Intelligent Mentoring How IBM Creates Value through People, Knowledge, and Relationships

How to Use Mentoring to Drive Maximum Competitive Advantage
Techniques and lessons from IBM’s world-class mentoring programs—for every business and HR leader, strategist, Chief Learning Officer, consultant, trainer, and scholar

For today’s enterprises, few challenges are as daunting as preparing tomorrow’s leaders. Mentoring is one of the most powerful tools at their disposal. But not all mentoring programs are equally effective, and not all companies have learned how to sustain mentoring. One company has: IBM. Intelligent Mentoring reveals how IBM has done it–and offers specific guidance and best practices you can use to achieve equally powerful results. Intelligent Mentoring shows how IBM has fully integrated a diverse portfolio of formal mentoring initiatives into both talent development and innovation promotion. Whether you’re a business leader, strategist, Chief Learning Officer, training specialist, coach, or consultant, this book presents a state-of-the-art framework for making mentoring work. Drawing on IBM’s experience, the authors demonstrate how to build a diverse portfolio of effective mentoring programs...use mentoring to strengthen organizational intelligence...build sustainable communities of mentors and mentees...promote collaboration across differences... and above all, link mentoring to strategy and use it to sustain competitive advantage.

•  Use mentoring to develop tomorrow’s world-class business leaders
Actionable solutions and best practices from IBM’s breakthrough mentoring program

• Embrace mentoring as a high-performance work practice
Maximizing, capturing, and communicating the value-added impact of mentoring

• Set the right goals for mentoring: then achieve them
Utilize mentoring to strengthen organizational learning, improve retention, promote innovation, and more

• Use mentoring to solve your organization’s most “wicked” problems
How mentoring can help you respond to complex, tangled challenges you’ve never faced before

Foreword xvii

Acknowledgments xxi

About the Authors xxiii

Mentoring Transformations 4

IBM’s Challenge 5

IBM’s Response 9

Creating a Mentoring Portfolio 13

Contributions of Intelligent Mentoring 16

References 19

Chapter 2 Organizational Intelligence: Using Just-in-Time Mentoring Solutions 23

Overview: Revitalizing Mentoring 24

Creating a Mentoring Hybrid 26

IBM Revitalizes Mentoring 27

Linking Mentoring to Organizational Intelligence 30

Attracting and Recruiting Talent 31

Socializing of Employees 33

Accessing Knowledge and Expertise 34

Supporting Knowledge Retention 36

Sustaining a Knowledge-Resilient Culture 38

Developing a Portfolio of Experiential Learning Opportunities 40

Experiential Learning Opportunities in the Future 43

References 47

Chapter 3 Organizational Intelligence: Fostering Communities of Knowledge 51

Overview 52

Learning through Communities of Practice 53

Building Communities of Practice at IBM 55

A Mentoring Solution 57

Mentoring as Communities of Practice 58

Lessons Learned from IBM’s Mentoring Communities 63

Mentoring Across Boundaries 64

Strengthening Relational Competencies 66

Fostering Meaningful Collaboration 68

Mentoring Communities and the Future 69

Valuing Community 70

“THINK”ing at IBM 70

Who Said an Elephant Can’t Learn to Dance? 71

References 72

Chapter 4 Connecting People: Creating Meaningful Engagement 75

Moving from Isolation to Engagement 76

The Benefits of Engaged Employees 76

Challenges for Engaging a Globally Dispersed Workforce 78

Mentoring, Technology, and Connecting People 80

Creating Access to People 81

Creating Access to Information 82

Creating Access to Virtual Communities 84

Example of an IBM Best Practice: Group Speed Mentoring 86

Engaging Employees through Mentoring—Lessons Learned 90

Technology as a Tool, Not a Panacea 91

Holding Managers Accountable 91

Some Final Engaging Thoughts 92

References 93

Chapter 5 Connecting People: Mentoring as a Tool for Diversity and Inclusion 97

The Importance of Connecting Among Difference 98

The Workforce of the Future Is Here 99

Diversity as a Business Imperative 101

Enhancing Diversity: Why Mentoring Matters 103

Connecting within Diversity at IBM 105

Mentoring Based on Affinities 109

Group Mentoring via Diversity Networks 110

Asian Diversity Network Group at IBM 112

Looking Toward the Future 116

References 121

Chapter 6 Connecting People: Using Mentoring to Signal Value in People 125

The Power of Value in People 126

What Employees Expect—A Relational View 128

Employees’ Perceptions of Organizational Support 131

How Organizational Leaders Can “Signal Support” 133

Using Reverse Mentoring to Signal Support 136

Respect for the Individual 138

Support for Employee Development 139

Collaboration across Difference 140

Preventing Career Derailment: A Plan for Success 141

Reverse Mentoring: Signaling Value in People across IBM 144

Reverse Mentoring in the United States 145

Reverse Mentoring in Finland 146

Reverse Mentoring in Latin America 148

Looking Toward the Future—Multigenerational Collaboration 151

Lessons Learned—Signaling Ethics and Integrity 153

References 155

Chapter 7 Business Impact: Using Mentoring to Deliver Value for Competitive Advantage 159

Adding Value through Mentoring 160

Mentoring Solutions as High-Performance Work Practices (HPWP) 161

Enduring Skills Help to Create Competitive Advantage 165

Developing a Balanced View of “Value Added” 167

Dangle the Carrot—IBM’s Marketing Group Mentoring Award 172

Lessons Learned—Adding Value and Sustaining Business Impact 176

References 177

Chapter 8 Business Impact: Using Mentoring Solutions to Solve “Wicked Problems” 181

Mentoring as a Strategic Solution 182

Using Mentoring to Solve “Wicked Problems” 184

Global Talent Management as a “Wicked Problem” 187

Mentoring: On the Manufacturing Floor to the Technical Labs 191

Black Technical Leaders Forum (BTLF) 193

Building a Global Knowledge Community—South Africa’s Cross-Geography Mentoring Initiative 197

Lessons Learned—Sustaining Business Impact via Strategic Mentoring Solutions 203

Some Final Thoughts—The Impact of Intelligent Mentoring 205

References 207