Several years ago, I was walking a trade show looking for innovative new food and drink products to add to our range when I became aware of the dearth of young food entrepreneurs in the exhibition hall. Not great for the future of our industry! I decided to do something about it, so the following year we started the Cotswold Fayre Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award, only open to those under age 24. The winner received a cash prize and, hopefully more importantly, received mentoring from me for a year as they grew their embryonic food or drink brand. The quality of the applicants was astounding, and some incredible young talent was unearthed, two of whom went on to appear on BBC 2’s Dragon’s Den and one of whom now has a global brand.
While there was the expected clear benefit to those young entrepreneurs from working with me, I can honestly say I received back as much as I gave out each year. At the time, that was perhaps a surprise to me. I’ve since talked to many others, and this is a common theme: Mentor others and you will benefit yourself, as well as the mentee.
While not all mentoring is from an older person to younger, much of it is, and engaging with younger people is life-giving and energy-creating. And, in my experience, it benefits the mentor as much as those being mentored. It is easier as we become older to become more cynical, and it is good for us to have some of this cynicism blown away by the “no-blinkers” view from those of a younger age and attitude. Of course, not all mentoring is from an older to younger person, and I would encourage the other way round, too, as younger people can mentor their elders. All intergenerational mentoring adds benefit.
Benefits of Mentoring
Let’s look at the other benefits to us of mentoring others:
- Spending some time in other businesses is good and often will give us a new perspective when coming back to affairs closer to home. Just as spending time away from work on holiday relaxing can fuel our creativity, spending some time in another business often can achieve the same result. We may well have a flash of inspiration that can help us see our own businesses in a different light. And there may be ideas and thinking we can adopt within our own businesses. Over the years, many of my best ideas were borrowed from others, and I give permission to others to do the same.
- From a recruitment point of view, mentoring a younger Gen Z leader, for example, will give us good insight into how another generation thinks and what values are important to them. Each generation is different, all with positives and negatives, and learning what makes other generations tick can only be of benefit to us as we lead multi-generational companies in many cases.
What motivates people from different generations and what incentivizes them will not necessarily be the same as us. For those of us over age 40, unleashing the massive amount of talent in Generations Z and Alpha is going to be key to our future business success, and mentoring these generations can only benefit our own business. Of course, there may well be a more direct impact, and it is fairly common for those who are mentored to join the mentor’s company in some role in the future.
- As a mentor, through mixing in different business circles and sectors, we may see investment opportunities for the future. It is easy to become too narrow-minded in our focus. Broadening this out to include other industries may open our minds to wider opportunities. There are a plethora of companies and agencies touting for business among the 600,000 start-ups every year in the UK. When advising entrepreneurs who are looking for a mentor, I often advise them to ask prospective mentors to invest in their business. While mentoring others and investing do not always have to be linked, it is often helpful to link the two.
- If you have had several years of business success, mentoring others free of charge is simply a good thing to do. Embedded deep within our humanity as social mammals is a need for community. Those who live their whole lives only focused on themselves and their own success are often unhappier people and die younger than those who look to give to others. There is something positive about giving and helping others, which does something good for us. Many eastern philosophies have taught this as a path to well-being for millennia.
Bring an Outward Focus to Your Business
I would put it as strongly as this: If you want to be happier and live longer, give to others through mentoring on a more regular basis. You also will bring that outward focus into your own business. As the 21st century progresses, it increasingly will be those businesses that are not just focused on profit that will prosper and succeed. Looking outward to the local community and the wider global community will have a tremendous positive impact on us personally and our businesses.
Just as caring for, mentoring, and training your own people will result in higher commitment levels and the ability to build a better business, caring for other businesses will result in building a better business—both theirs and yours. Collaborative working is becoming more and more important, and ideas flowing between businesspeople are essential in growing each other’s businesses. Mentoring others can only facilitate this in both directions. While advising others does involve a degree of effort and some sacrifice of time, the rewards will not only be reflected in your own business and character but also will ensure you have a greater impact in the world through another business you have helped achieve success.
