The key skills associated with mentoring are:
- Listening in order to understand
- Questioning to clarify and make sure you’ve understood correctly
- Questioning to explore additional options and consequences
- Action planning for the future.
Throughout these stages, the mentor is also facilitating the apprentice’s learning, development and performance. Through the use of questions (and challenging ‘with respect’), the mentor guides the apprentice to:
- Find their own solutions
- Develop their own skills
- Create new ways of thinking
- Change their own assumptions and perceptions
- Gain greater self-awareness
- Improve their personal and professional performance.
