How To Build Long Term Value: Successful Mentorships
A conversation with Vijay Ratthinam, CEO of PMI San Francisco Bay Area Chapter, about his views on mentoring and future trends.
You can find an extended audio version of the interview in the following link, available for free thanks to Soundcloud:
Project Management Institute (PMI) has more than 3,500 members in the Bay Area, and mentoring is one the passions of its CEO, Vijay Ratthinam, who has been leading the operations and hundreds of events during the latest years. Vijay’s objective is to give back to the community, from his current senior position as a Program Manager at Salesforce, remembering that we all have encountered hardships and struggled during the initial stages of our professional career. Many people resort to coaching as a guide for professional development, but mentoring can be a more powerful and long-term solution.
A fruitful and lasting relationship with your mentor can be of much value for many aspects of your life. Even at a personal level, a mentor can turn to be a coach in certain elements, but also an advisor, a source for motivation. Above all, your mentor is interested in your success as much as you are. Mentoring is flexible; you can be mentored by a pear, a group, on even online. You should not limit to have only one mentor, but you may have different mentors according to diverse interests, objectives, and environments. The ultimate goal is helping people to navigate their careers, and your mentor can find the best way up when you feel stuck.
From Vijay and PMI’s perspective, one of the critical elements of a successful mentorship is measuring this relationship. We should set up objectives and results to achieve, as it’s no good if your mentor does not have a clue about what do you want, about the concrete targets you…
