Macklin Business Institute students will be working with business executives who are employed in the corporate community and have an interest in working with business students. A faculty mentor will also be assigned to each student in order to maintain a similar relationship with regard to academic matters.

A mentor is a business professional who is willing to make a difference in the life of the mentee. A person adept at conveying a strong sense of trust in their mentee and in making that person understand s/he is there to help them. To share his/her knowledge not only on professional matters, but personal matters as well. A mentor provides a delicate balance of challenge and support. A mentor is a teacher, facilitator, friend, and role model.

A mentee is a business student who is willing to accept those challenges presented by the mentor and use these experiences in their own personal growth and knowledge.

                One of the paradoxes of formal mentoring programs is that the essence of the relationship is its informality - the ability to discuss in private a wide range of issues that will help the mentee cope with and learn from issues s/he encounters, putting aside any power or status differences that might operate outside the relationship. So the idea of measurement and review is, on the face of it, to some extent at odds with the need to retain a high degree of informality and ad hoc responsiveness.

• 1. Developing the relationship. Take at least a month or more to get to know each other before you nail down your plans. Explain why you've agreed to do this and what you believe you'll gain. Tell your life or career story. Listen to your mentee's story, probing for his/her highs, lows, feelings, and potential dreams. Talk about interests, hobbies, travels, movies. Resist the urge to "get down to business," unless your mentee seems anxious to do so. When the time seems right, move onto the next stage.

  Two special notes: If you're mentoring a young student, don't spend a lot of time "talking about" the relationship. Let the information about what you have in common and who you both are come out of enjoyable activities you do together. If you're mentoring an adult who is very different from you in age, culture, style, or background, take extra time on this phase.

• 2. Negotiating agreements. Start identifying and negotiating the expectations and desires you both have: when and where you'll meet, how long the formal partnership will last, how you'll give each other feedback, what's confidential and what's not. Have your mentee write these down and refer to them as needed. If an agreement isn't working, negotiate a change. All the while, you'll be helping your mentee become a skilled mentee that can also work with other mentors.
• 3. Developing the mentee. Here's where the bulk of your relationship will focus: building the skills, knowledge, and/or attitudes of your mentee. Remember, you don't have to do all the teaching. Try to be a skilled "learning broker," in which you help your mentee identify development objectives and development activities (people to meet or interview, books to read, tapes to hear, experiments or projects to try, shadowing of you and other experts to schedule). Also help your mentee identify some measures to be sure progress has been made (maybe a simple checklist or rating scale) and some target deadlines.
• 4. Ending the formal relationship. It has been discovered over many years of research on mentoring that formal relationships should have a "hard close," a formal official ending. Start preparing for this ending at least two months before it occurs. When it's near, plan a celebration of your accomplishments together and negotiate the form of your relationship.

                What will continue beyond being this person's formal mentor? Will you be one of his/her informal mentors, or will you be friends? If "friends," what does this really mean? Be honest with your needs and limits, or you'll set your mentee up for unrealistic expectations. Be certain in your last session or two to mention the value you've gained from the experience, and make some positive predictions for your mentee's future.

                It is thought, that by adding some of the above structure to even your very informal mentoring relationships, you and your mentee will both benefit. You'll have a game plan, a beginning, middle, and ending. Even if you can only spend limited hours helping your mentee, you'll make the most of this precious time.