Mentoring employees well will allow them to be self-sufficient which will help them in the future to tackle complex problems

Managers are responsible for nurturing the talent of the employees so that they make productive contributions in a dynamic work environment. 

Employee goal management is essential as it provides a guide to employees to achieve their desired outcomes. It also motivates them to strive for something higher.

But it is also important that managers offer their support to help employees achieve their goals.

Managers must not confine themselves with providing employees with goals, they must also introduce some mentoring programs so that  employees are able to achieve those goals.  

In this article, we shall discuss how to use mentoring to help employees achieve their goals:  

Boost healthy relationships between employees and mentors

Managers often interact with employees to discuss their goals every quarter because of the standard requirements of any company.

Also Read: The key to cultivating lasting business relationships

But it may not be reasonable to limit the discussion to goals and make sure that they achieve it.

It is better to provide them with a formal mentoring program keeping their long term interests in mind.

The relationship between an employee and the mentor usually lasts for a very long time.   

This amount of time is good for the employee to develop his skills and fulfil goals under the mentor’s guidance.

Mentors must be approachable, and employees should be comfortable while having discussions with them.

They must allow employees to identify solutions by themselves to the issues they face while achieving those goals.  

Bring in senior employees to mentor the junior employees

When you are planning to introduce a mentoring culture in your workplace, it is a good idea to get your senior employees on board to mentor the junior employees.

You can always match a senior employee with a junior employee based on their job roles.

You can establish this practice as a norm because then the senior employee would give their ideas and opinions to the junior employees.   

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This is because they have similar experiences, and senior employees could relate to junior employees because they have already been there.

So, let us say, for instance, Max must face something quite challenging, then she will be able to seek help from Caroline, who might have faced the same challenges. Therefore, Caroline will be able to guide Max as a mentor.  

Bring in lots of people

Bringing in the entire management into the mentoring process could be quite useful for the employee.

When it comes to employee self-development and performance management, it is always better to bring more support to employees by bringing in more people to mentor the employees, such as managers from other teams, mentors and life coaches.

Each one of them has a different role to play.   

All of them have different responsibilities for nurturing the employees’ talent.

For instance, if Max has a goal to write 20 articles per month, all 20 articles would need various kinds of inputs-some need technical support and some need language support.

She can always go to Caroline because she is the senior content writer, but she can also take other inputs from the manager of the technical support team or various other teams.   

Similarly, if she is facing time management issues, she can get help from her mentor, who could teach her how to manage time effectively.  

Focus on employee self-development

Employee self-development is a critical aspect of the mentoring process.

A formal workplace mentoring program aims to develop the employees both personally and professionally.

Therefore, you should integrate your formal mentoring program with a mechanism such as an employee performance management.

Also Read: Why startup founders should look for sharks as mentors

Fortunately, with the advent of different forms of technology in the market, you can incorporate mentoring programs in your performance management software.  

Since, performance management deals with employee goals management, performance appraisals, etc. then you could always include this module somewhere after appraisals or with the goals that you set for your employees.

The best part about such an integration is that your employees will come up with their own smart goals that they want to achieve. 

So, what kind of mentoring strategies do you have in mind for your employees? Leave your comments down below.   

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