University Experts Share Mentoring Skills with Partners of Judges
by Mary F. Moyer

The Ohio Judicial Family Network (OJFN) Mentor Program was initiated in October 2000 to offer role-related support and psychosocial support to the spouses of newly elected and appointed judges. The mentors, partners of experienced judges, are matched with mentees using the following criteria: gender, community size (urban or rural) and court jurisdiction.

To enhance the skills of the mentors, Leslie M. Fine, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Marketing, Fisher College of Business, The Ohio State University, and Judith B. Fountain, Director, The Women’s Place, OSU, facilitated a three-hour training.

Leslie Fine presented “Mentoring: Paying Back and Paying Forward.” She stated that mentoring is not counseling, coaching or supervision. “A mentor is someone with experience related to the role who is willing to share that experience with someone new in the role.”

Mentoring is not counseling. A counselor is a person who has a set of objective listening skills and uses those skills to allow the person being counseled to come to his/her own decision. In a mentoring relationship, the mentor shares experiences and personal opinions with the mentee who uses that information in the decision-making process. The mentor might say, “This is what I wish I had done when I first got into this.”

Mentoring is broader than coaching which is skill-based training without an emotional component. Mentoring may involve some coaching, but there is also a responsibility to engage in a caring relationship.

Mentoring is not supervision. The mentor does not tell the mentee if he/she is doing well. There is no evaluation component. The mentor offers advice and support and shares experiences
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Leslie Fine stated that the two key categories of mentoring are role-related and psychosocial. Role-related activities are specifically related to situations that a person encounters in his/her role. Psychosocial functions offer caring support and friendship to someone who is new in a role.

[1] [2] [Mentoring Qualities]