Do you have a mentor or a coach?
Do you know the difference?
A mentor is someone who is a few steps further than you who can guide you to be where they are one day.
In short, your goals are similar.
Think about someone who mentors you to be a top notch researcher or who can teach you how they got into a particular residency or leadership position or how to progress in your academic promotion. They are trying to help you follow the same path because they have successfully walked the path already.
But what if you don’t have the same end-point in mind? (I KNOW–there are different ways to be successful in medicine…just saying).
That’s when you would benefit from a coaching approach.
A coach helps you clarify what you want in the future and helps you unlock your inner wisdom to get there. They recognize that your goals are unique and therefore so must your journey be specific to you. As you become more open and curious, you might examine the limiting patterns of beliefs that keep you stuck. You might learn how to stretch open your perspective so that you see new possibilities.
So the next time a colleague comes to you with a problem, would you consider withholding your advice? Could you step back and ask a more open question that gives them permission to think of their own dreams first?
Try coaching them instead of mentoring them!
Question: “How can you support a friend without imposing your own choices on them?”
