Are you struggling to make a career change
into user experience
or frustrated that your company
doesn't understand your role?
Or have you been a UX professional for years
but starting to feel dissatisfied about your career path?
When we focus on getting that new UX job
or moving up the corporate ladder,
we can lose perspective,
get stuck in our unhelpful habits, and start wilting.
If this sounds like your situation,
you should check out mentoring.
Mentoring is a one-on-one relationship involving two people,
a mentee who is less experienced
and a more experienced mentor.
The goal is to support the mentee's personal
and professional development,
but both partners can grow from the relationship.
In academic research, mentoring is commonly defined
by three functions.
The first is vocational support
where the mentor shares advice, ideas,
or information to improve the mentee's job performance
or they enhance the mentee's reputation
within an organization with endorsements
or high profile assignments.
Mentors within your company excel at this
since they have experience with the same products,
tools and techniques your company uses
or they can recommend you'd be perfect to lead design
for the company's newest app to their colleagues.
The second is psychological support
where the mentor actively listens to the mentee
and fosters trust, mutual respect and friendship.
This emotional support can benefit any mentee
working as an isolated UX team of one.
And last is role modeling
where the mentor influences the mentee's future behavior
through their actions
because the mentor represents someone the mentee admires
and hopes to emulate.
These people aren't just excellent at design or research
but excel at persuasive communication
and relationship building.
Various studies have found
that mentees experience more job satisfaction,
a renewed commitment to their organization,
higher salaries, and greater self-confidence.
Mentors also benefit from more job satisfaction,
a renewed sense of purpose and less burnout,
improved career growth,
and even better mental and physical health.
It's inspiring to have a mentor who can truly empathize
with the struggle of gaining acceptance and support for UX.
And it's just as inspiring to have a mentee
with fresh enthusiasm and optimism
that may have been forgotten over a long career.
So how does mentoring work?
Mentoring programs will have their own rules
but here are the basics.
First, the mentee identifies a promising mentor.
Look for mentors who are two or three levels higher
in seniority for your UX role,
who understand your company or industry
and who have some experience mentoring others.
Then the mentee formally asks the mentor
for a mentorship relationship.
If the mentor accepts,
the mentee and mentor can set clear expectations
for how frequently they can ask for advice
and how often they'll meet in person or online.
A practical guideline is to meet one hour a month
for at least several months
but really effective mentoring takes time,
about two to three years.
So meeting once every three months
would be appropriate in those cases.
Finally, both partners meet virtually or in person
for as long as they experience mutual benefit
and either can politely end the mentoring relationship
at any time.
If you wanna get started with mentoring,
check out UX mentoring programs
such as ADPlist, Designed, Hexagon,
your local UXPA chapter, and perhaps even NN/g?
Or just get to know talented people in your company
and ask if they'd be interested in a mentoring relationship.
Your mentor should not be your boss,
but maybe they'd be willing
to ask their connections for help.
All mentoring relationships eventually come to an end,
even positive ones.
Relationships naturally change over time
and maybe the mentee learned what they needed to learn.
But from that ending, a lifelong friendship can blossom
and with it, an appreciation for mentorship
that you can pass on to another aspiring UX professional.
So give mentoring a try.
You might enjoy some fresh perspective
and start growing again.