Mentoring Product Managers

I wish someone had encouraged me to find a mentor when I was younger. Luckily a few found me outside of work and ‘took me under their wing’ but until a few years ago I don’t recall mentoring being a thing in my workplaces. This seems odd given I’ve been in the modern industry of online product development for over 15 years. Anyway, what a difference a good mentor can make both in your career and in life.

It’s not like mentoring is a new thing. A quick search online suggests the concept of it originated in ancient Greece. When Odysseus started his odyssey, he left his young son Telemachos in the care of an elder named Mentor. Apparently, this relationship defined mentoring where a known older and trusted person helps to counsel and guide a younger person. I’m pretty sure age doesn’t matter much in mentoring but trust certainly does. The mentee is looking for guidance that the mentor should either be able to provide themselves, or help find from others in their network.

My current employer Trade Me (NZ’s largest auction and classified advertising site) runs a couple of mentoring programs, and one specifically for its Product Managers. This program is where I first got involved back in 2015 as a mentor. That leads me to my first piece of advice — get yourself a mentor before mentoring others. Being a mentee first will help you gain insight into different approaches to mentoring, and it’s a good idea to get your own house in order first. Some of us aren’t the best at asking for help, are we?!

My kickstart to mentoring came in the form of a quick Mentoring Others course on Lynda.com. I was off. Back in 2015 I’d never really had a strong desire to manage people before but in mentoring I found a way to use my own experience to help others, which I thoroughly enjoyed. I’ve learned that there’s a big difference between a manager and a mentor and that not many do both well. In fact, mentoring made me want to manage a team of my own and I do hope they benefit from my experience as a mentor. So my second piece of advice would be to get some mentoring under your belt before considering managing others.

Being a mentor can help change someone’s life. Tweet this.

I’ve had the pleasure of helping half a dozen aspiring Product Managers realise their dream which is an awesome feeling. In fact it’s been so rewarding for me personally to see them develop and grow from aspiring to actual PM’s that I’ve taken the opportunity to lead our PM mentoring program at Trade Me now. There’s actually not much to it, the main responsibilities being:

• making sure people are aware it exists
• connecting people appropriately
• encouraging participants to have a bit of a plan for how and when they’ll interact (and to keep a log of what’s discussed at each meeting)
• and last but not least to ensure participants set some goals (and regularly measure them).

It’s fair to say that mentoring has given me more back than I expected it would and has been quite addictive. Recently I’ve gotten involved in a few different mentoring programs both here in NZ and abroad too. I’ve helped Creative HQ here in Wellington with mentoring participants in their incubation and accelerator programs. Right now I’m involved in a global mentoring program called The Product Mentor which is run over Google Hangouts and “connects product management mentors with those seeking mentorship”. Through all my involvement in mentoring there is one guiding principle I’ve used which is my third and final piece of advice — be the perfect listener and remember we have two ears and one mouth for a reason.

So, don’t just take my word for it. If you’ve been doing product management long enough that you think your experiences can help others realise their dreams go find someone to mentor — but before you do, get yourself in shape with a mentor of your own first!

P.S. Feel free to get in touch via the interwebs if you’re looking for a mentor, I may be able to help.