Mentoring is traditionally a partnership between two people, the mentor and the mentee in which the mentor is usually the more senior of the two in age, experience and knowledge. It is a relationship geared to enable the mentee get support in their career growth and in realising their potential. The mentor gains by sharing and giving back what they have learned. It is a relationship based on mutual trust and respect.
A mentor acts as a guiding compass for the mentee to help navigate against issues and challenges in their career and sometimes touching personal lives. They empathise and sometime sympathise with their prodigies.They boost their confidence if needed.
These days, very often you see young dynamic people at the helm of organisations or holding senior posts. Age alone is no longer considered a sign of knowledge and experience. In addition to this, organisations are getting flatter. There are fewer senior titles so to speak. People are encouraged to be leaders in their area of work and an egalitarian approach is encouraged.
Traditional mentoring only allows helping few people at a time, plus it is time consuming and expensive unless the mentor happens to be a family member or friend. In which case it is not structured and regular, thus missing out on a regular mentoring practise.
New age mentoring demands coaching competencies in addition to mentoring hence the term Men-Ching. It is based on the paradigm that everyone can learn something from another person. It is a many to many structure as opposed to one to one. It is a method which is collaborative, open and self initiated. It is still based on mutual trust and respect as in traditional mentoring. With underlying coaching competencies you can create an environment of trust and openness that cross all barriers of age, title and position thus enabling creation of a pure mentoring space.
Anyone can play the role of the adviser or the protege. This kind of a learning collaboration should be encouraged by the senior management in an organisation. It enables leadership in the junior population and Servant Leadership in the upper ranks.