From my own experience, I do think it’s a good idea – but not in isolation. Being a General Counsel means that you’re much more embedded in the workings, outputs and successes of your organisation. For that reason, I always try to find mentorship opportunities from commercial stakeholders across the business too, beyond just my “Legal” manager, so that I benefit from the wisdom, experience and guidance of multiple gurus.
This doesn’t need to be a formal arrangement – and for me, in fact, it isn’t. Given business-as-usual, competing priorities and limited time and resource across the board, for me it’s about taking those ad-hoc opportunities to learn from your informal mentors (even if you or they are unaware of that label) – by, for example, shadowing calls, actively seeking 360 feedback, and learning from my colleagues’ own personal and professional development paths.
On the other hand, a coach is, again from my experience at least, often a luxury for in-house counsel. My idea of a coach is someone who focuses on your specific goals and skills, and helps/ equips you (through plans, structures etc.) to achieve those goals and improve those skills.
I am noticing more and more external coaches entering the legal industry (or increasing their marketing presence on the likes of LinkedIn, at least!) – particularly those with a focus on in-house lawyers. So watch this space, I’d say, as that luxury may soon become more of a norm for many.
Gethin Bennett – Assistant Legal Counsel – The Royal Mint
So, seek mentoring and support from your line manager - and also have a separate relationship with someone independent of your reporting line who can also mentor you when your boss cannot.
They way that I understand the terms is that:
- a mentor helps you, through structured questions and support, to find your own answer to things (through "how do you..., what do you think, how might someone..." type questions); and
- a coach gives you specific technical advice on how to do or improve something through comments like "if we do this ... then the CFO will accept our budget; or change these words in the draft because then..., or make sure that you do the following things when conducting the disciplinary interview so that we avoid it going wrong")
Bruce Macmillan – General Counsel
Better to have someone who is completely independent in a formal mentor setting. If your manager is good, they will act as a mentor but useful to have someone who works outside your area. Mentors tend to use their experience to help guide whereas coaching is much less directive and more about listening and asking powerful questions to help someone.
Ian White and Simon McCall – In-house legal consultants
People will have a lot of different views on this. In my view, it is unrealistic to expect a line manager to do line management really well, and also be a mentor. It can happen, but in my experience it is asking too much of one person.
A good line manager should be able to work in a “coaching” mode. A coach can help you identify your goals, workshop through challenges you might face in reaching those goals, and help to hold yourself accountable to those goals. Whereas a mentor is usually someone who is at least one step removed from your day to day, and who is able to offer advice based on that perspective, and their own experience.
It’s much more common for a good line manager to become a role model for their direct reports, who may want to emulate them as they progress into more senior roles. I have certainly benefitted from working for individuals who had that positive influence on me. But it was leading by example, rather than mentoring.
Besides, there are so many wonderful, wise people in the in-house legal profession that it doesn’t make sense to be looking to your line manager for mentoring. Don’t be shy. Reach out and ask someone you admire for advice when next you need it. Provided the request is made with consideration, it’s very unlikely you will be refused.
An effective manager/leader is likely to deploy elements of both mentoring and coaching in developing their staff and managing their team’s output. Sharing experience to suggest a solution or a possible approach is a form of mentoring and it’s hard to think of a good boss who doesn’t share their wisdom and experience in this way. Similarly, encouraging a team member to come up with solutions themselves and think their way around and out of a challenge is essentially a form of coaching. So they are both useful parts of a leader or manager’s toolkit.
My perspective is that a mentor has a bit more licence to be directive and to give advice to the mentee drawing on their experience. A mentor can say “Why don’t you try x?” A workplace coach is more focused on creating a safe space for the coachee to explore the challenges facing them and work out for themselves what might be a way forward. A coach’s version of the previous question is likely to be something more like “What might you try next time this happens?” or “ What’s worked for you in the past when this happens?”. Both are incredibly valuable work relationships.
Another difference is that mentoring can, if both sides agree, be a more open-ended arrangement; someone to check in with to discuss/debate what is going on and seek a steer on tricky issues through different phases of a career. Workplace coaching tends to be a more structured relationship with a beginning, middle and end with the coachee hopefully emerging with a range of tools and insights that they can take forward and apply themselves.
However, as practised by a line manager, there is the scope to bring both styles to the table to support a team member depending on what is needed at any given time. And the balance may shift – a less experienced team member may want/need more of a mentoring approach in the early phase of their career but as they mature and progress, may benefit from more of a coaching approach encouraging them to take ownership of working out their challenges and their development in their role.
Rebecca Staheli - Head of Competition and Regulatory Law, BBC