This past Friday night, GovLoop kicked off the Spring 2012 Mentors Program. As part of the orientation session, we asked participants to break into small groups and identify attributes of the ideal mentor and mentees. Here’s what the group (including participants who chimed in by live chat) identified as the top 10 traits for each:
Ideal Mentee
- Enthusiastic
- Faithful, Available, Teachable
- Good follow-through
- Honest with self / open with mentor
- Humble / receives constructive feedback well
- Knows what they want
- Prepared / proactive
- Recognizes that they bring value, too
- Reflective
- Willingness to step outside comfort zone
Ideal Mentor
- Attentive
- Available
- Constructive listener
- FAT (per above – two-way street)
- Good communicator
- Help the mentee find calm / centeredness in chaos
- Identifying and navigating “chickenship” (fear and/or stepping in “it”)
- Sage perspective
- Selfless
- Sensitive
Please also see my colleague Pat Fiorenza’s great post on “What Makes a Good Mentor?”
What traits would you add for either the mentor or mentee?
What have been the best traits you’ve observed in a mentor/mentee?
