I see that our AMA has initiated a Marketing Mentee program. This is wonderful. I encourage you to volunteer to offer guidance and support to a doe-eyed young person recently embarked on their career.
I encourage you to provide this service to said young person because, and I say this with all due self-respect, I suck at it. Believe me. I have engaged multiple young persons of various eye configurations and have failed spectacularly. I have face-planted on the ski slope of mentoring. If failing at being a mentor were, say, acting skill, I would be Meryl Streep. You get the picture.
My first mentee experienced a personal epiphany after our second meeting: that she was more mature than her mentor. By the third meeting, she realized that my main qualification for mentoring was that I celebrated a birthday around the time her mom was born. And it occurred to her on the fourth meeting that there would be no point in a fifth.
Determined to share my wisdom with Charleston’s young personhood, I volunteered again, this time armed with research on best practices and insightful tips. “Quit now” would have been the best “best practice.” This particular mentee determined, after much honest self-evaluation, that as long as I wasn’t quitting my job anytime soon, there wasn’t any point in leaving hers.
So. There is a serious mentor deficit in the Lowcountry, due in large part to a rider on the TARP bailout prohibiting me from ever mentoring again. Which means it falls to you, dear AMA colleague, to pitch in and fill the void for the good of young personage throughout the Charleston area.
Oh, one more thing. Being a mentor might just be your most fulfilling endeavor in years, not withstanding procreation. Guiding an enthusiastic young marketer as they navigate the open waters of their career can be a deeply rewarding experience. You’ll make a friend, find yourself needed, and maybe even learn something about yourself.
You might not make the Mentoring Hall of Fame, but I promise, you’ll be better than I was.
barry waldman
Flickr Photos
