Who Runs the Show?

The mentor deserves respect, but the mentee sets the agenda. This isn’t a teacher/student relationship. In the teacher/student relationship, the teacher decides what the student needs to learn and tries to deposit that knowledge in the student’s brain in some way. That relationship is necessary and important, but it has its problems. In the mentor/mentee relationship, the mentee decides what he wants to learn and asks the mentor for assistance in doing so. There are some distinct advantages to this.

One advantage is that the mentor doesn’t have to decide what the mentee needs to know. The mentee comes to him and asks. “How would you handle this situation?”

Another advantage is that the mentee is more open to learning. He isn’t sitting in class telling himself he needs to learn this boring stuff because it will be on the test. Instead, he recognizes the importance of the information he is receiving because he has probably run into a situation where he could use it, causing him to ask for it.

Each time they meet, the mentee is asking the mentor questions. The mentor has the option and is even obligated to make suggestions on what questions the mentee should be asking at this point, but if the mentee doesn’t see the value in it, the mentor shouldn’t try to force it on him. The mentee initiates the relationship. The mentee sets the agenda for their meetings. The task of the mentor is to address the questions of the mentee, if he can.