Yesterday, I spent an enjoyable half day session with T.I.P – Technological Institute of the Philippines watching, questioning and giving feedbacks on student’s project presentation. I enjoyed it more in a physical event format, however with this COVID19 Movement Restriction Order all events are brought online.
“Why are you doing all these?” “What do you gain from these?” – I got asked often as these gigs are usually pro Bono basis and requires some time / undivided attention to be sacrificed. My simple answer will be “I am learning from these people!”
Coaching / Mentoring is a 2 way communication
Don’t get confused with teaching or lecturing which are usually a one way imparting of knowledge. Mentoring requires you listen and understand issues and then point them to the right methods to find answers or solve problems but not giving them the answers. That doesn’t mean I can just speak whatever in my mind and tell funny stories, I have to know the right questions to ask, identify and relate experiences. All these require more learning and preparation beforehand.
Let me share with you my first ever Mentoring gig during the first StartupWeekend in Georgetown Penang back in 2014. I was excited to contribute and was teaching participants to solve problems instead of being a neutral mentor. Although the teams did well, but it defeated the purpose of the event and I maybe limiting the teams of their full potential.
Over the years and 14 StartupWeekends 20+ other events later, I am now a better mentor. I learned a lot from other Mentors on mentoring and coaching skills. I learned even more from participants of the event on technology, pitching styles, validation techniques…etc.
I learned a lot!
“Are you an expert in the field? Certified or accredited to be a judge/mentor/coach?
I can proclaim confidently that NO ONE is perfect or an expert in everything. I’ve seen brilliant engineers who are poor in business acumen, Financial geniuses who are just weak in problem solving and the list goes on.
Hence, in judging events and entrepreneurship mentoring, there are usually a mixed of diverse experience judges and mentors. Judging scores are averaged out and participants took turns talking to different mentors.
In events like this, I usually take the opportunity to learn from other mentors / judges as well and connect with them. So far, many great things happened from these relationships too. Did I mention I learned a lot?
Practice makes perfect
When I was in school, generally friends will come to me for help especially in Mathematics and English. In order for me to be able to help my friends, I have to know how to solve it myself too, else what we do is to work on it together. One after another, they will come and some questions were repeated. It was a good practice for me as after a few times teaching my friends, I master the whole chapter in a more fun (and forceful) way than myself revisions.
This is also applied to the mentoring duty I volunteered for. Over the years of practicing, I became less of a “teacher” and more of a “coach”. I help participants identify goals, develop skills, question their validation… all those became second in nature now from the experiences that came from practicing in events.
“The more you share, the more you will learn”
I also believed that the more you share knowledge, the more knowledge you will gain the the process.
Lifelong learning
“To master something, teach it.”
I used to strongly agree in this quote and thought I was doing the same during school or over the years during my career. However, one can’t be an expert by just teaching alone. I totally believed in sharing = more learning opportunities for the sharer. The most important thing is to keep on improving ourselves. We all know it’s hard to keep on self-motivating ourselves to learn, but via the means of teaching, coaching, sharing knowledge, it will indirectly make us learn more and master a particular subject as well.
Build your own learning network
We are in the 21st century and networking in the prime form of learning. This is one of the reason I love to be part of all these events, to build my learning and professional network. This requires commitment as well. I was taught by Multi-Level Marketing coaches (during my early days trying out MLM sales) to quickly built network and connect with people.; just to be visible/seen. However the work doesn’t stop there.
Think of Collaboration
To make this network work, first find/build a like minded network, bring something to the table while you connect and learn from others as well. Don’t be afraid to ask questions and be active to help and suggest as well. A very good example and my proudest success will be KakiDIY’s Repair movement – KakiRepair.
It’s always easier to form these within a community and among hobbyist… what about in a company? Well, that is a whole other discussion but it does boil down to culture and Knowledge Management. although, the fundamentals are generally the same as above..
Stay safe, Take Care… and Happy Learning!