Startup mentorship: 6 lessons learned

Mentorship has become a vital part of startup practice. As startups expand into all parts of life, they need mentors from every field to…

Mentorship has become a vital part of startup practice. As startups expand into all parts of life, they need mentors from every field to help them learn fast and deep enough to make it.

Mentorship is a science. There is more to being a mentor than showing up and telling founders what they are doing wrong. I’ve been mentoring startup founders for more than 10 years now and I have stuffed it up too many times to remember.

Here is what I have learned so far.

1. Mentoring works best when founders know your experience

Start your next mentoring session with a 30 second pitch on your experience so that they understand where you can best help them. What do you do a lot? What might you be able to share an experience in, that will shine a light on this founders challenges?

While mentoring, don’t be afraid to say “I have no idea”. It won’t make you look dumb. In fact, it will make the experiences you do share all the more valuable. Too many mentors try to answer questions they know nothing about to maintain expert status.

2. Questions are better than statements

Statements can make founders feel disempowered and close down possibilities. Questions encourage the founder to look at their own experience for an answer that they intuitively understand. Questions I use a lot include: How can I help? How could you test that? How do people solve that today? Who wants this the most and why?

3. Stories are better than conclusions

I learned this at EO. When a founder shares a challenge, consider if you have a personal experience which they can learn from. Tell the story and do not make a conclusion like “So what you should do is…” While you are telling the story, the founder will be running scenarios in their mind. They will build a rich view on possible solutions and experiments and these will be tightly integrated with their own specific context. As soon as you make a conclusion you will not only weaken the learning, but you will make the founder feel dumb.

They need to decide what to do.

4. Listening is a visual thing

There is nothing more disheartening than sharing your problems and knowing that someone is not listening. Especially when that person is visibly distracted or bursting to tell you something else. Mentors must listen and they must be seen to listen. Look at the founder. React. Smile. It is OK to pause when they have finished to think about a valuable response.

5. Tools provide a map for diagnosis

Like a doctor, we need to diagnose problems and the patients don’t always know where to look. Tools such as lean canvas or business model canvas can help. It doesn’t matter which one you use but tools provide a checklist that can capture in a uniform way how a founder understands their business. It starts a conversation that can lead to diagnosis.

6. Smiling is good

It has become a cliche that startups are hard. Founders need hope. Smile a lot. Be enthusiastic. Get yourself to a place where you love their business and it excites you.