5 Tips To Effective Grads Mentorship

For graduates, having access to a mentor can mean the world. It boosts their confidence and speeds up their professional growth while helping them adjust to real-life challenges and performance reviews.

We can all agree that transitioning from academia to corporate life is an important milestone. If we could all go back to when we were them, we would have wanted the help of someone who worked in the career we wanted to pursue.

In the past few years of my career, I have worked on creating solutions for organisations to help them grow their talent through mentorship. Here are 5 experience-based tips that will help you make your graduate mentorship program much more impactful.

Understanding Gen Z: Your Future Workforce

Let's start by understanding that our grads are Gen Z, born between 1997 and 2012. They are tech-savvy and well-connected, they prioritise flexibility and autonomy and value diversity, inclusion, and social responsibility.

Organisations can't wait to hire them because they bring fresh perspectives, enthusiasm, and knowledge to help them stay ahead and innovate.

Tip 1: Power Personalised Learning

76% of Gen Z see learning as key to career advancement.

Learning happens in 3 distinct ways: through formal education, on-the-job experience and social learning. Mentorship sits in the social learning bucket. It provides opportunities for grads to get 1:1 support, amplify their network and learn from a more experienced colleague.

However, it does not stop there: when interacting with a more experienced employee, grads grow their skills faster and identify on-the-job and formal learning more easily, setting their career up for success from the start.

Tip 2: Make It Tech-enabled

Gen-Z grads want mentoring to be integrated into their workday. Matching and interactions should happen seamlessly and in a place that is easy to access.

One of the solutions I've recently implemented at a Fortune 500 company is using Slack for mentor-mentee matching. This has proven to be the most effective method because employees engage with numerous technologies daily. Aligning with the collaboration tool they already use is key to solving this issue.

Tip 3: Tell The Story & Define Expectations

Matching is tricky. There is no such thing as a 100% success rate when trying to match a human being with another one (ask Tinder about it). However, from experience, I can tell you that I have never seen employees more excited to help new grads than I have seen in the corporate world.

The reason is simple: we have all been there before, and want to support those going through the same experience. Employees understand this and are excited to offer their help as mentors, helping you create a larger pool of experiences for grads to choose from.

Up next: make sure both mentors and grads are trained, understand roles, expectations and know what to do when engaging with matching.

Tip 4: Focus On People Managers' Buy-in

Grads understand the importance of having the right support from their manager and want mentorship to have a clear place within their performance rhythm.

People Leaders have the chance to ask how mentorship is going during quarterly reviews. They can help grads if they feel stuck, introducing them to someone who can help. They can share their own experience of how mentorship helped them.

Mentorship should also be integrated with the feedback cycle, ensuring grads can take clear actions and use their mentorship experience to grow their careers.

Tip 5: Create An Invaluable Safe Space

Confidentiality is crucial in mentorship, especially when starting their first corporate job. Empowering mentor-mentee interactions helps your grads navigate uncertainties and share challenges, without the risk of that being used in their End-of-Year review.

Key Takeaways

To ensure your Gen Z grads thrive in your organisation, develop a customised mentorship program that leverages technology, sets clear expectations, integrates with their daily activities, and has full support from their manager. Prioritise creating a safe space where grads feel empowered to share challenges and confidently grow in their careers.

Are you looking to implement your Grads Mentorship Program or want to improve the one you currently have? Reach out and let’s set you up for success.