Mentoring and helping each other
Mentoring scheme for migrant women guide to their professional and business career include one-to-one relationships, working in teams and peer mentoring. This program addresses the barriers faced by migrant women in gaining employment, which includes lack of language/s skills, social networks, understanding of workplace practices, difficulties in official recognition of their qualifications obtained abroad and the lack of local work experience and networking. This activity will enable migrant women to develop their marketable skills and competences.
For developing mentors, the learning methodology is focused on migrant women and behavioural tools to gain the necessary benchmark competences and skills, especially emphasize solidarity and non-judgement attitude.
Processes of development and growth are central in mentoring relationships.
Respect, trustfulness and confidence during mentoring should build safe, trustful environment and wellbeing by eliminating the fear of mistakes. Migrant women mentorship directions depends on common professional interest and mentorship synergy. Mentor should encourage migrant women to analyse her interests, experience, dreams, goals,
Empowering migrant women supported by another migrant women. How migrant women can find a mentor?
Empowerment and support by another migrant women depend on solidarity. Migrant women who had already experienced migration the problems related to starting their business can support and empower newcomers with constructive but challenging questions. The main task of mentors is to encourage self-confidence and the growing independence of the migrant women.
One of the problems of migrant women is that they do not feel empowered enough to help and guide each other. Migrant women facing a lot of obstacles and it is not easy to find possibility to become strong not only for yourself but also for others migrant women. They were encouraged by centuries of male dominance to seek help from those who are more strong and powerful and discouraged from taking actions. With leadership and mentoring program, we aim to encourage migrant women and provide them with the tools to connect to each other and become united via solidarity and mutual help. The solidarity between women and the mentoring of other women that have been in similar circumstances and found the way out of isolation and helplessness will help newcomers to become economically independent, self-confident, and successfully integrate into community. Empowering migrant women supported by another migrant women should be focused not only on expectations, perceptions but also building social network. Mentor role is to guide and show possibilities.
Social network and integration into community will help to develop not only non-formal learning competencies, but also allow to analyse the demand for specific entrepreneurship ideas, to share them with your colleagues, neighbours, business partners contacts to ensure wider supporting social networking, to reflect on non-formal learning competencies and to start developing non-formal learning courses.
- Solidarity - migrant women solidarity (unity or agreement of feeling or action, especially among migrant women with a common interest and mutual support within a group) and a wish to help others and yourself.
- Common professional interest of mentee and mentor (migrant women) will help to reach their future professional goals and developed useful skills.
- Optimistic attitude - positive, cheerful and confident about the future, a belief that no matter the situation, things will improve.
- Life-long learning competencies – ability and motivation constantly to learn.
Mentoring results:
- described goals;
- reached goals;
- continuing support by implementation phase
Mentor is a person who is willing to invest their own time and energy to help others. Mentorship is a voluntary activity, in which both participants take responsibility to develop relationships and to accept the roles of mentor and mentee.
Mentor skills:
- ability to support, give advice;
- ability to encourage;
- ability to inspire;
- managing skills;
- consultation competencies;
- ability to provide honest and respectful feedback.
The most important is to start searching different social channels to find a mentor with whom a migrant women could grow and develop her own career path.
How to become a successful mentor for migrant women? Self-assessment of mentoring competencies
- A successful mentor for migrant women needs to be open, respectful and willing to devote time, share knowledge, skills and be a supportive shoulder when it’s needed.
- A successful mentor is accessible and supportive of small steps needed to develop migrant women self-confidence.
- A successful mentor provides empowerment and encourages a mentee not to be afraid to start, helps in analysing the first entrepreneurship ideas and helps to realize them successfully.
- A successful mentor has a holistic view of a migrant women situation and gives realistic, logical and useful advice.
- Being a role model for migrant women gives a mentor responsibility to lead migrant women to success.
- A successful mentor respects migrant women mentoring principles (solidarity, wish to help, openness, understanding, non-judgemental attitude, etc).
Support and encouragement are the most important for each person. Adult educators working with migrant women have to play a lot of roles with a goal to understand, support, encourage, suggest possible ways. Adult educator, migrant women mentor and migrant women should see the meaning in their efforts. If family situation, religion or social security system do not always motivate and support migrant women successful integration in labour market. There are little expectations of success for migrant women entrepreneurship.
Building a professional career or your own business requires setting realistic expectations/goals and defining milestones (e.g., SMART goals, which stands for specific, measurable, attainable, relevant and time-bound).
Career goals should be realistic and could be analysed by encouraging and supporting in career pathway by questioning:
- What are your biggest strengths and weaknesses?
- What kind of work environment you would like to work in?
- Do you know you work profile?
- Do you prefer working by yourself or with other people?
- Is it possible to translate your passion/hobby into a career/business?
- What would your ideal job description look like?
- What would your ideal workday look like?
Mentor should demonstrate the following mentoring skills to reach the goal:
- ability to support, give advice;
- ability to encourage;
- ability to inspire;
- managing skills;
- consultation competencies;
- non-judgment skills (diplomatic skills);
Migrant women leadership and mentorship connection is important to support migrant women pathways. For mentoring practice, it is important to be open and accept personal and cultural differences when setting career goals and supporting personal and professional development of a mentee. Social networking and widening connections using mentors contacts will be helpful for migrant women to unroll as a leader and begin establishing her own enterprise. Mentoring steps are important for both the mentor and mentee.
Below you can do your mentoring competencies assessment.
Self-assessment of mentoring competencies
| Mentoring competencies:
|
I have it | I need to improve | I need to develop |
| Ability to inspire | |||
| Ability to guide | |||
| Give corrective feedback | |||
| Ability to support | |||
| Team up building ability | |||
| Ability to collaborate | |||
| Networking ability | |||
| Ability to prioritize | |||
| Ability to organize | |||
| Ability to follow-up | |||
| Endurance and frustration tolerance | |||
| Identify and exploit opportunities | |||
| Ability to encourage | |||
| Managing skills | |||
| Consultation competencies |
Migrant women (mentee) skills:
- motivation to start;
- openness to create;
- wish to invest time and knowledge;
- wish to learn;
- wish to be involved in a new activity.
