Mentorship statistics for 2024 demonstrate the importance of men­torship programmes on professional and personal de­velopment.

Unfortunately, 63% of women have never had a formal mentor.

According to the Pew Research Center in 2019, employees who undergo mentoring programs are employed in five times higher po­sitions than their colleagues who lack mentorship.

It further revealed that only 6 percent of Fortune 500 compa­nies have a woman as CEO and these are women, who had access to a mentor or a mentorship pro­gramme.

Why then do women miss out on this crucial relationship?

To further understand this relationship, let’s define, who a mentor is and the kind of rela­tionship that a mentee and men­tor share.

Professionally speaking, a mentor can be described as an individual who provides exper­tise and professional knowledge to another person to enable him/ her achieve career advancement.

This, she does by sharing her experience and skills on the sub­ject or profession.

Empowered women empower others:

I am sure you have heard this saying severally. Women who have had any form of empower­ment be it in the workplace or in other social spaces are quick to empower other women within their sphere of influence.

There is little or no competi­tion as the mentor looks forward to replicating herself in the men­tees.

Mentorship builds resil­ience in women: Women with­out a strong support system will breakdown and give up when faced with challenges that they think they can’t rise to. Whether it is for professional or person­al strides, mentorship provides women with resilience to weath­er tough times.

It is imperative to note that despite the successes associated with mentorship and mentorship programs, many women and or­ganisations are yet to explore these opportunities.

It has become necessary to pro­mote mentorship programmes for women of all ages and across all spheres of life as this has an overall effect on women and or­ganizational growth.

Mentorship programmes can be tailored towards personal, ca­reer or entrepreneurial develop­ment. It could also be a sector or position focused mentorship pro­gram where women are trained to assume those roles.

Knowing the importance of mentorship, how then can women manage a healthy mentee men­tor relationship to maximise the benefits that comes with it? As a mentee, you need to:

Trust your mentor:

Once you have made up your mind to seek knowledge from a mentor, you must be willing to trust that person.

By so doing, you will be open and are able to learn from the person. Endeavour to trust your mentor’s judgement and advice.

Be open to talk about everything as it relates to the area of expertise:

Your mentor will need to understand where you are and where you want to be, so you need to be able to openly disclose rele­vant information to your mentor. Do not be ashamed to talk about your passion, it may just be the missing puzzle.

Take notes and endeavor to build a vision board to spur up your ambi­tion:

Every time you have a session with your mentor, keep a note pad with you.
https://independent.ng/mentorship-and-whywomen-need-it/