National Mentoring Day
2021 Survey results
In a new survey published today, to mark National Mentoring Day 2021, it was revealed that only one in three SME business owners have a coach or mentor to support them. In what is often seen as a key tool for the development and improvement of business owners, only 23% were seen to have a mentor and only 18% have a coach, with a measly 5% having both. A huge 64% of SME owners have neither a coach nor a mentor.
With the problems that SMEs are facing with Brexit, the pandemic, supply chains and more, it is surprising that business owners are not taking advantage of the benefits that having a mentor or coach, or a Business Sounding Board like me, bring.
These alarming statistics have come to light in an exclusive survey that I conducted with a range of SME business owners, ranging from solopreneurs all the way up to multi million pound turnover businesses with 100s of staff.
Not only am I a Business Sounding Board, but I’m also a member of the Association of Business Mentors and I’m also a former successful business owner. In my opinion the benefits of external advice and guidance on a business journey are so huge, it is shocking to see so few Business Owners doing this. It’s a cliche but ‘it’s lonely at the top’ is true, and a coach, mentor or Sounding Board can really help with that. Perhaps the issue is that business owners don’t want to be seen to not have all the answers and bringing in outside support may be perceived as being weak. The opposite is true. Getting outside advice and support is a great proactive move.
The issue of Business Owners not having a coach or mentor, does however seem to be, in part, related to size, or perhaps expense, as the statistics show that micro and small businesses are around the 64% figure for not having a coach or mentor, whereas, the prevalence of coaches and mentors increases to around four in ten for business owners who have more than 20 employees.
What are are the benefits of a business coach or business mentor
In my experience there are multiple benefits to SME owners in having a mentor or coach; the ability to bounce ideas off someone else, a view from the outside from someone who isn’t stuck in the day-to-day management of the business, an accountability partner to check that important tasks are being done, the experience of someone who has ‘been there before’, someone to ask ‘dumb’ questions of (that are never dumb questions) and even just a friendly, supportive ear to just listen. Coaches and Mentors will often push their mentees to heights and goals that they never thought possible.
For now, many SME owners are missing out, but as awareness grows of the benefits of mentoring and coaching, hopefully more of them will take the leap of faith and bring outside help in.
How do you find a business coach or business mentor?
Often business owners don’t know how to find a mentor or a coach or are reluctant to ask.
Before finding a mentor or coach a business owner needs to clarify what their strengths are and which weaknesses they need to work on. This helps focus the search. A business owner then needs to look into who is already mentoring or coaching, check their background, and see whether they would be helpful to them in the area they want to focus on. A business owner needs to be really clear about what you want to get out of the relationship. In my experience ego also gets in the way of asking for help. If you need a simple explanation as to why you might need a Business Mentor see here.
What is the difference between a Coach and a Mentor?
There is however an on-going confusion between coaches and mentors.
Business Owners often ask ‘What is the difference between business coach and a Business Mentor?’ , and yes there are crossovers, but in my opinion, in the simplest sense mentoring is ‘education through sharing past business experience’, whereas coaching is ‘education through guidance, direction and knowledge’. A business mentor can share their business experiences, earnt knowledge and learnings with a business owner as their mentee. By dipping into their skills and experiences, and having faced the same challenges as their mentee, a business mentor can guide their mentees in the right direction and help avoid mistakes or find opportunities.
Those business owners that don’t have a business coach or mentor are missing out on a wide range of benefits. Those that did have a mentor or coach were asked in the survey what they saw as the advantages of having one were;
10 Benefits of a Coach or Mentor (from survey respondents who have one)
• “A way of rationalising and organising the vast amounts of information circling around in one’s head.”
• “Helping with bigger strategic decisions where the advisor has been there before and I haven’t.”
• ”Second opinions (and devil advocates) help ensure I make better decisions”
• “Gaining perspective, having the time to step back and look at priorities.”
• “Someone to bounce ideas off, double check decisions and someone to take guidance, or advice from.”
• “For me it’s about a sounding board and also accountability. I also like to be challenged.”
• “Someone to mediate and help answer questions for growth, direction, inspiration and practical knowledge.”
• “Massively helped steer the ship from the start saved on mistakes that I probably would’ve made without him.”
• “Accountability, mindset, goal setting, clarity in next steps, business improvements.”
• “Business growth that I wouldn’t be able to achieve without them.”
Unsurprisingly, given the limited numbers of SME owners that had a mentor or coach, 85% also said that their business also did not have an internal mentoring programme.
In such troubled business times are we are currently in, SME owners should take advantage of every helping hand that they can find.
What is National Mentoring Day
National Mentoring Day (#nationalmentoringday), this year on Wednesday 27th October, recognises the invaluable contribution that mentoring and coaching makes to the economy and businesses, as well as education, communities and society in general.
It’s an annual celebration to thank individuals who mentor across all walks of life. The campaign has become a significant day in the calendar and is celebrated to shine a spotlight on mentors and mentoring initiatives making a difference.
Founder Chelsey Baker said “Mentoring should be accessible and available to any business, individual, child or group that needs it. National Mentoring Day continues to make this happen.”
What activities are happening on National Mentoring Day?
Mentors are being encouraged to mentor someone on the day. NMD’s mission is to make mentoring accessible to every individual, child, business, or group that needs it, regardless of age, background, or ethnicity. National Mentoring Day educates, connects, celebrates and supports all forms of mentoring.
National Mentoring Day presents a fantastic opportunity for businesses to get involved and make a difference to the progression and lives of individuals within their business or organisation.
Business owners are encouraged to launch a mentoring initiative in their company if they don’t yet have a mentoring scheme. National Mentoring Day is a perfect opportunity to put one in place. Not only will this support the personal growth and development of employees or team members, it’s a great way to attract new talent to your business by highlighting it as one of your benefits. Here is a simple five step process to get started:
How to create your own company mentoring scheme
1 – Create goals in terms of what you hope to set out and achieve from having a mentoring scheme in place.
2 – Identify the personal development and training needs of team members.This can be achieved by going back to appraisals, or asking employees to complete a quick survey or ask one main question: “What’s the biggest challenge you’re having in your role right now?”
3 – Based on the skills, experience and strengths of other team members, who would be a suitable match? This is where you begin to identify potential mentors.
4 – Provide guidance for both the mentee and mentor on how to get the most out of the relationship
5 – Decide on how the results will be measured. For example, more internal talent being promoted into new management roles, an increase in employee engagement, increased productivity, simple feedback…
The key is for those interested in being mentored to have a clear idea as to what they need help with the most, why and their desired result
Other ways to incorporate mentoring into your business
There also others ways to incorporate mentoring into a business. You can use technology to assist in mentoring. You could create a webinars, videos, internal talks and presentations or a series of podcasts and use key topics to empower, inspire and educate. This could be on career development, mentoring approaches, best practices, a series of interviews with a mentor and/or mentee or run a series of mentoring Q&A sessions.
In a larger organisation you could even create a ‘speed mentoring’ event where team members who are looking for a mentor, get the opportunity to be mentored by a number of different people within the organisation.This is a fantastic way for team members to tap into the skills and expertise of different people within the company and for mentors to further develop their mentoring skills. The opportunities are endless.
For more information about National Mentoring Day, please see here.
For more information about the Association of Business Mentors see here.
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WHAT NEXT?
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