Ask HN: Anybody looking for Mentors or willing to be a Mentor?

My problem is the following: I have quite a bit of knowledge and I like to help, but have no idea how to start actually being a mentor. I've "mentored" quite a few programmers in reverse-engineering, but it's never been a formal thing, just helping out from time to time. I guess these are the questions I have:<p><pre><code> What are the responsibilities of a mentor? Is this relationship more like a teacher-student relationship or like a senior team member bringing on someone new? How long does this typically last? (Formally, at least -- I'd imagine that if the process works out well, the relationship will likely continue past the end) What sort of time is dedicated to this? </code></pre> This is something I'm very interested in, just don't quite have all the information I need to jump into such a commitment.

I think this is an interesting concept, but man, making a mentorship match is HARD. You have to really hit it off with the person, on more of a personal level than anything at first. Then the rest works out. I'll be interested to hear some real feedback once you've made some matches. Please do give us a followup in a few months.

It's a nice idea; I hope it works. Dear god how I could use a business mentor.

Funny that I few days ago I was thinking about this idea of "peer mentorship". You see, in a typical mentor-protege relationship (like in this site, which is great if it works btw) there's a hierarchy: the mentor advises the protege in a one-way street.<p>My idea is having connections between two people on the same level, so that they both help each other. So if HN is a gym, this would be like having a personal trainer (and being a trainer for somebody).<p>Rather than specialized domain or expert advise, this would be more for things like getting a new and honest opinion about ideas/implementations etc, prodding the other person to action (you skipped exercising this week again?!) etc.<p>I see many ways why this wouldn't work (most people won't 'click' between each other etc) but for instance I would benefit from chatting once a week or a month with someone who's following what I'm doing and vice versa.

Let me mentor you in not making arbitrary text blue. It looks like a hyperlink when it's not and makes me frustrated.<p>In fact upon a second glance I notice that _some_ of the blue text is hyperlinked. Impossible to tell because your stylesheet overrides my browser settings which call for underlined links and the above color issue.<p>You should have a nice small diagram or paragraph explaining what your "smart matching solution" is. (That was the "link" which initially frustrated me.) Seems like I have to fill out a form and wait for a sales person -- wait, "Nuron" -- to call me back. Instead I just close the tab.<p>Can you provide more to assure us this isn't a data collection scam?<p>Good luck!

Good idea. Consider offering it to organisations that have mentoring programmes.<p>My old university has an alumni mentoring scheme, but the web app that does the matching is so broken that not many people use it.

Cool. I've always wanted a programming mentor. I work in a really small software company in which I find a lack of standardized software practices. Not that it is bad, but I would love to discover the other side of the spectrum through a mentor.

Well, yet another one of my website ideas in action. I wish I could pump them out a little faster.<p>Site looks alright, I'll be sure to check it out later tonight when I get home. (on the iPhone ATM)

This is an interesting concept. I would like to see the quality of relationships that Nurall will be able to generate.Mentoring is a give/take relationship and is a Hard Problem to solve.

Who's Nuron? Play on words?

I read "Mentors" as "Mentos". Now I'm eating a mint. Thanks for that.