MENTORING

MMH mentoring programme

Mentoring champion: Paula O’Sullivan

Mentoring can be defined as unlocking a person’s potential to maximise their own performance, helping them to learn rather than teaching them.

The new 3 monthly ITAs and WBAs are designed to evaluate your progress and performance as trainees, the mentoring programme is designed to support your development personally and professionally. ACEM are keen to get everyone involved with mentoring but the mentoring programme is separate from the training programme. This is not part of your assessment and ACEM does not get any reports of your individual participation.

The anticipated benefit of a being in a mentoring relationship for you, as registrars, is the potential to develop a supportive relationship with a colleague who can assist you as you make your way through your training. The MMH programme has been going for the past year or so with ongoing training for the mentors so they can best support the mentees. The concept of mentoring is introduced at registrar orientation and then there is time to get to know the SMO group so you can choose someone you think you could best work with. Some of the SMOs are already in mentoring relationships or are very busy with other projects so I will ask you to nominate 3 mentors that may suit. I will liaise with your nominated SMO’s to find someone who can dedicate time and resources so that you can get the most from your mentoring relationship. The DEMTs will not usually be able to act as mentors for college trainees as they are involved in assessing performance which makes it difficult to be their mentor as. If you have an ongoing mentoring relationship with someone from another hospital or if you think mentoring is not for you please let me know anyway.

The expectation is that the relationship will be driven by you as the mentee, you will need to organize meetings and come to mentoring with some goals in mind. You can then work with your mentor to clarify and identify ways you can work toward those goals and discus how your mentor can support you to achieve those goals.

Please take a look at the mentoring resources via ACEM:

acem mentoring resources

It is very worthwhile taking the time to work through the confidentiality and role perceptions forms at the start of your relationship so you can confidently set forth on your mentoring journey together. Please come and talk to me if you have any questions about choosing a mentor, getting your relationship started, progressing or finishing your mentor relationship.