Reverse Mentorship: What Older Executives Can Learn from Emerging Leaders
Mentorship plays an important role in a person’s professional development and career growth. This working alliance usually involves an experienced professional taking a younger colleague under their wing to share knowledge and skills necessary for success within the specific company or industry. Mentorship adds deeper value to a person’s career because there’s a lot that young businesspeople can learn from their senior colleagues. However, vice versa is also correct. Reverse mentorship is also a thing, and it’s equally meaningful. Read on to learn more about reverse mentorship and what older executives can learn from younger, emerging leaders.
Table of Contents
Reverse Mentorship: What Older Executives Can Learn from Emerging Leaders
Benefits of reverse mentorship
What is reverse mentorship?
Reverse mentorship is a concept where younger employees are paired with executive team members to mentor them on several topics of cultural and strategic relevance. In other words, a younger colleague and emerging leader is mentoring their senior colleague.
Despite gaining momentum in recent years, the reverse mentorship concept has been around for decades. A good example is a well-known CEO Jack Welch who used the idea of reverse mentoring in the late 1990s at General Electric. He relied on reverse mentoring to suggest that younger staff should teach senior executives about the Internet. The goal was to make sure the senior executives started using technology that younger generations were comfortable using.
Modern reverse mentorship goes beyond sharing technology-related knowledge and extends to the way senior executives think about leadership, mindset, and strategic issues.
The goal of reverse mentorship is not to undermine someone’s vast experience but to complement it with fresh insights, digital fluency, and contemporary social understanding.
Benefits of reverse mentorship
Mentoring isn’t just about senior executives sharing tips and knowledge with younger colleagues. Reverse mentorship has a wide range of benefits because there’s a lot that senior executives can learn from emerging leaders. Some of the most significant advantages of reverse mentorship include:
● Higher retention of millennials: These programs offer transparency and recognition that millennials expect from the management. Reverse mentorship makes younger leaders listen to and welcome in offices. Companies that listen to younger generations and build a workplace that reflects their priorities are better positioned to retain talented millennials.
● Digital skills sharing: Although the development of digital skills isn’t the focus of reverse mentorship, it is an important part of this relationship. Senior executives can learn how to use social media, for example, and improve the way they interact and communicate with employees or represent the company.
● Contributing to culture change: reverse mentorship encourages open communication and exchange of ideas. Senior executives get to learn from younger colleagues about various issues from their own perspectives and adjust their moves accordingly. This leads to culture change through new solutions and strategies.
● Increased diversity: The concept of reverse mentorship improves the executives’ understanding of minority issues, which leads to better inclusivity and diversity.
Lessons that emerging leaders can teach senior executives
Digital fluency
The term digital fluency refers to learning and applying technologies to everyday tasks. One of the first lessons that senior executives can learn from younger colleagues is how to improve their digital fluency. Younger leaders can show how to use AI tools to streamline productivity, break down trends in social media marketing, and reveal how collaborative tech platforms can enhance workflow.
Agile thinking
Emerging leaders are usually more flexible in the way they approach challenges at work. That happens because young executives are less constrained by legacy thinking and more inclined to embrace adaptive processes. They can teach senior executives how to experiment, accept that failure is part of innovation, and promote speed in decision-making through lean thinking (a mindset that fosters a culture of continuous improvement). These lessons are important because they help companies navigate through challenges quickly and remain competitive.
Social awareness and cultural intelligence
Younger generations expect their leaders and employers to reflect values such as equity, inclusion, and environmental responsibility. Reverse mentorship can help senior executives learn how to build a purpose-driven brand, the importance of transparency and authenticity in leadership, and how to engage meaningfully with issues such as mental health, racial equity, and many others. Younger colleagues offer an insight into modern societal values that may be unfamiliar to senior executives.
Inclusive language
Language evolves with culture and time or, as one paper reported, language drives culture. As the language evolves, so does what is considered inclusive, empowering, and respectful. Senior executives can learn about the importance of inclusive language from their younger colleagues. They can learn to avoid outdated or potentially offensive terminology, use empathetic language to create a sense of calm and safety, and lead with vulnerability and emotional intelligence.
Understanding young workforce
It may be quite difficult for senior executives to understand the needs, preferences, and attitudes of the young workforce due to the clash of entirely different generations. Their younger colleagues can offer real-time insight into the motivations of their peers. Some of these motivations include a desire for flexibility over fixed working hours, a preference for purpose over pay, and an interest in development opportunities over hierarchical advancement. Thanks to these lessons, senior executives can recalibrate their leadership strategies to retain a younger workforce.
Unlearning outdated practices
One of the most important lessons that senior executives can learn from younger colleagues or emerging leaders is to listen actively and unlearn practices that are outdated and provide no benefit as they used to. They can also learn how to lead with humility, curiosity, and openness. Young or emerging leaders can teach their senior colleagues how to embrace new technologies, practices, and approaches to increase productivity and improve workplace culture.
Conclusion
Reverse mentorship is a powerful tool that allows senior executives to learn valuable lessons on digital fluency and active listening, focusing on new methods rather than outdated practices. Emerging leaders show how young generations feel about work and what they expect. Senior executives can use this information to retain young talent. They also use lessons from reverse mentorship to adapt to the latest technological advancements that will improve the efficiency and success of the company.
References
https://hbr.org/2019/10/why-reverse-mentoring-works-and-how-to-do-it-right
