Let’s hear it from our Mentors

Catherine* has decided to join the PWI Mentoring Programme as it seems the right place to share her knowledge and her experience and to provide guidance and feedback to professional women in their current career growth.

I have been a mentee …

During my first years of work in the banking world, I benefited from informal mentorship.

My mentors, usually managers from my working environment, gave me support in crucial moments of my early career. Their advice and reflections over their own experiences had given me at that time the necessary strength to listen to my instincts and take the right decisions.

Our bond eventually turned into a lifelong connection. I currently still keep in touch with my mentors and feel them part of not only of my professional life, but real examples of inspiration for other aspects of my life. We share industry updates and we help each other through our network.

All in all, my mentors have definitely contributed to my professional fulfillment, they became people that I keep close to my heart, they keep inspiring me and give me the piece of wisdom I need at crossroads.

… And now I am a mentor

Last year, I was looking for a project where I could contribute to someone’s life in a similar way my mentors did for me. Sharing this experience and supporting someone in their early career seemed natural to me at that point. However, with a limited time availability, I struggled to find a well-balanced formula.

One day, I came across an email from PWI where the mentorship programme was being launched. I realised then that this could be a good place to share my mentoring energy and directly help someone in need.

Under PWI’s umbrella and benefiting from their practical tips and advice, my journey as mentor has started.

Mission accomplished?

For me, as a mentor, the fact that I could share practical tips, be there in some important moments of my mentee’s life and see actual growth in her career and mindset is already a mission accomplished.
Nevertheless, I hope we can go further than that and develop a bond which will last for a lifetime. As a mentor, I would like to be a source of strength and wisdom for my mentee — just how my mentors were and are to me.

As a mentor, I would like to be a source of strength and wisdom for my mentee — just how my mentors were and are to me.

At a certain point, I noticed that my mentee was reflecting in a similar way as I did couple of years ago. Thus, through this mentorship programme I could visualise myself at an earlier stage in my career. I was then glad to share my learnings and use the pieces of advice given to me at that time.

We should support each other

In this mentoring exercise, I learned that as professionals we should support each other. Knowledge and experience are indeed a source of strength and wisdom. However, if shared in the right environment, they can generate positive energies in the society and can directly help individuals to fulfill their dreams. Being part of this mentorship programme is what I see as humble contribution to sharing this positive energy in the world.

Being part of this mentorship programme is what I see as humble contribution to sharing this positive energy in the world.

After this programme, I hope that my mentee will carry with her some essential life learnings and will eventually share them in the future by becoming a mentor herself.

Do you want to know more about our mentoring programme? Join us on 6 September for the presentation of the new wave.

*Please be aware that Catherine is not the real name of our mentor as she requested, in the interest of her mentee, to keep her identity private.