So you need a business mentor, Or do you need a coach? If you’re not sure which one, don’t worry — you’re not alone. Many people have a difficult time understanding the differences between the two roles. But while there may be some similarities, mentoring and coaching are quite different.
So how can you tell the difference between the two, and how do you decide which service will give you the assistance you need? To begin with, you need to understand that business mentoring and coaching are two entirely different concepts with different end goals and focus points. You can refer to our blog post, “Newsflash: Even The Savviest Entrepreneurs Need Business Mentors,” for an explanation of what business mentoring is, and hopefully, after reading this post, you’ll have a better idea of what it means concerning coaching. Once you have a strong understanding of both, you’ll be much more apparent on two crucial points:
- Why your business needs mentoring and not coaching.
- How to distinguish a qualified business mentor from a coach.
Before distinguishing between business mentoring and coaching, we should first understand the difference between an ordinary mentor and a business mentor. A regular mentor operates in more of a general environment, sometimes taking on all kinds of mentees, regardless of their specific career goals. On the other hand, a business mentor is an expert in a particular field; ideally, the same area their mentees want to excel in. Business mentoring focuses on enhancing specific skills and attaining a higher level of performance. Know the difference between an ordinary mentor and a business mentor; where does coaching come into the picture? Coaching is a mostly short-term initiative that often focuses on executives and upper management. Rather than targeting individual employees, coaching targets specific areas for improvement in an organization or team. It is more about identifying problems and changing behavior than fostering the growth of aspiring employees. Below are some apparent differences between the two concepts of business mentor and coach:
Skills
You can identify a business mentor by his/her skills. A business mentor is a qualified and trained professional who will help you develop or improve upon specific skills, talent, and knowledge. On the other hand, a coach might be a senior team member or manager within your organization who will guide you based on lessons learned from personal experiences.
Scope
Business mentoring has a much broader scope than coaching. It is a long-term commitment and mentee-specific. It requires the business mentor to invest a considerable amount of time in a mentee’s progress and overall career development. Coaching is more of a short-term initiative, tending to be task-oriented rather than broad scope, and is primarily concerned with selected issues for improvement.
Culture
Business mentoring has been a valuable teaching technique for ages. The Mentor Hall of Fame highlights mentors all the way back to the time of Socrates in the fifth century B.C.E. Incorporating the traditional values of mentoring -like knowledge-transfer, guidance, career, and personal development, and skills-development -into your organization’s culture will make it more robust as a whole for years to come. On the other hand, coaching focuses on the specific problem at hand, devising a desired solution, and taking immediate action to correct the problem. Coaching is a less formal approach to development and is more concerned with changing behavior than changing company culture.
Process
Business mentoring demands time, patience, and emotional interaction between mentors and mentees. Thus, the business mentoring relationship is a systematic process. There is a set of rules and challenges designed to measure the mentee’s progress at various stages of the process. Coaching may not be quite so methodical as it focuses more on assigning tasks and setting targets for changing behavior. If you are looking to increase employee engagement, enhance your employees’ skills, and improve the quality of work, you need the well-structured and industry-specific process that business mentoring offers. Understanding the difference between a business mentor and a coach is essential to identifying your organizational needs. Contact MentorCloud to guide you through making the decision. If this post was valuable to you, please feel free to share it across your social media channels. Also, please give us your thoughts on best practices and your experiences with mentoring. Thank you for reading, and check back in every Monday and Thursday for original posts on the #powerofmentoring!
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