By Alison Sfreddo
The mentor plays a key role in designing developmental learning experiences for the mentoree. Often, though, a mentor's first question is, "How do I design a 
developmental activity?" The first step is to identify a need that offers the greatest opportunity for improvement and focus an assignment to address this need. Secondly, the activity should be one in which the mentoree will learn without becoming discouraged or feel overwhelmed and where the learning environment will be "safe." Finally, ensuring an effective means of feedback from the activity is vital to achieving and solidifying the developmental goal of the activity. The following are a few ideas for developmental activities within five specific realms of employee experience.
Communication
- Style - Encourage mentorees to solicit feedback after meetings from trusted colleagues as to how their communication style is perceived by others.
- Listening Skills - Practice listening skills by having the mentoree listen to someone explain an issue and then recite the major points of the argument to that person in order to see if they have captured the main purpose of the discussion.
- Writing - Have the mentoree draft an internal memorandum and evaluate the writing style and tone in terms of company expectations and effectiveness of the communiqué. Provide feedback.
- Presentations/Briefing - Provide feedback after a presentation has been delivered. Ask for feedback from others who also received the brief.
Leadership
- Problem Solving - Encourage the mentoree to tackle a problem within the organization from an analytical perspective incorporating the views of the major stakeholders and create a plan to address the problem.
- A Fresh Look - Have the mentoree walk through the office space with "new eyes," asking themselves if the environment reflects the culture and values that are important to him/her and then discussing these new insights with you.
- Unwritten Rules - Have the mentoree speak with at least three senior managers about what they consider to be the organization's "unwritten" rules and why they are important.
Teamwork/Team-Building
- Information Sharing - Have your mentoree set aside a specific time monthly (or more often as required) to share new knowledge and information with his/her team members.
- Team Orientation - Encourage the mentoree to solicit feedback from team members in terms of how team oriented he/she is. Determine if team members feel that the mentoree pushes his own ideas rather than listening to the collective voice of the group or that he considers or fails to consider how decisions will affect the other team members.
- Membership - Have the mentoree join an "ad hoc" team or committee assignment as a team member and monitor his/her behavior within that role.
- Collaboration - Have the mentoree serve on a project requiring collaboration with a variety of different perspectives and disciplines to see what barriers he/she may face.
Technical Expertise
- Shadow an Expert - Ask the mentoree to follow an expert for a day and to prepare a paper on what was learned from this experience.
- Stretch Goals - Encourage the mentoree to take a project outside their normal area of expertise or comfort zone.
- Networking - Encourage the mentoree to foster a network of situational "technical" mentors by spending time with them on a monthly basis.
- Professional Conferences - Mentorees should attend at least one professional conference per year with the goal of strengthening their technical skills in at least one area.
Time Management
- Priorities - The mentoree should discuss his/her team's top ten priorities with a senior manager.
- Goals and Deadlines - Encourage the mentoree to maintain a work journal, chronicling their deadlines and daily work goals to identify time wasters, times when they are most and least productive, and means of controlling the use of their time.
- The Power of Experience - Have the mentoree interview three key executives who balance their time with ease to glean insight into the techniques and processes for doing so.
- Efficiency - Have someone visit the mentoree's office and provide constructive feedback on its efficiency.
These are just a few of the myriad developmental activities that you can recommend to your mentoree in order to help them become a more valuable asset for the organization. Use these as guidelines to create your own developmental activities that focus on the critical aspects of employee success. Most of all, try to make the activities interesting, non-confrontational, and even fun whenever possible.
By Allison Sfreddo, Reprint granted by The Mentoring Connection
effective leaders excelled: People, Strategy and Crisis.
doing?" It is an uncomfortable question as it begins the process of moving out of our current comfort zone to a place in our lives that appears to be of great uncertainty.
