Coaching and mentoring can both help us grow, develop and reach our full potential and can help us to reach goals in our personal or working lives. But which is for you?
There are several key differences between coaching and mentoring, so it’s important to see the strengths and similarities of each and understand which is which, which one might be for you and how they can work together.
Similarities of mentoring and coaching
Coaching and mentoring have many areas which overlap. For either to be successful the coachee or mentee needs to go into the process with an open mind and be ready to reflect; the whole focus is on self-development. Developing a strong professional relationship between the coach and the coachee and the mentor and the mentee is vital to ensure a safe space to establish and develop; trust, self-awareness, openness to new ways of thinking, working towards goals and fulfilling potential.
Differences in coaching and mentoring?
The table below highlights some key differences.
| Mentoring | Coaching | |
| A mentor is someone who can guide, advise, and support you and is often workplace based. The role of a mentor is to listen, learn, and advise. It is about pointing their mentee in the right direction and aiding their career development. | Advice | A coach is someone who can guide and support you to be the best you can be in your personal life or at work. A coach focuses more on supporting and developing a winning mindset. |
| A mentor takes time to understand you and the challenges you’re facing and then advise you based on their understanding of the problem and their personal experience – with the aim of helping you towards your goals. | Who decides on the steps towards the goal | A coach takes time to understand you and the challenges you’re facing and then support you to identify and prioritise areas you want to improve and break down your end goal into smaller goals and work alongside you while you shape and grow your mindset. |
| A mentor will often draw on their personal experiences and expertise to help advise their mentee. This could be in the form of sharing a story that taught them a valuable lesson, or a challenge they overcame in their career. | The place of personal experience | A coach will not discuss anything personal. In fact, there’s a high chance they have no experience in the industry or role that their client works in. However, they can use their generic coaching skills to support your growth. |
| Mentoring ensures specific skills and approach are passed on as part of personal development. | Understanding the area of expertise or yourself | The structured nature of coaching ensures a specific focus on an area of personal development, to improve your mindset and equip you with the skills to handle future challenges and situations. |
| Mentoring opportunities often lead to long-term mentoring relationships, fundamental in shaping career paths. Mentorships have the potential to last a lifetime if they result in friendship. Once you have that connection with someone you may reach out to them informally again in the future. | Time bound | Coaching partnerships are more short-term due to the fact that they are objective-driven and more structured, possibly to manage a particular issue or work through a particular limiting belief. The coaching could well end once that skill or objective had been acquired. |
Both coaching and mentoring have their place and can support our growth. It may seem hard to believe to begin with, but whilst we think we might need a mentor to support us with a particular issue, a coach can often provide key support allowing long-lasting personal development and growing self-worth, despite not working in the same field of expertise.
