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Carol Dweck, author of Mindset, would love this mentoring! In her 2007 book, she introduced the world to fixed and growth mindsets. “Talk yourself up” comes from a growth mindset.

With a fixed mindset, our efforts, actions, and results define us. So then, each success or setback feels like a validation or an indictment of who we are. And this causes us to constantly defend, justify, excuse, or blame to preserve who we are.

Conversely, with a growth mindset, our efforts, actions, and results do not define but inform us. Thereby, each success or setback is merely information that we can use to improve and grow.

When we operate from a fixed mindset, we battle fears and imposter syndrome (“Who do you think you are to perform on stage in front of millions?”). We become so consumed with protecting an image that we recoil from taking chances or appropriate risks. We talk ourselves down to prevent failure. 

But when we operate with a growth mindset, we work to improve, look for areas to develop, seek mentoring, take on new actions like an experiment, and approach our perspectives like an exploration. We talk ourselves up for the adventure that awaits!

Frustratingly, our fixed mindset is triggered when we are confronted by challenges, face criticism, and compare ourselves to others (say goodbye, social media!).

Our daily test then is to catch our fixed mindset in the moment (“Watch out! You’re going to fail!”) and shift to a growth mindset by talking ourselves up! (“This is an experience, and I’m going to learn something amazing!”) 

My niece talks herself up each time she steps onto the swim block for a race at the pool. When I first watched her swim, I thought I was cheering for her to beat the swimmer in the next lane. But in each race, she is focused on shaving seconds off her personal record. A growth mindset! (Her mindset when doing her English homework is another story…)

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

His statement sparked a thunderstorm! NFL mentors rushed out of every corner to declare their commitment to mentoring others:

• Marcus Mariota, quarterback of the Atlanta Falcons, said, “I have no ego. If the team drafts someone else, I’ll give as much advice and knowledge as I can.“
• Eagle center Jason Kelce said, “The way you make a lasting impact as a player and as a person is how you influence other people and hopefully help others realize their dreams. That’s a big part of being a veteran player. I’d like to be part of something that lasts longer. I don’t want to just leave behind statistics and cool highlight blocks.”
• Retired quarterback Kurt Warner, “I will never understand the ‘I’m not here to mentor the next guy’ mentality… so for all you young QBs that need a mentor, DM me, and I’ll be that guy, happy to help in any way I can!”

While we all need people on our team like Mariota, Kelce, and Warner, we also need to identify people like Tannehill – not to castigate their approach but to welcome their honesty. 

Not everyone likes to mentor. Not everyone considers it essential to share their wisdom, especially with their future replacements. And not everyone is on a mission to support other people’s success. And that’s OK.

But if we guilt or shame these people into mentoring, we will invariably end up with a gaggle of mentors who don’t want to mentor. And that ruins the journey for both parties – the displeased mentors and the unfortunate mentees.

Instead, let’s create mentoring structures that attract, encourage, support, and acknowledge those who value mentoring others without punishing those who don’t.

Mentoring is a gratifying, leadership strengthening experience… but only for those who believe it is. Find them. Foster their potential to make a difference, and your rookies will be well cared for.

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

In a more recent episode, Dr. Rick takes a group of adults to the movies, and as they walk toward the theater, one woman points out the restrooms and says, “Bathrooms! Even if you don’t have to go, you should try.” Dr. Rick scolds, “We all know where the bathroom is and how to use it, okay?”

I need to channel Dr. Rick when my mentoring program leaders attempt to manage and protect their mentors.

One program team I worked with was so afraid of burdening their program’s mentors that they refused to send any emails to the mentors. As a result, the mentors were confused and frustrated – predictably, they complained about the utter lack of communication from the program.

Other program leaders insist that mentees be responsible for creating and driving the relationship. But it’s a relationship. And relationships take two to develop and grow. So why absolve the mentors of responsibility?

And then my personal favorite… the fear that mentees will reach out to mentors too much or too often. I wish programs had this problem! Instead, most suffer from over-intimidated or overwhelmed mentees.

Mentors don’t need safeguards!

1. Mentors are not fragile – mentoring is not their burden; it’s their privilege
2. Mentors are not offended by communication from the program or their mentees – they know how to manage their emails, voicemails, and schedules
3. Mentors do not want to be detached and nonchalant – they signed up to engage in a relationship, so encourage them to forge ahead!

I’ve never had a mentor complain about an over-eager mentee or over-communication from the program!

Mentors don’t need protection. Instead, they need to discover and grow their mentoring skills! Program leaders just need to get out of the way…

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

This month, Phillip returned to American Idol to debut his new single, “Love Like That.”

When he finished singing, the audience was on their feet, roaring for their fan favorite.

As the applause subsided, Phillip exhaled, smiled, and remarked to the judges, “It’s still terrifying.”

Similarly, when Willie Geist interviewed actress Sienna Miller recently on Sunday Sitdown, he asked her, “Stage or film? Which one gratifies you more?” Without hesitation, she responded, “Stage. Because it’s terrifying and indelible. And when I achieve that unimaginable thing I didn’t think I’d survive? I say, Yes! I did that!”

Why are Phillip and Sienna seeking out “terrifying” situations while others gravitate to zones of comfort? 

And are we robbing ourselves of the journey and the challenge when we seek safety, predictability, and ease?

While “terrifying” means dreadful and fearsome, it also means hair-raising, formidable, thrilling, and white-knuckling, like riding a roller coaster.

These moments push us to grow, remind us that we are alive, and encourage us to lean into life.

But we don’t need to audition for American Idol or jump out of airplanes to find those white-knuckle moments that help us grow.

Opportunities abound!

• Volunteer to lead a new project
• Pitch an irreverent idea
• Be the lone dissenter or supporter
• Ask a question in a room of silence
• Confront a bully
• Advocate for ourselves
• Offer tough-to-hear feedback
• Embrace difficult conversations
• Change roles
• Make friends out of strangers
• Connect with senior leaders
• Engage cranky clients and petulant peers
• Deliver a presentation
• Be a mentor
• Call a mentor

White knuckles don’t typically result from answering routine emails and attending conference calls. They occur when we muster the courage to do that which we think we can not do.

Actress Viola Davis reflected recently in an interview, “I don’t want to go to my grave and have my final thought be, I was not brave.” 

Isn’t it time for more butterflies-in-the-stomach experiences at work and in life?!

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

And when people ask me, “How do I find a mentor?” I offer similar advice…

“Don’t look for a mentor. Look around for mentoring.”

Last year in one of our leadership mentoring programs at a small hospital, a nurse manager mentee confessed to me glumly, “Ann, I’ve never met with my mentor.”

Concerned, I approached his mentor, a nurse executive at the hospital, to better understand the situation and hear her side.

I was surprised (and delighted!) to hear the mentor say, “Ann, I love this mentoring program! Once a week, I walk around the hospital with my mentee as he sees patients and engages with his nurses. I get to observe one of our leaders in action!”

When I asked the mentee about this, he staggered, “That’s our mentoring session? I envisioned sitting in her office immersed in conversation about leadership.”

I challenged, “John! Be agile and adaptable! While you wait for Obi-Wan Kenobi to show up, your mentor is walking with you! Stop missing these mentoring moments and start asking better questions.”

To prepare him for his walk-and-mentor sessions, we generated the following questions to spark the mentoring conversations he craved:

• What are you noticing that I’m doing well?
• What could I be doing differently?
• What is your perspective of this situation?
• What am I missing? What are my blindspots?
• Do you have any advice or recommendations for me?
• Who else should I get to know?
• What resources should I leverage?
• What should I be reading?
• What actions should I take next?

Once we closed his expectation gap, the mentee successfully kindled his mentor’s wisdom during their weekly walk-and-mentor sessions.

Don’t look for a mentor. Look around for mentoring conversations by asking different questions.

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

Coined by author Wallace Wattles, the Impression of Increase describes the concept of feeling better off after an experience.

“All human activities are based on the desire for increase; people are seeking more food, more clothes, better shelter, more luxury, more beauty, more knowledge, more pleasure, more life.”

~ Wallace Wattles, The Science of Getting Rich

Everything in nature is either growing or dying. So, naturally, we are attracted to that which will help us grow.

We constantly decide how to spend our time, energy, and money. And the Impression of Increase drives those decisions.

• Will this meeting, webinar, project, event, product, or service leave me better off than before?
• Will it increase my knowledge, pleasure, or life?
• Will it help me grow or improve?

If we don’t get an impression that the activity or person will help us advance, then we typically say, “No. I’m too busy,” or “I have decided to go in a different direction,” or, if we are Phoebe-honest, “I don’t want to.”

But we always make time for people or activities that can help us progress. As a boss and a business owner, I start every day thinking, “Who can help me solve my problems today?” I prioritize those people and those conversations.

Impression of increase also shapes participation in mentoring:

• Will being a mentee advance my career potential?
• Will being a mentor contribute to my leadership skills?
• Can mentoring expand my network and connections?
• Can I earn recognition or credit for certification?
• Will it strengthen my reputation?
• Will it help me feel more joy and meaning at work?

The challenge is that people answer these questions rapidly based on a program title, an email subject line, or a flyer.

So, when it’s essential to convey an Impression of Increase, we must be deliberate with our communications.

Forget about what’s in it for you, and don’t worry about what’s in it for them. Instead, rouse people with your undeniable commitment to helping them grow, advance, and increase.

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

During these lunches, they connected personally and discussed career paths at JCPenney. This senior leader wasn’t stressed, over-scheduled, or frenzied with any work, as Ben remembers it. His only role in the department at that swan song point in his career was to mentor new hires.

Mentoring doesn’t look like this anymore because our work doesn’t look like this anymore.

To reap the benefits of mentoring in today’s rapidly changing, everything-is-urgent work environments, we need a bend & flex approach. One in which we bend and flex our expectations and contributions to meet our mentoring partners where they are.

Examples of Bend & Flex Mentoring:

• A night shift mentee connects via Zoom on her phone with a day shift mentor as she ends her shift and he begins his.
• An executive at a medical center leaves her office each week to “walk and mentor” her mentee, a nurse manager, while he visits patients.
• When a new hire mentee didn’t reach out or respond to her emails, a mentor called and sent text messages to initiate contact. Because of this perseverance, the mentee immediately trusted her new mentor.
• When Hurricane Ida hit New Orleans in 2021, the mentors in a leadership mentoring program ensured their mentees shadowed them during the hospital’s hurricane briefing sessions.
• A mentor on the West coast talks with his mentee in the UK via WhatsApp when the mentor is heading to the office and the mentee is driving home from the office.
• Two directors paired in a year-long leadership mentoring program booked weekly 10-minute touch-base calls to ensure they sustained their momentum throughout the program.

How to bend & flex in mentoring:

• Utilize calls, texts, emails, and LinkedIn messages
• Leverage Zoom, Teams, Webex, FaceTime, or WhatsApp
• Schedule quick 15-minute calls
• Send questions/topics in advance
• Engage in bite-sized conversations (tackle one question or one issue only)
• Anchor meetings to other activities (ex: attending a company event)
• Share calendars or a calendar link
• Enroll assistants to find available timeslots
• Jump on a Waiting List (meetings are regularly canceled or rescheduled; ask to jump into an available slot when one opens)
• Take advantage of transition points, downtimes, and routines (ex: driving, airport waiting, dog walking)

When you are committed to growing, developing, and improving, saying “I’m too busy” is simply a breakdown in resourcefulness and a failure in gumption.

Bend & flex to create a mentoring adventure together.

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.

Recently the editors highlighted a family that cycled together with a friend through Montana.

Before they departed, the friend asked the father if he thought the kids could accomplish the daunting journey up steep hills and across the Continental Divide. Without hesitation, the father replied, “We don’t need a team that can. We just need a team that thinks it can.”

Hire for passion, not for skill.

In my brazen 20s, as I was graduating from law school and searching for a job, I found the Employment Weekly newspaper in my neighborhood grocery store (because the Internet was not yet available). Every job listing stated, “minimum  5-7 years experience required.” Undeterred, I applied anyway, promoting my enthusiasm, perseverance, adaptability, and willingness to learn.

Unquestionably, the jobs were out of my skill range but not my passion range. And I’m grateful that my audacity overshadowed my sensibilities. I was young and sheltered by seven years of higher education, not yet hardened by reality.

And while I received more rejections than I thought my esteem could ever handle, I received one phone call from an in-house recruiter. He had looked past my limited skill set and noticed my determination and eagerness. He said, “You’re not ready for the job you responded to, but we are parched for passion. So, I’d like to introduce you to the team for a different opportunity.”

My career launched!

Today, as a hiring leader myself, I always win when I find someone who thinks they can, regardless of whether they can. I can teach the skills of the job. I can’t teach fire-in-the-belly.

And as someone who strives to be hired every day by current and future clients, I shine when I project my “think-i-can” passion rather than my “evaluating-if-i-can” hesitation.

“Whether you think you can or you think you can’t – you’re right.” ~ Henry Ford.

© 2022. Ann Tardy and MentorLead. www.mentorlead.com. All Rights Reserved.