It could be that as well as fulfilling a mentoring role with the apprentice you are also fulfilling other roles, such as line manager, colleague, and assessor. For the purpose of providing you with a clear vision of what falls into the mentoring role, here are some things that are definitely not part of the mentor’s role:
- Acting as a parent. The apprentice holds the reins, not the mentor. The mentor might sense that the apprentice would like them to take control and ‘babysit’ them, in which case they should make it clear that the responsibility lies with the mentee.
- Acting as a counsellor. It could be that part of your employer responsibility to the apprentice is to ensure they’re signposted to practical support for personal or health problems. However, it’s important to not find yourself in the role of a counselor should these problems be outside your realms of experience or knowledge area.
- An excuse for the apprentice to moan. Although it’s important that the apprentice is able to share issues and concerns they’re experiencing, if they arrive at every mentoring session with a list of woes expecting to spend the session on these, the mentor should help the apprentice identify a course of action to address these issues and gently steer them in a more positive direction. This is where it would be more appropriate to deal with such issues in a management or supervision session.
- Being the apprentice’s friend. That doesn’t mean the mentor should be completely detached – of course, they can be friendly! But becoming too friendly can prevent honest feedback. It’s important that the mentor doesn’t let the boundaries become blurred.
- Dispensing discipline. Just as the mentor is not there to look after the apprentice, they are not there to tell them off if they make a mistake or aren’t working hard enough. That might be part of another role you fulfill, but it’s not a mentor’s role. If the mentor notices the apprentice isn’t pulling their weight, they should bring this up in a supervision session where work is being discussed and then help them identify the issue and a course of action for addressing it in that environment.
- Being a god. No matter how much experience and knowledge a mentor has, they are not expected to have all the answers. Instead, mentors are there to guide, support and encourage someone to progress along their own learning and career path.
