Mentorship or Advice – that is the Question?

It seems that many people believe that mentoring means giving advice. I beg to differ. If mentoring is done correctly, there should be no need to give advice. In fact, it can be quite rewarding when you get it right. 


I recently read an article written by Matthew Ho on avoiding “mentor whiplash”, which was fascinating. 

Mentoring is really about experiential sharing and as Matthew mentions in his article, “Advice that worked for one particular circumstance may not work in another.” He suggests that you need to have your own opinion and I totally agree. 

You are the only person who can fully appreciate your needs, understand your circumstances, knows your business and the way you think therefore, whilst listening to someone else can be helpful, beneficial and insightful, it is totally up to you, how you implement what you learn. 

It is important to understand the differences between an Adviser, Mentor and Coach, and although sometimes they may seem similar, they are different. 

Adviser is a person who gives advice in a particular field. Usually, this person is an expert in their field such as a lawyer etc. “An adviser may direct without regard to the person’s specific situation, needs or passions. The adviser simply provides the direction that the advisee "should" follow.” Mentor Doctor – sciencemag.org 

A mentor guides - allowing, and even encouraging, the person to choose their own direction. By guiding they help the person to formulate their own decisions and rarely do they tell the person what to do. "A mentor is an experienced professional who has travelled a similar career path, faced challenges, overcome them and achieved success. In essence, they are someone who has achieved the sort of success that a person aspires to." This allows them to share their personal stories which may help their mentee." Chartered Accountants Australia & New Zealand 

"A coach on the other hand, may not necessarily have achieved the success a person aspires to, instead they have the skills and ability to observe and coach specific behaviours that are critical to a person's performance." Chartered Accountants Australia & New Zealand 

Now that you have a better understanding of what mentoring really entails, it is important to understand the right and wrong ways of going about it. (See next weeks Blog).