What do you say to someone you want to mentor you?

Let them know why you think they would be a good fit as mentors. Show them how their skills and goals align with their experience. Share some of your background and what fascinated you most about them. This will give them a context that explains why you're interested in them mentoring you.

Ask your potential mentor if they can spend an hour meeting with you. You don't want to be in a hurry and have enough time for the other person to ask you questions about your goals, etc. This approach will ease the pressure on both of you and start a relationship that will last much longer than those formed in formal corporate mentoring programs. When I decided that I wanted to find a mentor, I had in mind a person whose blog posts and business advice I had been reading for years.

This doesn't mean that he's officially your mentor now, but you're building a relationship that could take you in that direction. If you're in marketing and you ask a successful, well-rounded developer to advise you, then it makes little or no sense. A good mentor will sometimes recognize you without even being asked or told that your advice is highly valued and respected. I have been part of organizations with forced mentors, and it has always been very uncomfortable for me to ask someone to be my mentor in a formal way.

Directly asking someone to mentor you is not only unfair to the person because it puts them in a position they may not even want to be in, but it also makes you look like someone who just wants to be your mentor. You must confirm your willingness to do your part and move on, because it's frustrating to mentor someone who doesn't take the necessary steps to take advantage of advice. As you continue to strive to build a relationship with Michelle (around the fifth meeting), you can ask Michelle if she would like to be your professional mentor. Mentoring is a relationship between two people in which one person (the mentor) provides guidance, advice, and supports the other person (the mentee).

Mentoring relationships can be challenging, but open and honest communication can overcome these challenges. It is important to periodically review the progress and effectiveness of mentoring and to determine if it continues to meet the needs of both parties. As tempting as it may be to approach finding a mentor with the same “check the boxes” attitude you would use to schedule a Zoom call, doing so often produces disappointing results. I've seen too many professionals get stuck trying to figure out how to ask someone to mentor them.

When you ask someone to mentor you, it's important to recognize that it's a pretty important request, and that there should at least be some indication that that person will be interested in doing so.