Greetings from Stevenage near London, UK, where my wife and I are attending the second edition of the International Conference of RCCG (Redeemed Christian Church of God) Regional and Country Administrators and HR practitioners. Participants are expected from about 190 countries in which RCCG operates. I have been favoured to be invited as one of the speakers. On the subject, the decision to write on coaching and mentoring was taken before we left home. I started the essay but it wasn’t proceeding fast enough because I had to perfect my Stevenage presentation contents. Now, as I look through my hotel window at the Ibis Stevenage Centre, looking at several well groomed or well fed pigeons perching on the windows of a nearby big old building housing several stores, food malls, and a branch of the iconic Tesco chain superstore, I’m suddenly inspired and motivated to finish what I started back in Lagos. By the way, my editor seems a bit lenient this time around, may be because he is privy to my crowded itineraries these past couple of weeks. That’s why I have not received any WhatsApp message encouraging me, and at the same time reminding me of the deadline.
Meanwhile, by the editor’s (not by popular) demand, I’m going to work on transcribing my Stevenage session from PowerPoint slides into prose to share with my esteemed readers on this platform very soon. I’ll be speaking on Embracing Strategic Human Resource Management and Enhancing Capacity Building for Strategic Administration in RCCG.
The outline of today’s essay was first sketched out about two years ago, and published as a 700-word essay in The Sun Ghana newspaper. That piece has since been fleshed up and its scope widened with additional resources from mentoring training, one-on-one coaching sessions, coaching best practices and coaching smart tips. It is also instructive to note that I was motivated to do this piece by the inspiration of the scriptures as it is written in second Timothy, chapter two, verse two, which is further embellished with subject matter experiences from my professional practices. My acronym for this Bible passage is ‘4Ts’, that is, Two Timothy Two Two, and it reads thus in New Living Translation: “You have heard me teach things that have been confirmed by many reliable witnesses. Now teach this truths to other trustworthy people who will be able to pass them on to others.” This is a verse which has long been my reference text in my mentoring classes. It was an apostolic charge from Paul to the young Timothy ‘to give back to humanity’, to lend a hand in discipleship and the spread of the good news. It also seemed a valedictory message from a more experienced person to an up-and-coming individual who went on to become an experienced Bishop.
This brings to mind the origin of the word, mentor. I referred to this briefly some few weeks ago quoting this same source: “In Homer’s Odyssey, Mentor was a friend of Odysseus. When Odysseus left for the Trojan War he placed Mentor in charge of his son, Telemachus, and of his palace”. A mentor takes charge, holds the mentee’s hands, and leads the way with experience and know-how. Another motivation is my passion for the proper professional upbringing of the younger ones especially the Millennials who are now coming into the workplace in their large numbers replacing us, the retiring baby boomers. This group is now splitting into two distinct workplace groups namely: Generation Yers on one side, and Generation Zers or 2020 on the other hand. You may want to read my past articles on “My Generational Preferences” on the unique attributes of these two generations.
t is so important that we spare quality time for coaching and mentoring. I describe the process as the outpouring of anything good in the mentor or the coach into the mentee or coachee*. The upcoming generations need a 360° grooming process for them to get it. Talking of 360° grooming, a passage of the scriptures has this to say about Joseph, no not the husband of Mary, I mean the other one, yes, the young man that was sold into slavery and later became a Prime Minister in Egypt: “Now Joseph was handsome in form and appearance” (Gen. 39:6b. NKJV). Handsome in form looks to me as talking about the way he was formed by the Almighty Himself. However, the insight I got from handsome in appearance is that this has to do with the way he had been groomed and thus appeared – in comportment, in speech, in dressing, in action, reaction, behaviours, etc. Someone said that the way you are dressed is the way you would be addressed. I have a short thesis I call ‘The Joseph Principle’ which, God willing, we would share on this platform in no distant future.
Everyone wins in a coaching and mentoring relationship. The coach is fulfilled, the mentee gains self-esteem. The double-edged discipline of coaching and mentoring is for those with the growth and outward mind-sets or mentality, who have shown signs or intention or have demonstrated the capacity to do more but need help to accomplish that which they have purposed. They are willing to be groomed having flexible change adaptability, and they are not set in their ways. The whole essence of this two-part (or more) essay is to encourage you out there to give back to the society and to humanity by offering to invest in people who may need your work and life experiences. You may be thinking only senior people, either by age or position, who have been around and seen it all can be mentors or coaches. But that is not true.
Anyone can be a mentor to someone less experienced if he is requested. I am equally unrepentant in my submission that no one passes the age of mentoring and coaching. My father-in-law of blessed memory was in his 70s when he decided to get a tutor to coach him on the use of the computer. In the same vein, I appeal to those who may need coaching and mentoring assistance to come forward. Humble yourself and ask for help. Humility is a virtue, hubris is the pride that comes before (or leads to) the great fall. There is no way a willing and ready coach or mentor would know who needs help through facial expression except when a service error is committed. In spite of blatant service errors, we have seen service providers acting under the influence of arrant hubris, still refusing mentoring and coaching overtures offered by consultants like us as willing and ready coaches and mentors.
I am unrepentant in my submission that no one passes the age of mentoring and coaching’
Let me wrap this up today on the importance of this twin complimentary ‘help skills’. May be I would also start to look at the distinguishing elements between these two. In the workplace, as in life, coaching and mentoring are inseparable parts of what we have termed in BezaleelConsulting as the ‘New Functions of Management’. This is because results-oriented management and leadership skills have moved away from the old MBA class tutorials of planning, organising, staffing, coordinating, etc. Coaching, mentoring, counselling, performance management and demonstrating Emotional Intelligence (EQ) skills are now the new functions of performing leaders in the engaging and great workplaces of today. Coaching and mentoring rely heavily on one-on-one discussions to improve on people’s skills, performance and quality of life.
Coaching is done or given mostly in and at work or vocation. Mentoring is in life and living, it is beyond work, and it may be for life. A good example is the life and times of Chief Obafemi Awolowo. Legend has it that until his death, he was still mentoring his true disciples. There are massive literatures and materials out there reeling out various differences between these two key skills. We would be looking at some of these ‘differences’ next week. Suffice now to just warn that we should not be distracted by these attempts at differentiation and separation. The helping skills of coaching and mentoring are complimentary and they go hand-in-hand, almost inseparable. The differences are mainly in the focus and process, the outcome is undoubtedly to grow people and the business, invest in lives and make them better than if they have had no coaches and mentors.
To be continued. Enjoy.
Acknowledgement/Sources of Resources for this article/Notes:
- * In my writings and in our classes, Mentor and Coach are used interchangeably as we call the more experienced person who lends a hand in the grooming or growing people process. We have also adopted mentee, coachee and protégé interchangeably for the one who is being coached, mentored or who is under tutelage.
- Smart Tips by Soundview Executive Book Summaries soundview.com
- Clip arts and snippets from the Internet for embellishment.
- A compendium of over 25 years of manuscripts of my thesis and lecture series in Talent Management and People Matters (unpublished yet) courtesy BezaleelConsulting Group Library bezaleelconsultingrw.com
- I promised last week to acknowledge a book I read long ago on delegation but which title and author I could not readily recollect. Hurrah! I found the executive summary. The book is: Empowering Employees through Delegation: How Effective Managers Get Results by Robert B. Nelson. Irwin Professional Publishing, 1994.