The Protege Perspective
In this third installment of the Mentoring series, I explore the perspective of the protégé. We cannot expect mentoring to work well without both mentor and protégé being fully involved.
Becoming a protégé is something we all should do. Everyone, at every level of an organization and with any title, can and should become a protégé under a mentor. Learning from and gathering input from others on a level that goes beyond task management and business processes, the mentor can provide the protégé with valuable insight into office politics, unspoken alliances, real power brokers, connections that go beyond the org chart, and hidden land mines that the protégé may step on without realizing it.
Mentors need a protégé. Without an engaged protégé, mentors are just talking to themselves. Without an involved protégé, mentors are just tossing advice into the wind. Without a responsive protégé, mentors are left feeling like their encouragement is falling on deaf ears. So let’s look at several areas to see what is needed from the protégé’s perspective with regard to being plugged-in, energized, and ready for action.
Protégé interactions can take on many shapes. They can be focused on technology updates, navigating company politics, getting career advice, or just connecting on a specific topic. I have been a protégé via formal and informal connections. Many times I have connected with people and never told them that I felt like a protégé. I just identified someone that I thought knew more about something than I. I sidled up next to them for a while and learned what they knew. I have watched people from a distance who handled tough situations better than I do, so I garnered ideas and approaches that helped me later.
No matter how you approach these kinds of interactions, a protégé is simply a person who is learning from another by coming alongside. I am not a protégé when I read a book or watch a video. There is no interaction between the persons involved. I may become a protégé when taking a class if I nurture a relationship with the teacher that extends beyond the class location or topic. I am a protégé when I connect with someone on a regular basis, with deeper involvement for a defined goal.
In all protégé relationships, there are a few common threads.
A Protégé Needs to Be Engaged
Engagement is a term used in measuring employee morale, focus, initiative, and more. It was defined in the 1990s and has since been used in surveys and such to define just how energized the employees are. One definition proposed "an employee's involvement with, commitment to, and satisfaction with work.” With a protégé, the need is to be involved with the mentor, have the commitment to make things happen, and gain satisfaction from participating in the process. Engagement covers the full breadth of the perspective the protégé needs to nurture. They need to get engaged and stay engaged.
A Protégé Needs to Have Commitment
A protégé needs to have a commitment level that sets other things aside to interact with the mentor. They keep to the schedule of agreed-upon meetings and move calendar items around if needed. They commit themselves to staying with the process. They also commit themselves to taking action. They are not passive listeners; instead, they initiate actions born of conversations with the mentor. More on this later.
A Protégé Needs to Be Involved
This means that the protégé should be involved in a manner that encourages discussion, pondering, refining, and planning on how the information provided by the mentor might be used. They should be interactive and inquisitive. They need to ask questions, listen to the answers, be introspective about what the mentor says, and then define how they might put the advice into practice.
Involvement also means full disclosure and honesty with the mentor. They need to speak the truth and divulge full information about the topic being discussed. Providing half-truths or partial, one-sided information will not allow the mentor to give the best advice. The protégé also needs to be willing to ask the tough questions of the mentor. Mentors are accustomed to asking tough questions, but protégés must also dig deep into mentors’ perspectives so that they can filter it through their own viewpoints.
A Protégé Needs to Be Responsive
When interacting with a mentor, the protégé needs to be responsive. They are active listeners that take notes. They ask for clarification on items that are not fully understood. They are not afraid to ask dumb questions (because the mentor makes them feel that comfortable). They are not intimidated by the mentor but will actually challenge their advice if it seems off target. This repartee, with back and forth, open and honest discussions, will prove so valuable to the protégé.
The protégé will also seek to be responsive to the mentor’s need for more information. The two may even respectfully flip roles—the protégé may become the mentor on a specific topic of interest to the mentor. It is a two-way street. The best protégés will know when to offer advice back to the mentor. And a good mentor will welcome it.
A Protégé Needs to Take Action
Beyond being responsive while interacting with the mentor, the protégé must be devoted to taking action on the mentor-provided advice, input, and observations. I am not talking about taking every word as a command. Rather, protégés should pass the information and perspectives of mentors through their own filters, observations, talents, and goals and then come away with a plan of action.
The best protégés know that they need to act as themselves and that attempts to duplicate, reenact, or even march along the same path as the mentor may not work as hoped. The protégé is focused, self reflective, proactive, and resilient. They are not derailed when things get tough. They may go back and reevaluate their efforts with the help of their mentor, but they continue to move forward. They are thankful for the input and advice they get.
As you can see, being a protégé (or a mentor) is not an easy task, but it is a rewarding one for those who choose to follow it. By working out a good relationship with one or many mentors, you can make more progress than by going it alone. I encourage you to step out and ask someone to be your mentor.
