Mentoring

Domain VI · Brief, integrative, trauma, hypnosis & coaching

What it is

Mentoring is not a psychotherapy and has no single founder or manual. It is a relationship-based developmental model, used in two main forms: (1) structured programmes in which a trained volunteer (usually an unrelated adult) is matched with a young person for at least a year; (2) workplace,…

Format

• Dose and format. Youth programmes: one-to-one, face-to-face, minimum one calendar or school year, average weekly meetings, 4+ hours a month; shorter or less frequent designs only with empirical support, a clear theory of change and preparation for closure. Workplace/professional schemes: e.g.…

Who practises it, and how they are trained or regulated

• Clutterbuck (developmental, adult): rapport building, direction setting, progress making, winding down, moving on. Phase content below is drawn from the AAU workbook, which uses a closely related four-phase model and cites Clutterbuck.
• Version followed: two layers combined. (a) Programme structure: MENTOR's Elements of Effective Practice for Mentoring, 4th edition (2015), six standards with benchmarks (B) and enhancements (E), written for formal youth mentoring programmes. (b) The one-to-one relationship: David Clutterbuck's developmental mentoring (European tradition, EMCC), Kram's phase model (1983, as summarised in Kram & Isabella 1985), and…
• How change happens. The relationship itself is the active ingredient. Kram describes two families of mentor functions: career functions (sponsorship, coaching, exposure and visibility, protection, challenging assignments) and psychosocial functions (role modelling, counselling in the lay sense, acceptance and confirmation, friendship). In youth mentoring, trust built through consistent, enjoyable contact comes…

Questions to explore with your client

• What drew you to it, and what are you hoping it will change?
• Does it involve any substance, plant preparation, remedy or supplement? Has your doctor or prescriber been told, especially about any medication you take?
• Is it a group, retreat or community? How do they respond if someone wants to leave or raises a concern?
• Does it use a device, heat, cold, water or a physical procedure? Has a medical professional checked that it is safe for you?
• Who runs it, and what training or registration do they hold?
• What actually happens in a session or meeting, and how often?
• What does it cost, and is there pressure to commit to more?
• How do you feel afterwards, in the hours and days that follow?
• Does it fit with, or clash with, the work we do here?

What practitioners of it watch for

• mentors becoming case managers.
• the tool replacing conversation.
• the ICF coach-side signals in 4.31(6).
• pressure to persist with a clearly poor fit.
• polite non-answers; ask for one thing to change.

When to involve someone else

• New or worsening physical symptoms, or advice to stop or change prescribed medication: involve the client's doctor or prescriber.
• Signs of coercion, isolation from family and friends, escalating costs or secrecy: discuss openly and consider safeguarding.
• A crisis or thoughts of suicide: follow your crisis protocol. In the US, call or text 988; in the UK and Ireland, Samaritans on 116 123.

Drawn automatically from the guide's own sections. Stay curious: neither endorse nor dismiss what the client values, and check anything that matters against the full guide and its sources. Not medical advice.