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.

Last month I had the great pleasure of speaking at the Hillsboro Chamber of Commerce Westside Business Women lunch and learn event. The topic was  Being The MESSENGER – the nine principles that make networking so powerful. To capitalize on the momentum, the Chamber is having me back on February 17th for “Where Oh Where Should I Network?” - Whether it’s lunches, meetings, dinners, building that on-line tribe – how do you determine the BEST networking opportunities for you and your business? This session will help you save hundreds of dollars and thousands of hours while increasing your ROI on what you do spend.

On March 17th – “How to Generate 50 Contacts a Week” - - You can maximize your networking and have enough contacts to keep your business growing no matter how busy you are. Learn effective tactics you can use the minute you hit the street.

Please join us at these information packed sessions. WBW will be on February 17th from 11:30 AM-1:00PM at Coyotes Bar and Grill located at 5301 W. Baseline, Hillsboro 97124. RSVP by February 15th to Darcey Edwards 503-726-2143 darceye@hillchamber.org

I am the Chief Navigator for Odyssey Mentoring. We provide training to companies and professional associations for their mentoring and leadership programs. We opened our doors a little more than one year ago and we are in the black!

When I speak and write, I  share my business-building principles, strategies and tactics. She has trained hundreds in the art and science of networking. Throughout my career, I have delivered success after success in marketing, advertising and public relations – increased sales, broadened customer bases, community action, media campaigns and charitable fund raising. She has more than 20 years of hands-on experience as an entrepreneur, manager, trainer, writer and speaker.

A lot of experts recommend that having one or more mentors is an important aspect of developing your career. Being a mentor can be just as valuable. The problem with finding or being an effective mentor is that many people who are very accomplished in a particular area, may not have the skills to lead someone through the thinking that takes you from the problem to an insight to action and accountability – the keystones of breakthrough performance.

Years ago, I asked the finance manager where I worked if he would be willing to be my mentor. It was scary for me at the time. He was very smart, younger than I was by a decade, but higher up in management, and he knew finance like nobody else I had ever worked with. He was very abrupt, but I thought if he was being my mentor, he might soften his approach and it could improve our working relationship.

Math had always been a weakness for me and budgets and financial reports – full of numbers – seemed so daunting. The first couple of times  I brought him an issue I was struggling with, he  immediately showed me where the answer to my question could be found, or where the error was.  It helped in the short-run, but I didn’t learn from the experience so I could do it myself the next time. If I asked clarifying questions, he would roll his eyes and tell me to just do it the way he said to do it. Eventually, I stopped asking for his guidance. It was a mentoring match that simply didn’t work.

Practical mentoring skills can be learned and ultimately, mastery will make mentors better managers and leaders, while preparing mentees and proteges for the future.

The key things a professional mentor needs to be able to do are:

1. Develop a rapport with the protege/mentee to build trust and make it safe for open and constructive communication. Start by asking for and receiving your mentoring partner’s permission to delve into the problem.

2. Observe patterns in behavior and your mentoring partner’s ability to produce results – this allows the mentor to see what the protege or mentee cannot see from their point of view.

3. Listen to the core of the problem as identified by the protege/mentee – there is valuable insight in their take on what is happening or not happening.

4. Ask reflective questions that lead the protege/mentee through a problem-solving process that has them do all of the heavy thinking. Examples of reflective questions are:

What was the result you were trying to produce?

What actions did you take to get there?

How close to your goal did you get?

What do you think worked about what you did?

If you had to do this sales call, presentation, etc. again, what would you do differently?

In thinking through and answering these kinds of questions, the mentee has the best opportunity of getting to an “aha” moment. When he/she discovers their own answers, they can truly own the solutions.

5. Create a Specific, Measurable, Achievable Result in Time – SMART and a feedback method that works for both of you. This is what allows the mentor the opportunity to be supportive and encourage the mentee as he or she practices new behaviors, techniques  and ways of being.

This method initially takes more time than showing someone how to do it, telling them what to do, or giving “constructive criticism.”  It allows a person to think through a problem and to learn from their experience, whether they succeed or fail. The more you do it, the more trust there is in the relationship between mentor and protege, the faster the questioning and thinking process becomes.

During college, I had a faculty adviser who became one of the most effective mentors to ever work with me. Sometimes, even now I ask myself the kind of question she would ask and it gets me going in the right direction. Like the time I had writer’s block and the deadline was nearing. I was writing a biographical account for an article and it just wasn’t coming together. I remember telling her how hard it was to write about this topic in the first person. She said, “What if you wrote as if it was about someone else?”

I had my “aha” moment right then and there. I said, “I can do that,” and went on to complete the article that evening. It was one of my best.

These kinds of conversations don’t come naturally to most people. In our training programs, we give mentoring partners the underpinnings for these conversations, opportunities to try them in a safe environment and to  see how they work. As effective as these conversations are in a mentoring partnership, they are also very useful in management, supervision and even parenting.

Has the door to the executive suite and the board room slammed shut for women? Is it still possible for other capable and talented women to join the ranks of leaders like Brenda C. Barnes, Chairman and CEO of Sara Lee, Andrea Jung, Chairman and CEO of Avon Products, Indra Nooyi, Chairman and CEO of Pepsico, and Patricia Woertz, Chairman, President and CEO of Archer Daniels Midland?

The evidence is disappointing. In a recent article, about the 2010 Catalyst Census: Fortune 500 Women Board Directors and the 2010 Catalyst Census: Fortune 500 Women Executive Officers and Top Earners, released Monday, December 13, Ilene H. Lang, Catalyst president and chief executive officer told FOX Business, “The first look at our census numbers over the last years shows little progress for women as top earners.”

• In 2010, women held 14.4% of executive officer positions, up from 13.5% in 2009 and only 7.6% of the top earning positions compared with 6.3% in 2009.
• Women held just 15.7% of board seats in 2010, a mere 0.5% gain over the 15.2% in 2009.

One bright aspect of the report, according to reporter, Barbara Mannino, showed that men and women with mentors were placed higher in their post-MBA first jobs, with men benefiting more than women over time. Men with mentors were 93% more likely than men without mentors to start out at middle management or above. Women with mentors increased their odds of being placed at mid-manager or above by only 56% over women who did not have mentors.

Throughout their careers, men received more promotions than women and higher salary increases. Each promotion earned men an extra 21% in compensation; for women, each promotion amounted to an extra 2%.

High- potential men and women with senior-level mentors advance further and earn more than those with less senior mentors. Overall, though, women’s compensation still lags men whether or not their mentor is at the top.

With top tier leadership and board rooms having so few women among their ranks, it is less likely these executives will choose a woman to mentor. Historically, leaders choose the person most likely to be just like them as their own careers advanced.

Forward-looking companies can boldly address this issue by creating and supporting mentorship programs that are open to a wider pool of future leaders. To launch such a program, both mentors and mentees should receive training that prepares both partners for success – regardless of gender, culture and generational differences.

Mentoring at the senior level is not about showing another how to do something, rather it is about cultivating the kind of thinking that experience provides. It includes being able to have a conversation that leads to insight, action, accountability, and learning. It provides a support system for the learning process. Finally, as the mentee proves herself it includes career sponsorship and network sharing to help her advance in her career.

There’s just something about opening a calendar for a new year that inspires us to improve our lives. So it’s no surprise that New Year’s career resolutions often focus on big goals–such as a promotion or a new job.

And that’s why many resolutions get tossed aside by the second week in January, according to Tracy Brisson, founder and CEO of The Opportunities Project. “We get overwhelmed when we realize that outcomes are not always in our control,” she explains. But Brisson says that there are plenty of attainable goals–such as adding people to your network or committing to read one business-related book per month–that can add up to career success.

Sara Sutton Fell, CEO of Flexjobs.com, recommends a mix of easy-to-achieve and lofty goals. She says, “The important part is to choose goals that are directly related to making you more successful in your job.”

Here are some other suggestions from the experts:

Hone your elevator pitch.
For Jasmin French, principal of the personal branding firm J. French, it starts with honing your personal brand. French advises doing a simple inventory, “What did you do in 2010 that has transferable value to your employer or potential employer in 2011?” Then, she says, turn that into a succinct (60 seconds or less) pitch on what you are uniquely positioned to do better than anyone else.

French also suggests that you get people to start talking about you by updating your LinkedIn profile with any certifications you’ve earned or classes you’re taking, as well as forwarding relevant articles. “Create your own buzz. It’s self-promotion, but it’s not shameless.”

Brush up on hard skills.
Victoria Ashford, a leadership and career coach at Fearless Leading, suggests heading back to school for additional education, certification, diplomas, or language skills. “Once you have the knowledge and skill, it’s yours forever–hard to take away,” she notes. “Industries and work environments change, so make sure you’re keeping up. Be intentional about your knowledge base and upgrade or update it now.”

Solidify your soft skills.
While you’re admiring that new diploma hanging on the wall, Ashford cautions that you shouldn’t forget about “soft” skills, such as business etiquette, body language, and personal accountability. “Master the arts of introductions, conversation, and establishing professional presence. Ask others to judge your handshake, table manners, and posture,” she advises.

A University of Illinois study concluded that 55 percent of the first impression you make is based on your appearance and your body language. And while first impressions are made within the first 30 seconds of meeting someone, it can take up to as many as 21 interactions to undo a bad first impression. French says, “If you want to be known for being detail-oriented, hem your pants, polish your fingernails, or iron that shirt.”

Work better with others.
Susan Bender Phelps, a trainer and speaker with Odyssey Mentoring, urges employees to treat everyone they work with as if they are a customer. “Everyone includes your company’s management team, your direct supervisor, even your cubicle-mate. Provide knock-your-socks-off service.”

Bender Phelps says that one place to start is by sharing credit with your team and with everyone in the organization who contributed to a success. “When you do this consistently, you become the kind of leader people will want to follow, regardless of your title.” Likewise, acknowledge people when they do great work, and be specific: “Give evidence that demonstrates you understand their work and the difference it made to the organization.”

Approach failure as an opportunity.
“Use every failure or mistake as an opportunity to learn and plan for the future,” emphasizes Bender Phelps. She recommends paying attention to what you were trying to accomplish, what you did to make that happen, what went right, and what went wrong. By taking time to consider what went into a failed initiative, you can learn what could have been done better–and in the future, if you’re presented with a similar situation or project, you’ll know what you should do differently.

by Lydia Dishman

The recession caused almost every company in America to downsize, right-size, furlough, reduce benefits, cut expenses to the bone and basically, white knuckle it until things got better. Although the recession seems to be lifting, managers are still afraid to loosen their grip, and rightly so.

The experience was traumatic for everyone. Between the survivor’s guilt and being asked to do more with much less to keep the business afloat, the best and the brightest are re-evaluating their options. At the beginning of the year, the Department of Labor noticed a new trend. More people were quitting their jobs than were being laid off.

A recent report published by Watson Wyatt Worldwide affirms that top performers are increasingly dissatisfied with their jobs. They are choosing to leave for better working conditions, opportunities and resources.  To keep the best and brightest stars of your organization, you are going to need to create a new value proposition for them. As the economy improves, employees will need to see that their future with your company will improve as well.

One effective strategy is a comprehensive professional mentoring program that will help them through the transition; concretely demonstrate your commitment to their professional growth, ensure a lower turnover rate and greater job satisfaction. To be successful the program should be structured, begin with training that prepares both mentoring partners to make the most of the relationship and consistent support from senior management.