Reflections on reflection

If you happened upon my previous post about my personal thoughts on levels of competence, as discussed by Sheila Webber in her blog post on cpd23, then you will see where I am coming from with this post!!

Although I realise I lack confidence in my ability to do just about anything, this is really the only self-awareness that I have gained over the years! Rather pathetic really, because, if I was more self-aware then I’d be able to work on those areas where I’m not so good and become a better person.

Over the years, however, there have been illuminating moments where I have realised a bit more about myself. The first of these was when I did the Belbin team-working questionnaire and realised that I really had no preferred role and so was really a bit of a Jack-of-all-trades (I thought I'd blogged about this but can't seem to find it now, so perhaps I didn't!).

More recently, I have done another short questionnaire that has helped me to become a little bit more self-aware. Now, please don’t ask me why, given my lack of confidence, but I decided I’d like to investigate what it meant to be a mentor within the profession, and to that end I enrolled on the CILIP PTEG mentoring course. This was a day-long event that concentrated on the skills needed in order to mentor a CILIP chartership, or ACLIP candidate, and along the way we did a short questionnaire on learning styles.

I’ve done learning styles questionnaires before, but those were to do with whether you were an aural or a visual or a kinesthetic learner; the one we did on the mentoring course was along the lines of the Honey and Mumford one. Now, this was illuminating! Although, if I think about it hard enough, it shouldn’t have been illuminating, I should already have known what my preferred style was!

Anyway, in short, it turned out I was 4 parts reflective, 3 parts theorist, and 0 parts activist or pragmatist. I’m sure I’m not breaking any confidences if I say that the room was full of about half and half – that is half reflective/theorists and half activists/pragmatists, with one or two folk having a sole predominant style – and, knowing this, it was interesting to be more aware of how we all interacted.

As I said above, this was one of those light bulb moments for me! It helped to explain how and why I find it difficult to work with people who make snap decisions; I can feel wrong-footed, steam-rollered over, lacking in intelligence and unworthy. However, I now recognise that really I ought to work towards being less reflective/theoretical as sometimes it’s important to make decisions and take action rather more quickly than I do.

That led me onto thinking about change, and my attitude towards it. I’ve always said I don’t much like change, but actually, it’s probably more to do with being given enough time to think about the specific change and the implications/ramifications/consequences/impact the change might have on me, on my work, on my workplace, on my colleagues and on the users! If I feel I haven’t had enough time to reflect on it then I can feel threatened by it and overwhelmed. Trouble is, there isn’t always time to think too long and hard; some changes have to be made quickly, either in response to something or to pre-empt things. 

As with most things, I guess it’s all about balance, self-awareness, and not letting styles get in the way of working, and not letting styles become levels of unconscious competence that drift into levels of unconscious incompetence – meaning yes, it’s good to think and reflect, and yes, I’m quite good at it, but if I think too long I’ll miss the action and miss the chance to get things done!

Of course, I can always find something that vindicates the way I am! Clutterbuck (2004) said:

“people … have less and less time to stop and think deeply … Deep, reflective thinking is as essential to the effectiveness of our conscious brain as REM sleep is to our unconscious. In both cases we become dysfunctional if our minds do not carry out the essential task of analysing, structuring, organising and storing.”

Julian Baggini, in an interview on Radio 4’s Start the Week, is also an advocator of procrastination as a way to achieve things. Contrast this to Malcolm Gladwell and his Blink theories, and maybe somewhere in between is the perfect solution!

References:

Clutterbuck, David. (2004). Everyone needs a mentor: fostering talent in your organisation. 4th ed. London: Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development.

Mentoring

Mentoring post-cpd23

I've been thinking a lot about mentoring since I took part in cpd23, and various things that I've read have given me yet more food for thought.

I recently read an interesting comment about the outlook of people who are knowledgeable and experienced which seemed to imply that knowledge is the opposite of creativity, and experience is built on solutions to problems that are now old, and therefore neither were good qualities to have. However, in the context of mentoring, I think it is just this knowledge and experience that a mentor shares with a mentee that helps to develop the mentee, to help them work on solutions to problems and gain experience.

So, in order to be a mentor, surely you need to have some knowledge that is worth imparting? I don’t think I have (stemming from a complete lack of confidence, confidence that has been eroded over the years by various circumstances and various people), but having been put into the position of acting as a mentor I am now having to take a closer look at myself because I am trying to help someone else. This is hard for me. I’m sure most people would take this in their stride, and even if they were feeling a little unsure would hide this and plough on, but that’s not me; I need people to know where I’m coming from, but I do recognise that this isn’t always a good thing.

I’ve been reading around the topic just lately; I haven’t read enough yet to be able to mentor properly because almost everything I have read has said something profound which I’ve needed to take time to think about. Initially, I was struck by this comment:

“A good mentor can make a great difference in someone’s life. A good mentor helps, guides, shares knowledge, and enjoys doing it. Mentoring, when done right, benefits both the mentor and the mentee.” http://www.ehow.com/how_4670053_be-perfect-mentor.html

No pressure there then! But, I am certainly beginning to realise that there are benefits to me, as the mentor, even though my poor mentee is probably not getting as much out of the relationship as they’d hoped, as I am also on a learning curve.

As with offering training to people, mentoring is one of those activities that helps you to remember or realise just how much you do actually know, and that just because you know something doesn’t mean that other people do. So, I guess, in a way it’s a confidence builder; the more I mentor the more I realise I know things, the more confident I will become.

However, I’ve also read that I should be careful that I don’t make this relationship into an ego-building exercise for me, rather than a confidence-building process for the mentee! In my case, I think my sense of self-worth is so low, any ego-building will only ever bring me up to the same level as any “normal” person, who’s done normal things in their working life!

So, moving on swiftly, I have also discovered that in order to be a good mentor, the mentee needs to have shared their goals with you; they need to know where they are going and where they want to be, so you, as the mentor can share relevant experience with them. As with most, if not all areas of life, if you don’t know what your goal is then you will never know when you’ve reached it and therefore risk remaining unfulfilled.

I was also struck by this comment:

“people become stagnant out of fear. Fear of failure, fear of success and fear of something different.” (http://www.ehow.com/how_4513054_be-good-mentor.html )

So, I need to be a supportive mentor (tautology!) and I should be encouraging my mentee, helping them to get over any self-doubt they may be experiencing. I was also struck by the idea that a mentor can help to motivate the mentee by building on their strengths and improve upon their weaknesses; so I need to make sure the mentee does a SWOT analysis so that we both know what they’re working with!

And then there’s the idea that the mentor/mentee relationship is not just about two people getting together and chatting; it’s about chatting with a purpose, usually focussed on the mentor helping the mentee with their development. It’s also important to remember that actually, the responsibility to develop lies with the mentee; provided the communication between the mentor/mentee is open, honest and transparent this will foster a large degree of mutual respect which will help the mentee fulfil that responsibility.

As a mentor it is also important that the mentee is my focus. If I share experiences, or the way I handled particular situations this can help the mentee to value my opinion and feel connected to me, and this is fine as long as I stick to experience that is relevant to the goals of the mentee.

Most of what I've written here is distilled from rather a lot of sources I've read. I don't think there is any one right answer to how to go about mentoring, so the points I've highlighted above are the ones that resonated with me, and seemed to make the most sense. I'm sure there are plenty of other good ideas around, but these are the ones that I shall be thinking of when I actually mentor.

What next? well, I am considering attending the CILIP mentoring course. Will let you know in a future blog post!

Thing 11 - mentoring

Thing 11 - mentoring

This is a really difficult one for me to write about. Have I ever had a mentor? What exactly is the difference between a mentor and a role-model? Is a mentor a necessity? A professional mentor? An informal mentor? A life mentor?

One of the definitions of a mentor that I like is: "a wise and trusted counselor or teacher", and now, having also looked up the meaning of role model "a person whose behavior, example, or success is or can be emulated by others, especially by younger people", I can see that I had an informal mentor, but a number of professional role models.

It appears that my informal mentor was also my life coach: "a person who advises clients on how to solve their problems and reach their goals in life", although I was a personal friend, not a client! This was the person who advised me to read "I'm ok, you're ok" and "Games people play" amongst other books, talked to me about any problems I was having, whether they were work or personal, offered advice when needed and was generally always at the end of the 'phone, for the good times and the bad! Sadly, this friend died young in 1998; like the writer of thing 11, I often find myself thinking "what would this person have done or advised me to do" when I have issues and decisions to make.

Role models in the world of librarianship really came from the early days of my career. I mentioned the Site Librarian at Gwent College of Higher Education in my earlier post on thing 10; she was such a wonderful lady, and a good librarian too. Another role model was the District Librarian at Kettering district public libraries. Again, a lovely person and a great librarian. When you are setting out on a career, these early role models can be quite influential, and I hope I have somehow absorbed at least some of the qualities that made them worthy as role models.

As for being a mentor myself; I have never knowingly been one, and can't imagine that I have much to offer someone who is just starting out on a career in librarianship. At my stage of life I am probably a bit too jaded, a bit too set in my ways, and maybe a bit too cynical to be of much use to anyone!

Hmm, this has been a sad blog to write, so I am moving swiftly on to thing 12!