were significantly more likely to increase their confidence for being in a leadership role than their counterparts.

“The research has important implications for business,” Harms said. “Organizations may want to consider approaching leadership development in new, more systematic ways by using mentors. Prior research has also demonstrated that mentoring relationships have positive benefits for mentors as well as their protégés.”

“Organizations have to decide for themselves how important leadership development is for them,” says Harms and I couldn’t agree more. Our experience with client organizations is affirmed by the results of this study. We know that setting a firm foundation for trust can make or break a mentoring program. That’s why our Mentorship Launch Program can make such an important difference. Both sides of the mentoring partnership learn critical listening and actionable feedback skills, they learn and have an opportunity to practice conversational tools that lead to breakthrough thinking and results. It allows mentors and protégés to hit the ground running.

The study was authored by Paul Lester of the U.S. Army’s Comprehensive Soldier Fitness Directorate (UNL Ph.D.); Sean Hannah of the U.S. Military Academy at West Point (UNL Ph.D.); UNL’s Harms; Gretchen Vogelgesang of Federal Management Partners (UNL Ph.D.) and Bruce Avolio of the University of Washington. The findings will be published in a forthcoming issue of the journal Academy of Management Learning and Education.

I am so delighted to share this interview of me by Tom Cox, a truly talented consultant, speaker and blog radio host. I got to tell my story, how I became involved with mentoring and explain how what we do gives companies a competitive advantage by engaging employees at a much higher level. That means higher productivity, creativity, commitment and overall performance. Please listen in. If you like what you hear, call me for a FREE consultation. Invite me to speak at your next conference.

To Listen, cut and paste this link into your browser – allow about 30 minutes. http://www.Blogtalkradio.com/tom-on-leadership/2011/12/15/mentoring-for-competitive-advantage

Higher Ups Get Coaching on New Trends, Technology & Social Media From Young Workers

In a recent article in the Wall Street Journal, reporter Leslie Kwoh, notes an exciting new trend taking off in a wide range of companies. Instead of workplace mentors who are older and higher up in the ranks than their mentees – younger employees are being tapped to help senior executives learn new skills.

The idea is to give senior managers an opportunity to learn about life outside the corner office. If that isn’t enough of a reason, companies are seeing reduced turnover among younger employees because mentoring this way gives them a sense of purpose, along with an enlightening glimpse into the world of management and access to top tier leaders.

According to Kwoh, reverse mentoring was championed by Jack Welch when he was chief executive of General Electric Co. He had 500 top-level executives pair up with people below them to learn to use the Internet. Welch took his own advice to heart and was matched with an employee in her 20s who taught him how to surf the Web. Today young mentors are teaching their senior mentees about Facebook and Twitter.

Technology and global thinking are changing so rapidly, older executives don’t want to be left behind. Reverse mentoring also helps acculturate the younger employees more quickly. They begin to see a promising future for themselves in the organization. This boosts loyalty, employee engagement and overall productivity.

There can be pitfalls. Many older workers resist the idea of being mentored by someone younger, especially when they have so many more years of experience. This is where a solid launch event featuring the people skills that make for more effective mentoring partnerships can make all the difference in the success of the program.

Leslie Truex, author of the Work At Home Bible, interviewed Susan Bender Phelps, CEO, of Odyssey Mentoring and Leadership for an audio podcast on her website www.Work-At-HomeSuccess.com this week. You’ll learn how she started Odyssey Mentoring and Leadership and hear why mentoring skills and mentoring are so critical for professional development, employee engagement and productivity: http://workathomesuccess.com/wahs-podcast-163-susan-phelps-of-odyssey-mentor (you’ll have to copy and paste the link into your browser to get there).

I want to share this article from The Star Ledger because they interviewed me. Though I really grew up on Long Island – it is a true story. Of course, if you are mentoring someone with a very pronounced regional accent – this might be helpful, too.

By Lee Miller/The Star-Ledger – Published: Sunday, July 24, 2011, 11:09 AM

After college, East Coast native Susan Bender Phelps, president of Odyssey Mentoring, moved to Southern California.

Her first job was as a telephone solicitor selling solar hot water heating systems. After being on the job just two hours, her manager called me into her office and said, “You cannot talk to people like that! Your accent and the fast-talking are scaring people. Slow down and lose the accent, or you will not be able to work here.”

Well, she succeeded in quickly losing the accent when she spoke on the phone at work, but it took a lot longer to lose it in general conversation. Now, as a corporate trainer and public speaker, she occasionally uses her accent for humor or when telling a story to add character, but has found she is generally more effective without a regional accent.

A study conducted by Diane Markley and Patricia Cukor-Avila shows how regional accents can affect hiring.

The study involved 56 hiring professionals who were asked to make judgments about potential based solely on how candidates, with different regional accents, sounded. The hirers were asked to judge if each speaker sounded educated or uneducated, intelligent or unintelligent, energetic or lazy, uptight or laid back, outgoing or withdrawn, assertive or docile.

Of the 10 regional accents, a distinctive “New Jersey” accent received the most negative rating by hiring professionals. When asked to decide what types of jobs the individuals were suited for based solely on their accents, only 5 percent of the hirers selected the New Jersey speaker for positions requiring a high level of customer contact and more than 64 percent selected the New Jersey speaker for positions requiring little technical expertise and little-to-no customer contact.

Can a New Jersey accent hurt you in a job search or in your quest for a promotion?

For jobs located outside of New Jersey or for positions where you work with a national clientele, it may sometimes limit your options.

According to Sharlene Vichness, president of Roseland-based Language Direction, a company that specializes in accent reduction, employers often make snap judgments based on how you sound. She refers to this as “accent prejudice.”

Vichness suggests that “while you can talk any way you want with your friends, to maximize your career potential it is best to speak standard business English.” Her goal when she works with someone who feels that their accent is hurting their career is to “make sure that what comes out of your mouth reflects what is in your head.”

Everyone has an accent of some sort, even if it is a Midwestern “non-accent” of the type most television anchors have. Unless it interferes with your ability to communicate or affects how you are perceived, it is generally not a problem.

Some people, in fact, view their local accents as a plus. Jené Luciani, an on-air style expert, spent several years working in production “behind the scenes” before transitioning to the other side of the camera.

When she was contemplating the move to on-air personality, several people in the business told her she would have to lose her accent. They said she would have trouble getting work or getting an agent to represent her, if she did not get rid of her accent. They also suggested changing her name. She chose to ignore their advice and, as she notes, it has turned out quite well for her.

If you believe your accent may be holding you back, you can do something about it. Dawn Cotter-Jenkins, a speech therapist who works for Language Directions, recently worked with an accountant who felt that her local accent was impeding her chances of being made a partner at the accounting firm where she works.

Cotter-Jenkins was able to teach her techniques to change her pronunciation of words, such as dog and coffee, eliminating her local accent. Within six months her client was promoted to partner at the firm.

As Vichness notes, how you look and how you speak are the first things people notice about you. She adds, “first impressions matter and you never get a second chance to make a good first impression.

When your organization doesn’t have a formal mentoring program, or you haven’t been invited to participate, you can still benefit from mentoring. The difference is, you’ll have to find one on your own. How you can do that has changed, says Susan Balcom Walton, M.A., APR, associate professor of public relations at Brigham Young University, in the latest issue of Public Relations Strategist. Though her advice is targeted to public relations professionals and students, it is advice that any person aspiring to advance his or her career can use.

Balcom Walton asserts that mentoring relationships will come from networks that are broader. In the old days, potential mentees turned to people they knew well. But increasingly, mentor-seekers will find themselves approaching people they either don’t know well or may have never met.

She believes we will see more distance mentoring: successful mentoring relationships that exist primarily — or even completely — in the virtual world, with most exchanges of information taking place via email or social media.

“Situational mentoring” is also becoming more common. Balcom Walton sees this as a trend where mentees connect with mentors for certain periods of time or certain situations, rather than turning to one mentor for everything. Even so, traditional, long-term mentoring relationships will continue to thrive.

To learn how to find a mentor in this new environment, how to “pop” the question and anticipate some of the pitfalls of this new kind of mentoring, see Balcom Walton’s article in the July 12 issue of the Public Relations Strategist.

An actively engaged employee is a productive member of your organization. They care, they’re motivated and they are actively contributing. In fact, a large part of your company’s success is the direct result of their accomplishments, creativity, drive and talent.

A 2006 Gallup poll found that higher performing companies have a significant difference in the ratio of engaged versus disengaged employees than lower performing organizations. That’s 8:1 for the best, and just 2:1 at the average companies. If yours is one of those high-performing companies, that’s very good news.

But, according to a 2010 survey by global consulting firm BlessingWhite, only 31 percent of the global work force is actively engaged. Overall, they found that 52 percent of the work force is not engaged. That means they come to work and do what’s expected or less. If that isn’t an eye opener; it turns out 17 percent of the workforce is actively disengaged: they show up when they feel like it, and continually undermine and work against you.

This is important because employees who aren’t engaged lower overall productivity and add to turn over and that costs you. Before the recession, the cost of replacing an employee averaged $17,000 and those who made more than $60,000 per year cost more than $38,000 to replace. Now human resource managers tell us to look at an employee’s annual salary and figure 100 to 150 percent is what it will cost you to replace them. This includes lost productivity, recruitment and training. When you consider managerial and C-suite compensation packages, the total cost is sobering.

It turns out that the best predictor of high performance is that ratio of actively engaged employees at every level of the company. And employee engagement is most positively impacted when managers have excellent people skills. Managers who have great relationships with their direct reports out-perform those who rely solely on management actions.

This leads me to conclude that mentorship skills (people skills) and a mentoring environment (learning and support) are important tools for improving employee engagement at all levels of your organization. Once you have hired the best and brightest, mentoring is one of the most effective ways to ensure they stay engaged and committed to your organization. Mentoring enhances loyalty by placing high potential employees on the fast track with the extraordinary benefit of high quality senior level guidance.

Mentoring programs deliver three proven outcomes:

• While the best skills training can produce a bump in productivity of 33 percent, training combined with effective professional mentoring improves productivity up to 88 percent.
• Mentees form stronger bonds with you and your company because they can see a worthwhile future that includes them.
• Mentors experience a stronger sense of purpose and satisfaction when they use their knowledge and expertise to cultivate and develop another person.

Costly employee turnover will be reduced because employees in an effective mentoring relationship feel appreciated, have the opportunity to give and grow. Mentees get personal coaching, sponsorship and encouragement, enhance their skills, and increased levels of confidence. Both sides of the mentoring partnership experience a greater sense of satisfaction in their careers and often in their personal lives.

Here’s where you can see the complete study: http://www.blessingwhite.com/eee__report.asp

The people skills employees need in order to have effective mentoring partnerships can be learned and Odyssey Mentoring provides the training that empowers effective mentorship.

Mentoring employees is no longer just a case of coaching, life skills, techniques, capabilities and experiential sharing, but also driving transformational change, says writer Chloe Herrick, Computerworld – Australia.

She reports that IT leaders are being advised to change their approach to mentoring programs to focus not just on the individual, but instead on maximising the individual’s potential in the context of the organisation.

IT consultant, Rob Livingstone, told attendees at a Not for Profits Forum in Sydney this week that mentoring employees is no longer just a case of coaching, life skills, techniques, capabilities and experiential sharing, but also driving transformational change by focussing on issues impacting employees negatively. Livingstone is also a mentor with the CIO Executive Council’s Pathways ICT leadership program, a 12-month program that helps senior IT staff develop their business acumen and management skills.

I think Livingstone is right on the mark, not just for IT companies, but for all forward-thinking organizations.  Leaders should also be willing to enhance their one-to-one communication skills when supporting a mentoring partner through organizational transformation. Weathering these changes often requires a personal transformation with regard to accepting and adapting to those changes. Once there, mentoring can foster breakthrough-thinking and innovation.

At Odyssey Mentoring, we provide training for mentoring partners so they can achieve optimum impact from their work together.

- Listening

- Being a Keen Observer

- Understanding Differences – Diversity & Personality Styles

- The Conversational Dance to Insight, Action & Accountability

- Debriefing Successes & Failures

-Sharing your Network and Sponsorship

These skills make for better mentors, mentees and overall – better leaders. Win-win-win.

Downloaded 4/13/2011. To read the full article click here: http://www.computerworld.com.au/article/380072/it_leaders_urged_transform_mentoring_styles/?c=503741

I just love it when research proves I am on the right track.

“The potential benefits of academic mentoring for women are important,” say researchers who conducted a pilot study at the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London.

Forty-six women academics were matched 1:1 or 2:1 with more senior academic mentors. At the end of a year, job-related well-being (anxiety-contentment), self-esteem and self-efficacy all improved significantly and work-family conflict diminished at one year. The mentees affirmed their professional development was enhanced by their mentorship.

The results show that mentoring can contribute to women’s personal and professional development. The study also begins to demonstrate the mechanisms that bring about those positive results.

The bottom line is professional mentoring will help institutions that want to retain and develop the careers of their academic staff, particularly their women academics.

My experience shows that when you prepares mentors and mentees to be effective in their mentoring partnership, you will boost results even more. Pre-program training sets the mentoring partners up to win.

Click here for the full study Mentoring Pilot Study.

Your organization uses many tools to achieve and maintain your competitive advantage: You stick to your strategic plan, understand and react to market trends, keep budgets in line, earnings consistent, and ensure your employees have what they need to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done.

One of the tools you use to maximize productivity and talent development is high-quality training. Great training can give you an initial bump in productivity of about 33 percent. Most executives I talk to say, “I’ll take it.”

But can you sustain that bump or exceed it over the long-term? The answer is YES! This is where a structured and effective mentoring program can really make the difference. Here’s how:

• · By reinforcing skills-based training every day: For training to stick and mastery to be achieved, employees need daily practice, coaching, accountability and encouragement beyond the training room.  A mentor, even a peer mentor, can provide that support and boost your productivity over the long-term by as much as 88 percent.
• By creating a challenging work environment: When your employees can be assigned work that offers enough challenges to make work exciting, interesting and a learning opportunity, job satisfaction increases.  With an experienced and effective mentor who has the time and the commitment to support them as they learn, employees can rise to the challenge with minimal risk of failure and missed deadlines.
• By building your existing talent pool: Employees who align their career goals with your organizational goals are able raise the barre for themselves, co-workers and the organization– with the support of an effective mentor, they gain a better understanding of what the organizational goals are and where their skills, talents and accountabilities fit. Your organization will be nourished by this continually improved talent pool and increase your competitive advantage.
• By linking mentoring to business strategy: When your mentoring program is aligned with the strategies designed to gain over competitors in the market, your employees will be able to meet or exceed the expectations of management, shareholders and customers.
• By retaining your existing talent pool: Organizations like IBM and Nike provide structured mentoring programs for their employees. This adds a richer means of tracking employee performance while boosting productivity and innovation.
• By beginning organization-wide succession planning before it is too late: Boomers are choosing to work later for a variety of reasons. However, at some point, they will have to go – a mentoring program now can give them the direct means for transferring their knowledge and experience to the next generation. If they are partners in the process, they will not feel like they are training their replacement. The younger generation will see that they have a future with your organization.
• By increasing overall job satisfaction: When employees feel valued, see a future worth working toward that benefits them as much as it benefits the organization, they enjoy their jobs. Mentoring historically provides these benefits to both sides of the mentoring partnership.

A solid and effective mentoring program doesn’t happen by accident. It takes planning, training and a top to bottom commitment to making it work. Most people do not have the skills to lead another person from one level of expertise to another in an efficient way.  Those skills can be learned. When mentors and mentees learn the skills together and use their mentorship meetings to practice their skills while they learn and grow in their job or profession, you can expect extraordinary growth and results.

Susan Bender Phelps is the Chief Navigator at Odyssey Mentoring, a consulting and training company that specializes in strengthening existing mentorship programs and helping clients build strong programs from the start.