<i>“That guy doesn’t know shit. Why should I listen to him?"</i><p>If you have to ask that question, then you already know the answer.<p>With a good mentor, thoughts like that would never even enter your mind. Why? Because a good mentor would never just tell you what to do, he/she would share data in such a way that you would <i>learn</i> what to do.<p>If you don't find a way to turn mentor input into new actionable wisdom very quickly (even instantly) and feel confident about it, then it's probably time to find another mentor.
Yes you should be a mentor or whatever you want to call it. It does not mean you have to be an absolute expert at something to be a mentor. It means that you are willing to <i>advice/share</i> your experiences with someone else with the goal of helping them with whatever you can. For example, so what if you are not a superstar code ninja/rockstar or whatever it is. You can still talk to someone about what <i>you</i> know and give them some options to think about.<p>I would encourage everyone to be a "mentor". Go and talk to some younger/junior/less experienced people and you will realize how much they need you. No matter how small, you could make a difference. And you want to know another secret? You will suddenly realize how much you actually know when you try to teach/mentor someone else. You will also improve your <i>own</i> skills including communication, interaction etc etc.
Some of you might be interested to give this mentoring stuff a try, either as a montor or as a student. If so, you might be interested in checking out the Learn Programming Mentoring Community (LPMC).<p>This project was started when it became clear that quite a few posters in r/learnprogramming wanted to contribute to open source projects, but didn't know how or noticed that having their PR rejected did in fact not afford the greatest learning experience. LPMC aims to, among other things:<p>1. Match students with projects<p>2. Help students create pull requests worthy of being merged by upstream (offloading busy maintainers)<p>If this sounds interesting you can check out <a href="http://learnprogramming.github.io/" rel="nofollow">http://learnprogramming.github.io/</a> or come shoot the shit in #lpmc@irc.freenode.net
I think calling yourself a "mentor" gets the response it does because it is like calling yourself "successful"- according to who? It just doesn't fit into the model of western culture of speaking with humility. It risks alienating people- no one would disagree with you if you said "I really listen to people at these events." Aren't you actually suggesting that you try to be a good listener and offer helpful advice.
Teaching / mentoring / coaching is good for you as well. Trying to teach others forces you to learn your subject even better than you already know it. Additionally, the questions and counter-points and feedback you get from students / people you're mentoring /etc. will expose you to new ideas and new ways of thinking, which you can then integrate and synthesize around.<p>I don't know if I'd be able to do much "one on one" mentoring, as time is awfully limited right now. But I have a lecture/class or two in mind that I'll probably offer to teach somewhere in the RTP area later this year. I have learned enough about market research to do a useful one or two night session on the topic.<p>No, I'm not an expert on it, but what I've learned in the past 2 years would possibly be beneficial to the people who are now, where I was two years ago. I figure if I can help shorten someone else's learning curve, that's a good thing. And, inevitably, if I do the class, I'll learn a lot from the process itself.<p>So yeah, if you have some useful knowledge you've accumulated (and you probably do) teach a class, or take on a pupil to mentor. It's a win-win for everybody.
This post read like a bit of a humblebrag to me. I think it's fine to go to events and share experiences as part of conversation - the community is a big part of making a great event. To go to an event with the mindset of being a mentor to other people when you're just another guy trying to get a startup off the ground would definitely put me off.<p>“That guy doesn’t know shit. Why should I listen to him? Why is he even here?” I'd be that guy. I wouldn't be presuming you don't know shit or wondering why you're here, but rather wondering why a guy in the same position as most people trying to launch a startup is mentoring people.<p>Having said that, promoting oneself seems to be part of entrepreneurial culture and I don't blame you for seizing the opportunity to do it.
Great post!<p>I've started a number of businesses over the past 10 years, first of which was when i was 17, i've learned so much over this time, but had dismissed it as general knowledge.<p>Recently I took part in an accelerator here in the UK and one of the things I enjoyed most was offering advise to other teams, even just on simple things like Tax/Vat etc. I really didn't appreciate that much of the knowledge I've amassed over the past 10 years was valuable to people in the early stage of a new business.<p>I'm hoping to be invited back to that accelerator as a mentor this year, and I'd hope I can do this for other accelerators too as it's extremely rewarding, I'd almost say I find it more rewarding helping others than building my own startup!
The same advice applies for undergrads (though I wouldn't call myself a mentor). For a year or two now I've been part of a group of students who hold volunteer CS "office hours". We normally get visits from frustrated students who aren't in CS, and are able to make a huge difference for these people.<p>We don't get paid, but I still benefit from it, of course; my knowledge and teaching ability have both greatly improved. It's fun, too =)<p>A word of advice: operate outside of your school's official tutoring system. Just get a bunch of friends and make yourselves known within your department: you'll spend less time working the system and more time helping people. Feel free to get in touch for advice.
For me the only criteria is to stay away from 'mentors' who have never worked on a product.<p>Being in Pakistan, I get to meet tons of industry experts who have racked up millions solely by outsourcing and creating low-quality software for cheap. All they do is that they bring you down to their own ambition-level. Don't listen to them !<p>some real life examples:<p>"so why would you like to hire such an expensive resource here when you can get two average developers for a lot less and he can get your job done? that's bur resource management"<p>"you mentioned celebrities in your pitch but let me just tell you one thing , those people will never use your app"
Learn from other people, let people learn from you. A great way to cultivate a more fulsome understanding of a topic is to try to describe it to others, to share your understanding with others. Mentoring is like writing that way, and like writing, you can't expect to be good at it without practice. I think sharing what you know with people, people who you believe are both less and more knowledgeable than you, is incredibly beneficial to any environment (work, play, whatever). MENTOR EVERYONE!
It seems like a nice thing to do to help people out. I can see a reason why some people might be sceptical though: It's difficult to tell the difference between someone who's made mistakes and can share that with you, and someone who's just wasting your time. Success helps to differentiate the two.
Is anyone looking for a mentoree? I'm a self taught software engineer at a small company in the SF Bay Area. I studied mathematics at Berkeley. Lived in Los Angeles most of my life. Worked in film, real estate and advertising prior. I even helped start a company before I knew what HN was!