Recent reports have highlighted the benefits IT professionals can gain from having a technical mentor, to help them keep up-to-date with their skills.
Respondents to an IT Manager channel poll about the pros and cons of being mentored, commented on the benefits of having someone to talk to about alternative strategies and help them with troubleshooting. "It is fantastic to bounce ideas off another senior member of staff," wrote one ICT manager, who did not wish to be named.
Generally mentors are someone, heavily experienced, who is not working in the industry full-time themselves, according to Grant Montgomery, managing director at headhunter E.L Consult.
"People can get into businesses, particularly in the IT sector, who are very strong, capable and specialised [in a] technical area and find themselves out of their experience depth in the business environment and this is where mentoring becomes most effective," said Montgomery. "A mentor who has very strong business skills can supplement the technical skills of the IT professional".
Montgomery said that professionals chosen for a position because of their technical skills can sometimes find that they do not have the requisite complex business-related skills.
While often senior executives would find a mentor outside their own organisation, Montgomery said that some also chose a person that they worked with. But the mentoring experience tended to be different when the executive worked with the person who was mentoring them, he added.
3%
2%
