While his career journey had been prosperous – 20 years at Bain & Company from consultant to CEO, CEO of eBay, CEO of ServiceNow – he recognized the need for an intentional pause. So, John took a year off.

During this sabbatical, he created what he called a “Wisdom Tour” – a quest for inspiration, advice, and guidance through a series of mentoring conversations.

Reflecting on the enriching experience in an interview with Fortune’s podcast Leadership Next, John said:

“I was 55 thinking, what will I care about when I’m 65? Some people are 65 who have vitality – they’re young at heart, they’re happy. But there are an awful lot of people at 65 where that’s not the case.

“I learned from brain science that our brains get more negative over time. So I started reaching out to people 65 and over who have the vitality that I looked up to.”

In total, John connected with 50 people and asked:

“Tell me how you understand your life at this stage and how you have handled transitions since your 50s. How can I keep vitality into my 60s and 70s?”

5 lessons John learned during his Wisdom Tour:

1. Attitude is everything
2. Hang out with people you strive to be like
3. Be time-conscious and choose meaningful, consequential activities
4. Use your gifts in service of others
5. Allow serendipity to unfold instead of controlling everything

This learning journey informed John’s next stage of his life. He recognized his gift as service-based leadership and sought a role that would allow him to leverage it. With this clarity, he joined Nike as its new CEO.

You don’t need to quit your job to create your own Wisdom Tour. But you need to:

• recognize when you’re in a transition
• acknowledge the benefit of curating wisdom from others
• intentionally create an abundance of mentoring conversations
• be vulnerable and humble
• listen without judgment or dismissal
• take good notes, reflect, and synthesize

Wisdom is swirling all around us… but accessible only to those brave enough to seize it!

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

Wanting to experiment, I decided to order vegetarian options. Immediately, I discovered the joy of plant-based plates palatably and logistically. To me, being vegetarian is easy – I always find something to eat no matter where I go, without issue or declaration.

But it was the community friction I was unprepared for.

When people in my life noticed that I – the girl who grew up on a farm eating the animals we raised and the Big Macs we didn’t – was choosing forks over knives, they commented, questioned, and challenged me:

• Why are you doing that?
• I thought you grew up on a farm?
• What’s wrong with meat?
• Do we need to go somewhere else?
• Didn’t you used to eat steak?
• Aren’t you feeling sluggish?
• I don’t know how to feed you!
• What will you do for food on Thanksgiving? 
• That must be so hard – I can’t imagine!

Today, no one cares that I pass on the meat dish. And in fact, most people in my life have long forgotten that I used to love fish and filet mignon.

So why the initial friction?

We don’t hate change; in fact, we each actively work on creating change daily. How do I know? We constantly set and drive goals. Goals are the gateway to change.

Here’s the problem. While we want change, we don’t want to be changed.

And when we change, it forces other people to change how they know and relate to us. They experience “being changed” and resist.

But instead of surrendering, seek allies.

An ally is like mentor lite – a champion, a sympathizer, a collaborator – someone who supports or shares the journey. Allies don’t require a rationale to cheer. They offer a confidence boost without judgment.

While a mentor is always an ally, an ally doesn’t need to be a mentor. Allies stand with us, validating and encouraging.

Our meandering path is ours to create and discover at our pace. We don’t owe anyone a justification or an explanation for any change we choose. But sometimes, people who do not understand our choices demand one.

Whether you’re changing your health, your career path, your hobbies, or even your outlook, align with allies. They have the power to drown out the change-resistors and bolster our perseverance.

But to find allies, we must first be an ally…

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

• Inventor of Tethys, a lead-detection tool
• Inventor of Epione, a clinical tool to diagnose prescription opioid addiction
• Inventor of Kindly, an anti-cyberbullying tool
• Winner of the Discovery Education 3M Young Scientist Challenge in 2017
• Forbes 30 Under 30 in 2017
• STEM Scout of the Year in 2017
• EPA President’s Environmental Youth Award in 2018
• Top “Health” Pillar Prize for the TCS Ignite Innovation Student Challenge in May 2019
• Time’s Top Young Innovator in 2020
• “Kid of the Year” Time cover in 2020
• Laureate of the Young Activists Summit at UN Geneva in 2021
• 3x TEDx Speaker
• Author Young Inventor’s Guide to STEM: 5 Steps to Problem-Solving, published in 2021
• Conducts innovation workshops around the globe to promote a problem-solving curriculum.
• Entered college at MIT in Fall 2023

It all started with small actions by mentors who recognized and then fanned the flames of Gitanjali’s burning desire to do good in the world.

• Her uncle gave her a science kit when she was four, which sparked an interest in inventing.
• Her second-grade teacher, Ms. Jennifer Stockdale, encouraged this interest. Gitanjali recalls, “She told me I was going to change the world someday.” Ms. Stockdale gifted Gitanjali her first college flag – from MIT.
• Intrigued, Gitanjali explored MIT’s website and learned about carbon nanotubes.
• At age 10, she heard on the news about the Flint, Michigan water crisis and felt compelled to take action – why wasn’t there a device to measure lead content in water?
• At 11, she invented a lead-detection device based on the carbon nanotubes that she had discovered on MIT’s website that Ms. Stockdale had inspired her to consider.

Gitanjali shared some insights on a recent episode of “Tell Me More” with Kelly Corrigan on pbs.org.

• Teach yourself how to stop stigmatizing failure. Gitanjali generated many terrible ideas (her words, not mine) before inventing her patentable solutions.
• Adopt a habit of empathy to help solve problems – it nudges us to think of the bigger picture.
• Make a difference by standing on the shoulders of giants who have come before us (mentors!) and leveraging their incredible research.
• Don’t apologize for being you. 

In Gitanjali’s words, “If no one else is going to take that first step, I need to take it.”

Amid a slew of helplessness and powerlessness in various corners of the world, Gitanjali reminds us that we always have the power to start solving problems.

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

At our booth, we attracted bedside nurses to nurse leaders with our “spin-it-to-win-it!” carnival game – everyone won a prize!

After they won, we offered them a gift – a mentoring ribbon to attach to their conference lanyard. We had three different ribbons, and to help them choose, we eagerly inquired, “Are you a Mentee, a Mentor, or a Mentoring Champion?”

Suddenly, the delight of winning a prize was replaced with bewilderment. The attendees stared, searching for an answer.

Eventually, they concluded, “I guess I’m a Mentor…” or “Sure, I’ll be a Mentoring Champion.”

But no one exclaimed, “I’m a Mentee!”

In fact, of the 900 ribbons we brought to the conference, we left with:

• 2 “Mentor” ribbons
• 2 “Mentoring Champion” ribbons
• 298 “Mentee” ribbons

Dropped into an unexpected social experiment, I paused to consider what happened:

• Are “Mentor” and “Champion” more impressive or more familiar?
• Were people confused by the word “Mentee”?
• Did “Mentee” feel somewhat remedial?
• Were people unclear about the value of declaring themselves a “Mentee”?
• Is “Mentee” laden with obligation and expectation?
• Perhaps they were missing context – aren’t “Mentees” found in mentoring programs not on the exhibit floor?

And just like that, I realized that my experiment was flawed. I assumed that everyone knew the why and what of being a Mentee!

Had we framed the interaction better, attendees would have been enthusiastically grabbing for the Mentee ribbons!

Using different questions, we could have educated people on the concept and decreased the apprehension, even amid a bustling conference exhibit hall!

• Do you show up to work committed to improving yourself?
• Are you growing your career competence and leadership confidence? 
• Do you connect with others to discover their insights and learn from their experiences? 

If we had taught attendees that a Mentee mindset is a learner mindset, a growth mindset, I’m confident we would have run out of “Mentee” ribbons!

Ironically, being a Mentee is about learning through our connections – precisely the benefit of attending a live conference!

In the future, with better questions and richer conversations, I know attendees will confidently effuse, “Yes! Yes! Yes! I’m a Mentee, a Mentor, and a Mentoring Champion!” Ultimately, aren’t we all?

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

Before taking the reins from founder Howard Schultz, Laxman spent six months immersed in Starbucks cafés worldwide. During this time, he became a trained barista, learning to make favorite drinks while architecting a vision for the company’s future.

“This immersion experience informed my leadership role,” says Laxman.

Why did the new CEO plunge into coffee making before poring over the company’s financials? To understand the culture from the lens of the employees (called “Partners”). Laxman set out to discover first what it means to be a Starbucks Partner by experiencing it.

Through this adventure, Laxman allowed himself to see the business through their eyes.

He witnessed what he calls our “crisis in loneliness” and discovered, with input from Partners, Starbucks’ unique opportunity to address it. Together, they contemporized the company’s mission: “With every cup, with every conversation, with every community – we nurture the limitless possibility of human connection.”

Laxman’s impactful stint as a barista was Reverse Mentoring – he was mentored by people who essentially work for him.

Reverse mentoring occurs when a less tenured or experienced person mentors a more tenured or experienced person. For example, a Vice President chooses a recent graduate new hire to mentor her as she improves her social media strategies.

However, the most significant barrier to Reverse Mentoring is ego – the more miles under our feet, the less we think we need to learn, especially from anyone junior in age or experience.

But we can mitigate ego by focusing on the potential of Reverse Mentoring.

Giving people the opportunity to lead their leaders works to:

• Boost confidence
• Showcase expertise
• Engage people
• Expose potential
• Identify talent, skills, and ambition
• Spark interest in leadership
• Resist the “ivory tower” syndrome and the “certainty” trap
• Shift perspectives
• Disrupt hierarchical barriers stifled by job titles and layers
• Access learning across the organization
• Improve competence and confidence
• Promote listening, empathy, and compassion

Relentlessly curious, Laxman reflected in a recent interview, “The more I learn, the more I realize how much I don’t know.” Lucky for Laxman, he’s got thousands of potential Mentors!

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

In 2000, the US Army started assigning every recruit in Basic Training a Battle Buddy to tackle high anxiety, stress, and fear.

Through this forced partnership, soldiers:

• establish peer mentoring and emotional support,
• observe and assess each other’s stressors through daily contact,
• validate their experiences,
• improve readiness and resilience,
• and look out for one another, in and out of combat.

When the COVID-19 pandemic hit, the University of Minnesota Medical Center (UMMC) faced a similar urgency to address its staff’s acute mental health needs. 

Due to the high anxiety, stress, and fear experienced by its healthcare workers, UMMC sought a solution that it could deploy rapidly with high scalability, low cost, and few resources.

Like the Army, UMMC turned to human connection and adapted the Battle Buddy system:

• They asked everyone to participate, with leaders explicitly endorsing the program.
• They empowered frontline units to quickly pair individuals based on similar professional perspectives, life experiences, and exposure to stressors.
• They instructed pairs to connect daily for ten minutes to check-in, listen, and discuss daily challenges and successes (but not air grievances, debate, or argue).
• The daily contact allowed peers to emotionally support each other, observe and assess stress, and identify specific issues that might need additional support, attention, or escalation.

To guide their daily check-in conversations, each Battle Buddy received a pocket-card with thoughtful, compassionate questions:

• What is hardest right now?
• What worried you today? 
• What went well today?
• How are things at home?
• What challenges are you facing with sleep/rest, exercise, and nutrition?

By intervening with an in-the-moment-of-crisis solution, UMMC demonstrated its commitment to cultivating a working environment where people felt supported, validated, and ultimately resilient.

In its 2020 paper entitled “Battle Buddies: Rapid Deployment of a Psychological Resilience Intervention for Healthcare Workers During the Coronavirus Disease 2019 Pandemic,” UMMC stated:

“Given the remarkable adaptability of human beings, we believe that, by promoting resilience, our diverse health care workforce can emerge from this monumental challenge with new skills, closer relationships, and greater confidence in the power of community.”

People face proverbial battlefields daily, not just in combat or during a pandemic. While human connection is essential, it often needs to be intentionally constructed.

Where could you deploy a Battle Buddy model on your team or in your organization?

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

All new pledges in the sorority chapter received a “big sister.” I remember when my big sister chose me, I felt like I belonged! Lisa became my confidante and champion as I transitioned from pledge to sorority sister that first year.

Likewise, every junior in the chapter was expected to serve as a big sister. Why? Because the sustainability of the chapter relied on new pledges becoming sorority sisters and paying monthly dues.

The big sister/big brother model is an evidence-based strategy to improve onboarding and retention.

For the past decade, a research organization, Phired Up, collected and analyzed data to determine why members leave fraternal organizations.

They identified 3 main reasons:

(1) Misaligned Expectations.
People quit because of unclear or false expectations about membership.

(2) Lack of Connection.
People quit if they don’t have a friend group.

(3) Discord.
People quit over miscommunications and drama.

In their report, Phired Up recommends sororities and fraternities take the following actions to create engagement:

• Semesterly Engagement Assessments
• Retention Committee
• Big Brothers & Big Sisters

In summary, to retain chapter members, deploy “Bigs” to mentor, engage, and help new pledges find success as college students.

Why should we care about this report on sororities and fraternities?

Onboarding new members to a team or new nurses to a hospital is no different.

Simply put:

• People crave connection, acceptance, and belonging. 
• They will leave if they don’t feel it.
• It costs money and disruption when they go. 

Here’s where it gets nuanced. Most organizations already have some sort of onboarding initiative or residency program. So, where do many go wrong?

They either lack mentoring or…

1. make it optional
2. put the onus on the new hire

As a sorority pledge, I would not have created a relationship with a big sister (a mentor) if someone had told me that it was optional or my job to establish.

Why?

I felt intimidated, insecure, and isolated as a newbie. Asking an established chapter member to mentor me would have felt overwhelming and vulnerable.

New hires often feel the same way.

So what to do?

• Make mentorship uncomplicated, unavoidable, and rewarding. 
• Expect all employees to mentor new hires.
• Put mentors in charge. (Alternative titles: champion, buddy, advocate, ally, supporter, navigator, or “Big.”) 

If everyone in your organization takes someone under their wing, your organization’s culture will inevitably shift.

Retention doesn’t happen – it’s engineered through engagement. And mentorship is the spark.

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

At the time, I was living in San Francisco in an indescribably small condo, working remotely in a corner of my kitchen.

I needed a third place. 

I discovered a Starbucks two blocks away that opened at 5:30 a.m. It became my third place for three months while I wrote my book each morning. It worked!

While I’ve always credited my willpower for my success and blamed it for my stumbles, that “third place” mattered.

According to the book Willpower Doesn’t Work by Benjamin Hardy, success has more to do with changing our environment than changing our willpower. He says:

“Your environment influences you whether you realize it or not.”

“Continuing to focus on mindset, willpower, and goal setting is an outdated and misplaced approach to success. It’s not that these strategies are inherently bad. Rather, it’s that the focus is entirely wrong.” 

“The future of self-help will not be focused on ‘the self,’ but rather it will be focused on the environment that shapes the self.”

While Hardy primarily speaks to how we design the physicality of our environment, I read the book in reference to the people we choose to spend time with – they either contribute to or contaminate our environment.

As I pored over his book, I reflected on our mentoring programs. I constantly implore participants to “Make time for mentoring!” But isn’t this merely a shrouded appeal to mindset and willpower?

Instead, I should ask them if they want to change their lives.

When you want to change your behaviors, your success, and your life, change the people in your environment:

• Get a mentor.
• Be a mentor.
• Ask a mentor to sponsor you for a role or opportunity.
• Recruit an accountability partner.
• Engage a peer to be a champion.
• Seek allies and idea advocates.
• Create a mastermind group.
• Join a program.
• Take a class.
• Attend a conference.
• Volunteer.
• Travel.

The people you surround yourself with are a gateway to your future… choose intentionally!

© 2023. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.