Mentoring for Corporate Women in Sydney

I love being a Business in Heels mentor. Not only are you able to support other incredible women in their career (and life) journeys, you also learn as much as you share in these sessions.

Lisa Sweeney has created such a vibrant posse of female mentors across Australia and last night’s gathering was super enriching (the grapes and the bubbles were also a boon). 😁

What was really special last night for me was that two mentees who are currently studying at uni joined us. What courage to come to a corporate event in your early 20s seeking mentorship and support! I wish I had had the maturity to have considered the idea myself at that age!

How Do Mentoring and Coaching Differ?

One of the questions I get asked is what’s the difference between mentoring and coaching?

And it’s a good question!

Mentoring is when you share your expertise or experience with another person.

• Perhaps you are more experienced than them at performing a particular role.
• You might have some specialist knowledge you can impart.
• In your career you may have ‘done things’ and ‘seen things’ and are happy to share those mistakes with others so they can learn from them.

Mentoring can be extremely powerful and help fast track progress.

So What is Coaching?

Coaching is different to mentoring because in a coaching conversation, the relationship dynamic is quite different.

A coach isn’t a teacher like a mentor is.

A coach is a partner. The coach will work with a client to help them solve their own problems.

In my work as a leadership coach here in Sydney, I work with clients in a flexible way. Most of the time I am coaching and sometimes. a client might ask me to ‘wear my mentoring hat’ to help them review a particular strategic challenge.

Whether in coaching or mentoring mode, the important thing for me always to focus on is empowering my client with the autonomy to find their own solutions and make their own choices.

I’ll post about this again because it’s an important distinction!

If you’re looking for leadership coaching support here in Sydney or Australia, reach out and let’s have a chat. It’s always a good starting point just to share where you’re at right now and we can start exploring the steps to move forwards.