JB Singh, President & CEO Interglobe Hotels demystifies the art & need of mentoring in today’s work space
JB Singh, President & CEO Interglobe Hotels demystifies the art & need of mentoring in today’s work space
To implement change I sought mentors and at the same time I sought mentees in my teams. This continuous transfer and exchange of knowledge helped me build shared visions and goals that ultimately realigned the trajectory of my businesses. In fact, this powerful medium helped me recast the cultural fabric of my organisations.
Why Mentoring?
The newly defined VUCA (Volatile, Uncertain, Complex and Ambiguous) world is entering into a state of extreme disruption. Macro trends are driving new business models and creating new societal needs that are throwing up paradoxes which need deeper understanding and quicker decisions. This is creating challenging demands on professionals. To thrive, they will need to be hyper engaged, build extreme ownership, create sustainable positive energy and will need to complement their existing skills with enhanced learnings.
To help steer this overwhelming landscape, mentoring has become an even more of a crucial element of one’s professional life than ever before. Responsible and contextual mentoring of young individual will help them navigate these paradoxes and maximize their potential, enabling them to push boundaries. Mutual respect, trust, commitment and empathy forms the bedrock of mentoring and allows you to be better than you were a day before.
“As a mentor myself, I have always believed that an organisation needs a strong foundation of learning to build and retain employees who can adapt, develop and reinforce themselves over time.’’
Responsible mentoring calls for immersive learning by the Gurus themselves to understand current and future trends. The practice must ensure that it creates a fulfilling, relevant and a contextual environment for capability building. It must bring in an eclectic mix of the past from the mentor and a “here and now” experience from the mentee that will help organisations recast new leadership literacies as they prepare themselves for the future.
Research has revealed that those who have sought mentors have a higher job satisfaction index; are more engaged; earn more; and have a higher promotion rate than the others. Similarly, those who choose to teach are seen better at their jobs and demonstrate higher capability to coach, mentor and develop others, a skill that effective leaders must develop. It also helps them enhance their own self-awareness, self-discovery and growth as a leader.
This culture of teaching and learning provides a powerful platform to create an environment of alignment and commitment through a state of continuous dialogue and learning.
This opinion piece was first published in the print version of SUBURB September 2019 issue.