Career mentors: Student INFORMATION

Career Mentoring is a facility available for students to help them with their career development. Career Mentoring puts students in touch with alumni and other professionals working in a career area of interest to the student.

Y our career path
Finding the right match
Communicating with your mentor
Commuicating by e-mail
E-mail guidelines
Tips for a successful mentoring relationship
Student comments 

Our page of  Career Profiles may also be of interest to students who want to know more about career mentoring. 

Figuring out your career

Mentors from many different backgrounds and disciplines have volunteered to be student mentors.  By sharing experience, expertise and advice mentors contribute real-life perspectives of the workplace to students.  This can take the form of a once-off email or face-to-face meeting. As the mentoring relationship develops, students learn to really think about their career choice, develop their networking skills and gain valuable experience and first hand knowledge of a career.

Finding the right match

Following a meeting with a careers advisor, we can consider how best to match you with a mentor to ensure that the best possible interaction takes place.  A student may be paired with a mentor working in a career they are interested in, with a mentor who has a similar degree or with a mentor whose interests are the same.  Whatever the match, a mentor will offer a student valuable insights into the working world.

Communicating with your mentor

Communication with mentors is usually initiated by e-mail, and further arrangements (e.g. face-to-face or telephone communication) can be arranged if appropriate, at the discretion of the mentor and the student.

Communicating by E-Mail

What is different about mentoring by e-mail for those who are used to face-to-face mentoring?  One thing is that evidence seems to show that you have to work harder to establish rapport if communicating solely by e-mail so it is important to use small talk and ice-breakers in the same way as you would in a face-to-face meeting.

E-mail Guidelines:

Keep e-mails short, concise and to the point.  Including a meaningful heading in the "subject" field so your email avoids getting filtered out as spam.

• Use standard English - avoid "text" communication and abbrevations.
• E-mails are a permanent record of interaction.  Be aware that any statements made may not be retractable.  They can be printed out and shown to others.
• Don't write in capital letters - it's similar to shouting via e-mail.
• Avoid using jargon, unless you are sure that all your recipients understand it.
• Check out this useful website for email etiquette: http://www.emailreplies.com/

Tips for a successful mentoring relationship

• Discuss and establish your boundaries early on in the relationship. Decide with your mentor: what the aims and objectives of the mentoring are; at what times you will meet or email/phone; and what tasks are to be undertaken. 
• Develop a career development action plan early on, to set out clearly what you want to achieve with your mentor.
• Keep a track of your progress and review it.
• Accept as much information and help that you can, including that of the Career Development Centre.
• Ask questions.
• Communicate regularly and be positive, both in attitude and language.
• Be open and respect each other's opinion.
• Enjoy the process: it's solely for your benefit.

Comments from students who have been mentored

Face-to-face and phone mentoring:
" I found the mentoring excellent.  My mentor was very informative.  She gave me all the information I needed to help me decide on whether I was going to pursue a career in social work.  Thank you very much."

Face-to-face and email mentoring:
" The mentoring gave me an insight into publishing that is really impossible to obtain from the classroom.  My mentor was very gracious with her time and went out of her way to help me."

E-mail mentoring:
"The best thing that it did for me was to focus my attention on the working world.  It made me realise the opportunities that lie before me and that if I am prepared and have a good plan that the sky is the limit as to what I can achieve.  My two mentors are extremely successful people in what they do.  They gave me the confidence to try to do the same. I have often found that other people I have sought advice from seem to think that I am a dreamer and that my career ambitions are set too high and are unattainable.  My mentors taught me that everything is possible and that I just need to focus and apply myself."

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