Welcome to the Mentoring Admin Orientation and Quick Start Guide for the Sounding Board platform! Whether you're a seasoned admin or new to the platform, this guide is your go-to resource for efficiently managing mentoring programs. From onboarding to user management, we've got you covered with step-by-step instructions and key insights. Let's dive in and unlock the full potential of mentoring within your organization.
To streamline your technical set-up, we've organized the articles in a complementary order. We recommend going through them sequentially and actively building out your organization's mentoring structure simultaneously to grasp the technical steps involved. Feel free to refer back to this guide anytime as you navigate the Sounding Board platform. Happy mentoring!
Table of Contents
Phase One: Prep & Plan
Complete these foundational steps to prepare for working with your software workspace.
Welcome Video
Understand Your Role
As the Administrator for Sounding Board, you’ll be responsible for setting up your workspace/tenant and integrating our technology into your leader development strategy and practices. Sounding Board streamlines insights to help demonstrate how your programs impact leader development and business outcomes. However, before those insights can surface, the software needs data and adoption from your team—which is where you come in.
Here’s an overview of your role and responsibilities:
Create a Zendesk Account
Create a Zendesk account to access all the articles below. Instructions are here: Sounding Board's Zendesk for Articles and Tickets.
Review Implementation Resources
The Implementation section in Zendesk provides step-by-step guides and best practices to help you set up, configure, and integrate Sounding Board. It also explains the 'why' behind our tech-enabled approach to leader development, offering foundational concepts and encouraging strategic reflection for a successful rollout.
- Review Technical Resources: Access our technical requirements documentation and other resources like API & Integration overviews in this section. Share these documents with your internal stakeholders and IT teams to ensure a smooth rollout.
- Review Implementation Foundations: Explore our Implementation Foundations content to gain insights on managing the changes that come with adopting new technology. Learn the 'why' behind our tech-enabled approach to leadership development and best practices for navigating the building blocks like leadership capabilities & surveys.
Phase Two: Set Up & Launch
We've organized the articles in a sequential order to streamline setup. Follow the steps below, and use the test users to get hands-on & apply your learning.
Admin Onboarding
Once your workspace/tenant is created, check your inbox for a welcome email to begin onboarding to the software. More information here: Onboarding to the Sounding Board Platform
Explore Your Dashboard
Once Onboarding is complete, you'll land on your dashboard. More information here: Sounding Board Dashboard Overview
Users
We'll add the initial Admin users to your workspace. These Admins will be responsible for adding all other users, whether end users or additional Admins. Sounding Board has pre-populated your workspace with test users. These users allow you to practice key workflows involved in managing your programs and engagements.
- How to Create a New User
- Adding Users With The Bulk User Upload Tool
- Adding a New Admin User
- How to Assign or Update a User's Manager
- People Table
Mentoring Programs
Mentoring programs determine how mentoring is utilized across your organization and establish the parameters for mentoring engagements within the program. A mentoring program is a development program that connects experienced mentors to individuals within the same organization looking for support and/or to expand their skills. In an organizational setting, a mentor influences a mentee’s personal and professional growth.
Using the Sounding Board platform, you can design a mentoring program that fits your organization’s needs, tailoring aspects like matching, resources, and focus areas to support your participants’ personal and professional growth.
Mentoring Program Types
Two Options:
- Open Enrollment: Mentors and mentees can decide to participate in the program and handpick their ideal mentor or mentee. In this program type, the system will recommend one best-match mentor to mentees and rank mentors by highest match score based on Sounding Board's matching algorithm. Note: Only one open enrollment program is currently supported.
- Admin Driven: Admins designate users within the program as mentors or mentees and match them for mentoring engagements.
End User Experience
Below are articles to review for insights into the mentoring end-user experience on the platform. They're valuable for understanding how administrative settings impact both mentors and mentees before setting up your programs.
Mentors
- Complete Your Mentor Profile
- Enrolling into an Open Enrollment Program as a Mentor
- How to Access and Update Your Mentor Profile
- Accept or Decline Mentoring Requests
Mentees
- Complete Your Mentee Profile
- Enrolling into an Open Enrollment Program as a Mentee
- How to Request a Mentor in an Open Enrollment Program
Mentoring Program Building Blocks
As you develop your programs, you'll integrate additional items known as program building blocks. You can review and adjust these before building your program(s), with the flexibility to update them anytime.
Leadership Capabilities
Step one: Review articles
Step two: Apply Your Learning
- Go to 'Company Settings.'
- Add or edit a leadership capability.
- If you’ve already identified leadership capabilities for your organization, add them now. During profile creation, end users see the leadership capabilities listed under 'Company Settings'. Mentees are asked which capabilities they'd like to improve, while mentors are asked which capabilities they’re proficient in
Surveys
Step one: Review articles
Step two: Apply Your Learning
- Review the 'Survey List' & familiarize yourself with the Sounding Board surveys.
- Practice Previewing, Editing, and Duplicating surveys
- Create a test survey in the Survey Builder to understand how it works.
Creating Mentoring Programs
Step one: Review articles
- Creating a Mentoring Program
- Creating a Mentoring or Coaching Program from a Template
- Admin Driven Mentoring Matching
Step two: Apply Your Learning
- Decide how you'll use the program construct and choose the mentoring program type that fits best: Open Enrollment or Admin Driven. If you choose Admin Driven, explore how you can group participants by factors like region, leadership level, or shared development goals
- Create Templates & Test Programs: Create a Program from a Template or go to the 'Programs' section.
- Test Mentoring Program Type: Set up two test programs—one Open Enrollment & one Admin Driven. Log in as a test mentee or mentor to experience differences firsthand.
- Configure Leadership Capabilities: Practice adding, editing, and removing leadership capabilities in test programs. Adjust the default 'Company' capabilities at the program level to match desired outcomes or leadership levels.
- Test Survey Settings: Edit survey triggers, recipients, visibility, and survey content in your test programs. Preview and adjust surveys to fit your program needs.
- Launch Test Program: Select 'Launch Program' to finalize and change the program status from Draft to Active
Phase Three: Adoption & Growth
Maximize engagement management and operational efficiency to drive ongoing adoption.
- An Introduction to Programs
- Updating a Mentoring Program Type
- Viewing Mentoring Engagements
- Software Notifications
- Reviewing the Notifications Table
- Data Exports
- Mentoring Insights Dashboard
- In-App Chat Messaging
- How to Complete Engagements
- How to Manage Engagement Surveys
- How to Edit a User's Mentoring Profile
- Session Administration