This guide provides essential insights for mentors on how to effectively manage mentoring requests, ensuring they make informed decisions about accepting or declining potential mentees. By emphasizing the importance of assessing the mentee's needs and background, it encourages mentors to reflect on their capacity and suitability for the role. Additionally, it outlines the process for scheduling sessions and adjusting mentoring capacity, making it a valuable resource for anyone looking to enhance their mentoring experience. Overall, this guide equips mentors with the necessary tools to foster meaningful mentoring relationships.
Interactive Walkthrough
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Written Walkthrough
1. Navigate to https://coaching.soundingboardinc.com and log in.
When you are requested as a mentor, you will receive an email, along with an in-app notification, alerting you to review the request. To respond and access information about the request, you can follow the link provided in the email or in-app notification, or navigate to the Mentoring Requests tab on your dashboard. You will have two weeks, or 14 days, to either decline or accept the mentor request; after that time, the request will expire.
2. Navigate to Mentoring Requests on the left-hand navigation panel.
Note: You'll notice a red badge indicating the count of mentoring requests you have pending currently.
3. Review Mentoring Request(s)
When you receive a mentoring request, it's crucial to challenge your initial reactions or assumptions about the match's suitability. Pay close attention to what the mentee describes they want/need from the mentoring relationship. Also, consider what they might not be explicitly stating they need. Given their background and aspirations, identify the significant leaps they might need to make in their leadership journey. Reflect on whether you are the right person to assist them in achieving these significant advancements.
To get more familiar with your potential mentees,
- Click on their request to expand their profile photo/avatar OR
- Click "Read more"
4. Reviewing Mentoring Request(s)
After reviewing the mentee's profile, you have two options -
- Click "View Full Profile" to see further information on the mentee OR
- Click "Close Window" to return to your mentoring requests
5. Accept Requests
Locate the mentee who you would like to engage in mentoring with -
- Click "Accept Request"
- Add "Your message" for the mentee (optional)
- Click "Confirm & Accept"
6. Decline Requests
Identify the mentee with whom you declining to engage in mentoring with -
- Click "Decline request"
- Add a "Message" for the mentee (optional)
- Click "Confirm & Decline"
7. Mentor Requests
At any time, you will be able to see your past mentoring requests by clicking on the appropriate tabs -
- Pending
- Accepted
- Declined
- Expired
Note: You can easily see the count numbers on the tabs. If you do not have accepted, declined or expired mentoring requests, you will not be able to navigate to those tabs.
8. Edit Capacity
If, while reviewing mentoring requests, you feel the need to edit how many mentees you can mentor at one time, you have the ability to adjust your capacity. Once your capacity is full, by accepting mentoring requests, you will no longer receive new mentoring requests.
- Click "Edit Capacity"
- Edit the "Mentee Capacity"
- Click "Save"
9. Schedule a Session
Once you've accepted a mentee, we recommend getting your first session scheduled. You can easily do that from the Accepted tab of your Mentoring Requests or from your home screen.
- Click "Schedule a Session"
For more details, see Scheduling Sessions.