Way back in my early career as a quality professional, about the same time as yuppies became a big thing in the media, there was a good deal of buzz in the business press about the importance of mentoring. The concept didn't seem to receive widespread acceptance―at least on my part. What I remember most is the lampooning the mentoring buzz took after a while. The best example was the Doonesbury comic strip in which Mike Doonesbury asks a company manager to be his mentor, in the same spirit and style as if he were proposing marriage. Back then it seemed as if mentoring required a long, involved and complicated system. The term has come to take on more importance as people refer to me as "mister" more often and as new college graduates describe the events of my childhood as "American history." I have come to appreciate that good mentoring is easier with a system, but it doesn't have to be long and complicated.
展开▼
