Possible Mentor Selection Criteria

POSSIBLE CRITERIA FOR MENTOR SELECTION
© 2008, by Barry Sweeny

The following are some of the criteria for mentor selection that mentoring programs have used. They are stated as if the organization or program were stating it.

Do not confuse the selection of mentors with the matching of mentors and proteges. Criteria for matching are not in this paper, but guidelines for matching are to be found elsewhere on this web site. Some selection criteria, like "career ladder level", would only apply if your district has such a structure.

Most programs will use more than one of these criteria. This can work well but caution should be observed to avoid conflicts between criteria, or to avoid making mentorship an exclusive "club" to which only the best can belong. Such an exclusive approach can create many problems in an egalitarian culture of the work place and can actually be counter to the collaborative culture that mentoring tries to establish.

1. Career Ladder rank must be at least level ... If such a structure exists in your district is already includes some criteria and can be used to simplify the mentor selection process.

2. Your most recent employee evaluation must be..(X, Y, or Z levels). This is a tricky area. If the evaluation process is viewed as equitable and fair, then including some minimum level to be achieved on a recent evaluation makes sense.

3. The Mentoring Program Committee has criteria and a selection process , such as seeking evidence of:

Past collaborative successes
Leadership of adults, prior experience
Peer support for a mentor's application
People-to-people interaction skills
The quality of the employee's work, usually based on observation of mentor candidates
Answers on a mentor application about some of the above.

4. Supervisor recommendation. This can be tricky. Be very clear about what a supervisor's recommendation means. Is it "I recommend this person as an excellent mentor.", or "I will support this person with released time." or, "I don't object to this, it's OK". Be careful that it does not mean, "I want this person to be a mentor because I want the mentor to learn a lot more about being a better worker" (Yes, it happens.)

5. Peer recommendations. This is a tricky area too. Peer recommendation should be made based on a judgment that the candidate generally has desired characteristics which the mentor program has defined. If this is done well. you ask the very people who know who the best workers are and, non-participants will eventually look at who the mentors are and say "She is a good employee and should be a mentor."

6. Years of recent experience in their job. Often a minimum of five years experience is required of mentors. I would not recommend using a greater number of required years of experience than 5 as this can exclude some of your most enthusiastic and currently trained employees.

7. Self nomination. This is actually one of the best methods if carefully structured as follows:

Define a major mentor responsibility to be a model of continual learning and growth, which requires tolerance for ambiguity and a willingness to seek and accept feed back from others about their work practices.
Hold a 1-2 hour informational meeting for any interested in becoming mentoring candidates. Require all mentor candidates to attend one. Explain how the program will work, how the roles and tasks of the mentor are defined, and what mentors are expected to do. Acknowledge that not everyone will choose to serve in this role for a variety of reasons and that matches with appropriate proteges may sometimes be difficult to attain.
State "If you will be uncomfortable when a protege asks you to explain your work decisions, or to justify a specific practice, then you should probably not become a mentor because that's what it is like in mentoring."

If a person applies who you are wondering about, it still might make sense to allow them to attend the mentor training, because they may learn a lot, and, given more information about mentoring. may decide not to become a mentor after all. Even if the questionable person goes through with the training and still seeks a mentoring assignment, it is possible to deal with it by saying "the ideal match for a person with your unique strengths has not been found."

NOTE: ELABORATE PLANS FOR SELECTION OF MENTORS ARE OFTEN SOON DISCARDED DUE TO THE TIME-INTENSIVE TASK OF CHECKING CRITERIA, MAKING DIFFICULT JUDGMENTS, AND OBSERVING THEM AT WORK, PARTICULARLY IN THE SUMMER WHEN STAFF ARE NOT ALL AVAILABLE FOR THESE ACTIVITIES.