This post is part of Straight Talk Tuesdays, where mom entrepreneurs provide their thoughts on concepts and topics that drive their businesses forward.
Last week, I blogged about how Natalie Kaminski of FinCode has assembled an advisory board. Not only does a fledgling entrepreneur’s confidence get a boost from associating with industry experts, but the business also benefits from the mentorship found in a board’s collective experience and knowledge – not to mention access to their vast network. An advisory board helps guide your business decision and acts like a mentor in your entrepreneurial journey.
Zuzy Martin Lynch from Cooking for the Clueless, Inc. knows the benefits of mentorship: “Find mentors, take their guidance and strength and learn from their mistakes,” she advises. “I could not have launched my business without the support of my mentors and advisors. It would have seemed too daunting, but they gave me the confidence and lit the path to move forward.”
Do you have a mentor?
I don’t. I’m a bit of a lone wolf when it comes to asking for help in general – a trait that I intellectually know isn’t necessarily a strength. Although I’ve had plenty of informal mentors in my career and many inspirational people in my life, I’ve never had an honest-to-goodness mentor with whom I declared a mentor-mentee relationship and where we discussed my career advancement or business in a formal way.
According to Women’s Media, a blog offering expert advice to working women, I’m not alone. In their post “Stop Whining and Get a Mentor,” Molly Dickinson Shepard, with Jane K. Stimmier, suggest that men benefit from the mentor relationship more than women. “[W]omen regard their mentors as protective and supportive allies, while men use mentors more actively to gain visibility, promotions and choice assignments.” They advise: “We women need to rethink our ‘passive’ use of mentoring relationships and decide how we can derive more value from mentors in terms of career advancement.”
While I recognize that I could probably benefit from seeking out and establishing a formal relationship with a mentor, personally, I prefer to go the informal route.
My strategy has served me well. When I look back at my career – a fairly successful one for a person in her mid-thirties – I can easily pick out a handful of people who helped me in my development.
There was David who showed me that I really should go into technology instead of traditional publishing and taught me a lot about HTML, the Internet and the Web specifically. David had the ear of our vice president and was able to get me time away from my boring day job to work on plum assignments.
There was Jennifer who gave me the confidence to lead a women in technology association, who gave me tips about getting interviewed by the media, and who introduced me to the concept of “impostor syndrome” and “faking it until you make it.” She also opened the doors to her network, introducing me to her who’s-who list of the Toronto interactive community, which has helped me tremendously in my career.
That’s just to name a few.
Whether you declare a formal mentor-mentee relationship or if you’d like to keep the connection fairly informal, here are some potential mentor profiles who can help you advance your business:
1. Seek out experienced entrepreneurs.
I’ve talked about Kevin who inspired me to explore my business idea. Kevin is the most savvy and experienced entrepreneurs that I know. He has started and sold a business for millions of dollars. He holds a masters from MIT and an MBA from Harvard. He has known me since I was starting my career as a project manager almost 10 years ago and now we are working together on launching a web site for his company.
I don’t think Kevin would consider himself my mentor. But almost everyday, he inspires me to think differently about my business and uses a lexicon that forces me to take myself and Upside Guides seriously. I also know that if I had any question at all around my business, that he would freely offer his advice, as well as open doors to people he would think would help.
An expert entrepreneur as a mentor can boost your confidence, advance your knowledge, and give you access to people in their inner circle.
2. Alternatively, seek out people ahead, but who aren’t that far ahead of you.
Many people overlook this possibility when seeking out a mentor. Yaro Starak of Entrepreneurs-Journey advises that it’s sometimes easier to associate yourself with bloggers that are around the same level as you or maybe a little bit further on, rather than “superstar” bloggers who receive many followers vying for their attention.
The concept works when seeking out a mentor, since someone who only marginally ahead of you is nonetheless still ahead of you and can offer you advice. If you have a start-up online store that sells baby products, find someone who has been around for a year and is running a store selling, for example, women’s apparel. They’ll be able to impart information about setting up a newsletter, advice about snags in shipping, cash flow – whatever.
3. Find people who are strong in the areas where you are weak.
A common issue for entrepreneurs is that their business demands them to be generalists who have a decent knowledge in running a business, when their backgrounds often are as specialists in, for example, marketing, sales or operations. Some people, like Jennifer Thornton of Geekling Designs, love this challenge. For others, it can sink their business.
You can outsource your weaknesses, or if you’re just starting out and in bootstrapping mode, find someone who can mentor you in your weaknesses and learn from their successes and mistakes.
My list could have included “find people who are the same as you” but that wouldn’t really be a mentor relationship. While you could learn and be inspired from a peer, the real point of a mentor is to have them “teach” you and help you unlock doors to exclusive networks not necessarily open to you.
I’d love to hear about everyone’s take on mentorship. Do you have a mentor? Is your relationship formal or informal? What are the spoken or unspoken rules around your relationship with your mentor? How has your mentor helped you in business?
I’d love to read your comments!
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Great article! My sister, who is 4 years younger than me, is my mentor. She started her business, The Motherlist.com before I started my blog and had to learn everything by searching around. She amassed a lot of great info! When I started The Good Stuff Guide, she sent me a pile of articles, links, a Twitter demo, etc – everything I needed to get off the ground and running.
Our roles of big sis/little sis have switched and I’m certainly grateful to her. Thanks Whit!!
Heidi – I had NO IDEA you were related to Whitney! That’s amazing.
Whitney has been an tremendous supporter of mine. She was my first “5 Questions” post and I receive so many referrals from her.