How To Be a Great Mentee & Impress Your Mentor

Understanding how to be a great mentee can really help you get the most from your mentoring relationship, as you’ll be showing up to your sessions prepared, ready to listen and motivated to make changes to advance your career.

Buckle up and read on for our top tips for being a good mentee to impress your mentor and smash your goals.

What Is a Mentee?

A mentee is someone who has a mentor. Mentees aren’t necessarily pupils or students (although they can be); instead, they’re people who need guidance to help them move forward with a particular goal.

As a mentee, you might be looking to improve your skills, prepare for a promotion, need advice on your career path, or you may be navigating a full-blown career change.

A mentor works with you – the mentee – to provide a guiding hand through support, advice and encouragement to empower you to achieve your goals.

What Are The Characteristics of a Good Mentee?

Do you have the characteristics and qualities of a good mentee? If you have the below traits, you’re already well on your way to mastering how to be a great mentee:

• Good listener
• Ambitious
• Focused
• Curious
• Self-motivated
• Positive, can-do attitude
• Good time management skills
• Prepared to work on yourself
• Open to constructive criticism
• You know your strengths, but also your weaknesses

9 Mentoring Tips for Mentees

From knowing your goals to showing commitment and turning up to every session prepared, here are our top mentoring tips for mentees:

1. Know Your Goals

Know why you want or need a mentor in the first place. There must be answers you need and roadblocks to overcome – what challenges do you face in your professional career that you need a mentor for?

Ideally, you carried out this piece of self-reflection before you choose your mentor. After all, can you be clear about the person that can help, if you’re not clear about the help you want?

Your goals can (and should) change over time as your relationship with your mentor grows.
But what do you need most? Right here. Right now?

2. Be Prepared (Before and After)

Once you’ve figured that ☝️☝️ out, remember what that is, and come armed to each meeting with that agenda in mind. Being 100% focused on your goals will stand you in good stead throughout your career – not just in terms of being a good mentee. Know what you want to get out of each session, and try to avoid getting sidetracked. Remember: your mentor is here to help you achieve and excel in your career – not to console you after an argument with your significant other.

If you want to take notes, be ready. Taking notes is always a good idea, so make sure your pen works, or your fancy electronic gizmo is charged. If you have specific questions, have them to hand. It’s easy to forget things once your mind is actively engaged. It also shows you’ve thought about it, which your mentor will respect (more on respect later…)

What about after the meeting? Send a message with a quick recap of the meeting that includes:

• Any key points from the discussion
• Any actions to be taken by either person
• Any questions arising from the mentoring session

This will not only show your mentor that you listened and understood, but it’ll also act as a handy reminder for both of you of anything that needs to be done before the next meeting.
(This is another great habit to take with you throughout your career.)

3. Be Committed

Most mentoring relationships are like most…well…relationships. You have to commit to them to make them work. Unlike training sessions and occasional coaching sessions, your relationship with your mentor might last for months or years. If you find one you trust, who can help you achieve your goals, keep hold of them. That’s why one of our top tips for how to be a great mentee is to actively show you value their time and expertise. Great mentors are always in demand. So if they ask you to do something or research something…do it.

4. Be Open

Nobody learns from a closed book. Being as open and honest as you can with your mentor is one of the characteristics of a good mentee that shouldn’t be underestimated. (Note: This isn’t just on you, your mentor needs to be as open as you are). If something is suggested that is outside of your comfort zone, it’s better to acknowledge it and discuss it, rather than just not do it (or do it and not understand the benefits). Always ask if something is unclear. Maybe you just need to understand why you’re being asked to do something. Never just follow along because ‘they’re the mentor’.

Remember – these are your goals and this is your career. It’s important you understand the rationale behind why you’re being asked to do something – what’s the benefit to you?

Don’t be afraid though. If you understand and just think something is a bit scary – try it if you can.

Growth happens when we challenge ourselves.

5. Be Realistic

It’s unlikely one session will fix everything. There are only so many hours in the day, and only so much you can learn at one time. If you can’t drive, don’t enter yourself into the Monaco Grand Prix next week. There may well be several steps you need to take – and hoops you need to jump through – before you reach your ultimate end goal. Of course, being a good mentee is about challenging yourself, but you must make your goals attainable and logical.

Mentoring doesn’t guarantee you anything. Nobody can make a 100% promise that you’ll land your dream role within days of your first session.

There’s no cast-iron guarantee that your boss will promote you to CEO of the business after a couple of meetings with a mentor. You are still responsible for making the change. Your mentor will absolutely give you a better chance of success.

6. Nurture Trust

As discussed, the relationship with your mentor may be long. You should keep seeing your mentor as long as they’re helping you overcome your challenges and progress along the path you see for yourself. Remember the goals and ambitions from point 1? As long as you’re still on that path, and your mentor is steering you appropriately, you’ll keep seeing them.

But what’s in it for your mentor? After all, you’re the one with the goals and ambitions, right?

Well, they are also getting some growth out of mentoring. (They’re also probably earning money doing it.) There are lots of people looking for mentors. If your mentor trusts you, trusts that you’re progressing, trusts that you’ll listen to them, trusts that you’re both benefiting from the relationship, then they’re definitely more likely to stick around and have a genuine interest in your career progression. If they’ve asked you to read or watch something, let them know you’ve done it.

7. Respect

Your mentor. Yourself. Your relationship with your mentor. You chose your mentor. You’re expecting them to give their time, skills, knowledge and experience to help you achieve your career goals and objectives. While there are definitely rewards for the mentor, it’s fair to say the potential rewards for you are even greater.

Factor this into every interaction with your mentor. Be on time for sessions. If you’re going to be late, or are going to have to cancel a meeting, do it quickly and promptly. Once you’ve become friendly with your mentor, it can be easy to slip into a friendlier type of relationship. Remember, at its core, this is a professional relationship with career progression in mind. This one isn’t just on you though. Respect is a two-way street.

8. Ask Questions

All the time. You should be thinking about relevant questions for your mentor. Dig into their psyche a little bit, and you’ll uncover things they hadn’t realised may be useful or important for you. Curiosity is one of the most important qualities of a good mentee. Keep the questions relevant, of course, but don’t be afraid to ask anything you think might be helpful. This will also help with building trust – which you already know is important ☺️

How else is asking questions important? Well, it proves you’re engaged and that you’re listening. Whoever your mentor is, whether they’ve been mentoring for a long time, or are relatively new, they love to feel you’re part of the conversation rather than them just constantly firing information at you. Asking questions helps the mentoring session become more of a two-way thing.

9. Have FUN

Last and most definitely NOT least, knowing how to be a successful mentee is about knowing how to have fun along the way too. There are countless studies that suggest learning is more effective when there’s fun involved. Yes, you’re working with a mentor to improve your career, to increase your chances of promotion, to help you land your dream job, or to help you change careers. It doesn’t have to be dull though. Professional doesn’t necessarily equate to boring. (If you’ve spent any time on LinkedIn recently, you’ll see that manifesting right there). Also, if you don’t have a LinkedIn profile, it’s worth considering.

It’s important you get on with your mentor. That’s why your first session with any prospective mentor on CareerNavig8r is a free 30-minute ‘getting to know you’ session. Chemistry is important in a mentoring relationship. You’re going to be more successful if you like the mentor you choose – especially if you adhere to all the steps we’ve mentioned above.

Find a Mentor

Reckon you have the qualities of a good mentee and are ready to work with a mentor? Find a mentor (or Career Navig8r, as we call them) to help guide your professional development and career moves so you can reach your full potential.

Start your search for a mentor and get ready to show off your distinction in how to be a great mentee.