Five Ways to Check if a Mentee’s Theology is Sound
Occasionally when mentoring or supervising professionally in the Christian community, you will need to have a difficult conversation about theology and beliefs. Even within the Christian community, there are many differences: between denominations—for instance,Catholics and Protestants, Calvinists and Moravians all vary drastically—but there are also subtle differences even within a denomination. For example, some mentees/supervisees may believe in predestination, while others are firm believers in freewill. Every person is influenced by their own experiences and their spiritual education, which leads to many different interpretations of God’s word and will...
25 Apr 2024
Refocusing Energies and Efforts in Supervision/Mentoring Sessions
Have you ever been working with a mentee or supervisee, and a few weeks, months or years in, you begin to sense that their momentum is slowing? During sessions, do they seem distracted or unmotivated? This could be because of a need for more focus and energy regarding their goals...
18 Apr 2024
How to Overcome Discomfort with Difficult Conversations
Over the last few weeks, we have been exploring how to confront and challenge our mentee or supervisee when it is necessary. We have mostly focused on how we, as a mentor or supervisor, can encourage our clients to open up, to speak frankly and to face difficulties in themselves and the world around them. Today, we are turning towards ourselves and how we handle those conversations...
11 Apr 2024
Four ways to handle discrepancies in words and deeds
The role of mentor/supervisor is a reflective practice. Our job is to help our clients learn to see what they are not seeing about themselves and their behaviour and encourage them to become more self-reflective on their path forward. Unfortunately, it’s not as simple as holding up a mirror....
4 Apr 2024
Four Questions to Help Understand what God Wants for You
Have you ever finished a session with a mentee or supervisee and were left feeling that something was wrong? That something they said was not aligned with what God wants for them? It can be difficult to see behaviours or attitudes in your mentees or supervisees that you recognise as unbiblical and unhealthy for their lives but it also allows for the opportunity for you to provide some insight and, hopefully, help correct their path forward.
28 Mar 2024
Four Questions to Make Difficult Conversations Easier
Challenging and Confronting others is a difficult skill set that all mentors or supervisors need to have. Even our easiest and most pleasant mentees and supervisees will occasionally need to be challenged and pushed to grow. Some of the people we work with will need us to address many tough issues; confrontation may be a regular part of sessions. Either way, being able to acknowledge and embrace difficult issues within this relationship, and to take personal action, is key to successful transformation. This is exactly what we will be looking at over the next few weeks. This is an opportunity to self-reflect: how do you handle challenging your mentees? How do you prefer to confront supervisees? Are difficult conversations something you feel comfortable with? How do you go about correcting unhealthy behaviours?
14 Mar 2024
How to Offer Constructive Feedback
Providing feedback to a mentee is one of the most crucial skills for a mentor but also one of the most difficult. It can be hard to walk the line between helpful and constructive feedback and pushy and demoralising feedback. The last thing a mentor wants is for his feedback to hurt or discourage his mentee… however, feedback is essential ... Read More
22 Feb 2024
Tips and Questions to Hold Mentees accountable to Their Goals
Last week, we looked at what it means to deal with setbacks when attaining goals and how to redirect your mentee on their course of action. We looked at situations that require a mentee to put their goals on hold or change their goals… and how that is okay if the situation requires this. But what if the setback is … Read More ... Read More
30 Jan 2024
What do we do When our Mentee is Making a Mistake?
Are you a mentor needing to challenge your mentee's actions? Read this article to explore how to do it without sounding controlling, manipulative or judgemental. Learn how to rectify mistakes, report abuse and protect the heart and mind of your mentee. Take this personalised mentor growth support and development assessment to help grow your mentoring skills.
23 Nov 2023
Asking tough questions disarmingly builds relational bonds
Click through to explore how to ask tough questions with compassion and safety! I'm learning more about the importance of mentors in our lives and the best ways to ask hard questions from this great article. Find out how to make your mentee feel safe, build relationships and avoid judgement!
16 May 2023
Mentoring Essentials: Challenging and Confronting
How to Challenge and Confront with Grace No matter who we are, there are moments in our lives when we are pulled into heavy and challenging topics that sometimes lead to conflict. Well-being mentors tend to face these moments a little more often. It’s part of the joy and difficulty of the job; to get into the deeper areas of ... Read More
31 Mar 2022