Starting Strong: A Mentoring Fable

Written by Lory A. Fischler and Lois J. Zachary

Narrated by Nan McNamara

Story is a very powerful way to exemplify concepts and show the dynamics and issues involved in relationships. In this mentoring fable, Zachary and Fischler tell the story of Cynthia, a seasoned marketing executive, and her new mentee Rafa, a young and ambitious financial analyst. Through these characters, Zachary and Fischler explore the nuances of an incipient mentoring relationship and its possibilities, problems, and pitfalls to bring their suggestions for best practices to life. The first 90 days of a mentoring relationship are relatively fragile; as both mentor and mentee proceed uncertainly, they may not know how to create the ingredients that are crucial to its success: building trust, finding their comfort zones (and having the courage to leave them), setting up productive regular meetings and conversations, dealing with power dynamics, setting goals, and keeping momentum going. While the fable offers tools and skills that can be applied to any mentoring relationship, Zachary and Fischler also provide a conversation playbook for new mentoring relationships, with guidance for establishing a mentoring relationship and keeping it strong.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Ascent Audio
• Release date: Nov 12, 2021
• ISBN: 9781663705532

Reviews for Starting Strong

[scottjpearson · Rating: 4 out of 5 stars]

A key way to develop careers is forming a mentoring relationship. To facilitate this, a mentor has to gain specific skills, and a mentee, likewise, has to possess certain skills. Although this relationship can make a healthy career, not a lot of conversation about this topic exists, even in education circles. In this work, Zachary and Fischler try to examine traits that make mentoring relationships work. They do so through a fable (or allegory) that engages the heart and mind.Traditional mentoring theory tends to emphasize top-down instruction and sage advice from an all-knowing mentor. In contrast, recent trends emphasize that the mentee, too, has beneficial skills and experiences and thus has something to contribute. The shift moves to forming a healthy dynamic undergirded by trust and mutual development. The mentoring relationship can facilitate the mentee’s self-driven growth. Zachary and Fischler teach that effective mentors provide probing questions to the mentee.Instead of teaching this approach through an outline – a format that seems contradictory to their own advice – the authors engage us with a story about Cynthia, a senior leader at an organization, and Rafa, a new employee. Rafa had a prior career as a baseball player before becoming injured. Together, they bond and learn together how Rafa can fulfill his career goals. They overcome hurdles and build depth that enables Rafa to avoid professional pitfalls.The story provides an interesting backdrop to explore the art of mentoring. The story is somewhat generic and is clearly meant to teach rather than entertain. By focusing on a business relationship, the authors try to make this relationship generalizable to other fields. Although most relevant to the world of business, it succeeds in being able to reflect mentoring relationships in general. Thus, it could apply to the world of education, too. Being a helpful mentor or a ready mentee requires skills in itself in order to access more skills. This book can help us focus on better understanding this mentoring dynamic to advance our professional lives.