Welcome to the Clinician Researcher podcast, where academic clinicians learn the skills
to build their own research program, whether or not they have a mentor.
As clinicians, we spend a decade or more as trainees learning to take care of patients.
When we finally start our careers, we want to build research programs, but then we find
that our years of clinical training did not adequately prepare us to lead our research
program.
Through no fault of our own, we struggle to find mentors, and when we can't, we quit.
However, clinicians hold the keys to the greatest research breakthroughs.
For this reason, the Clinician Researcher podcast exists to give academic clinicians
the tools to build their own research program, whether or not they have a mentor.
Now introducing your host, Toyosi Onwuemene.
Welcome to the Clinician Researcher podcast.
I'm your host, Toyosi Onwuemene, and it is such a pleasure to be talking with you today.
Thank you for taking the time to listen in as we talk about how to make the most of your
mentors.
Now, sometimes there is this sense that the mentor is going to just do everything for
you.
It's going to be the one to lead you from A to B to C to Z. Everything rises and falls
with this one mentor, and sometimes it doesn't work out that way.
We're disappointed, and we're just annoyed, and we're like, well, if this mentor would
have come through for me, my career would have been better, or we call our mentors the
Tor mentors.
Wow, so many challenges can happen in our mentoring relationships, but it's not because
of the mentor.
I would say that if you've had a challenging mentoring relationship, please do not blame
the mentor.
And yes, I don't know your mentor, and maybe your mentor was the horrible person tormenting
you.
I'm not saying that they were not.
I certainly know people who do that, and I've had my fair share of mentors who felt like
Tor mentors, but I want to say that the relationship building is up to you.
And one of the ways that you get the best and the most out of a mentor is really taking
ownership of the mentoring relationship.
And many times we look up to our mentors and we're like, well, they're older, they're more
senior, therefore they're responsible.
But in reality, you are responsible for this mentoring relationship.
You are.
You're responsible to get out of it what you want from it.
You are in this mentoring relationship for you.
Yes, your mentor is going to benefit.
And yes, they're going to love mentoring you because you're so awesome.
And everyone loves to mentor the next generation of scientists.
So you are, I mean, it's a great relationship.
Your mentors are so excited to mentor you.
But if you're going to get what is needed to shape your own career, it's going to be
because you create the opportunity to do it.
Now there's some mentors who don't need coaching, who don't need training, who are able to just
take a person and really help them advance in their careers.
But for the most part, if a mentoring relationship is going to succeed, it's because the mentee
knows how to get the most out of the mentor.
And so I'm going to talk today about strategies that you can use to make the most use of your
mentors.
So remember in our last episode, we talked about the importance of you taking ownership
of your career?
Well taking ownership of your career means taking ownership of your mentoring relationships
as well.
And to do that, you really need to first be able to set clear goals and expectations.
What do you want for yourself?
What do you want out of this career?
Why are you here?
What do you want out of this career?
And if you're very clear on where you're going, then you can ask someone to help you get there.
It's like the person that is out walking and you stop them and you're like, sir, are you
lost?
And they're like, yes, I'm lost.
I need directions.
And like, okay, where are you going?
And then I'm like, I'm not really sure.
How can you give such a person directions?
And perhaps you're benevolent and you're like, oh, okay, well, give me a sense of where you
think you might want to go.
And they're like, well, I'm not really sure.
I could go here.
I could go there.
Maybe I'll go there.
I'm not sure I could go anywhere.
How can you help a person like that?
Someone who doesn't have a clear address to which they're going is very difficult to give
directions to.
And it's the same in your own career.
If you're not very clear about where you're going, no mentor can help you get there because
you don't know.
And like, isn't that from Alice in Wonderland where the Cheshire Cat asked Alice where she
was going and she was like, well, nowhere really.
And he was like, well, then it doesn't matter which way you go.
And it's the same thing.
You want to clearly define your goals because when you clearly define your goals and you
understand how this mentor fits in.
So remember, there are different types of mentoring relationships.
There's a research mentor in relationship.
There's also sponsorship that happens as well.
And then there's career development mentorship.
So there are different kinds of mentoring relationships.
What you need depends on where you're going.
Perhaps you've already gotten a lot of research mentoring and you're not necessarily looking
for another mentor.
But this person is someone you've identified as someone who can really help you move forward.
Well, in what way are they going to help you move forward?
Where are you going so that you're very clear, you know where you're going so that you're
very clear on how they can help you get there.
And so if you have very specific achievable goals, it helps you and your mentor stay focused
on what you need to accomplish.
It helps you not go on the tangent of the great project that you could take on that
you don't really want to do.
But now you're trying not to make your mentor upset or you know, you're trying to please
your mentor.
So you're going off tangent.
And so the way that you make the most out of your mentor is to set very clear goals
and expectations so you know where you want to go and you become clear about when you're
veering off your goals.
And I will tell you that the process of setting goals and expectations is very hard.
This is difficult.
It's number one for a reason.
It is hard.
It's hard because in our training in medicine, there's the prescribed path.
There's like, this is where everybody goes.
This is at the end of four years, you graduate medical school, there's no questions asked.
At the end of three years, the residency is over.
This is the way it works all the time.
And when we get to the place where we're planning our own careers, there isn't such a clear
path.
And so we haven't been practicing the muscle of defining where we want to go.
And so it's something that we haven't been exercising the muscle of defining where we
want to go.
And so it's helpful that we start to do that.
So setting clear goals and expectations for yourself is the most important first step
in making the best use of your mentors.
So that's number one.
Number two is to communicate these goals and expectations.
And so sometimes, okay, number two is to communicate these goals and expectations effectively.
So you know where you're going inside your head, but nobody else knows it.
They still can't help you get there or give you the directions that are necessary to get
you there.
Because although the goals are very clear to you, you're not communicating them.
And part of communicating is really being open and honest.
And this can be really hard, this effective communication, because we don't want to disappoint
our mentors.
If we come into their program and they say, oh, my goodness, I'm so glad you're here with
your expertise, you're going to help me move this project forward.
It's going to be so awesome.
And you're a little bit deflated because you're like, well, that's not why you wanted that
mentor specifically.
And you're not interested in moving in that new direction.
But you don't want to disappoint them.
And maybe they're the number one research mentor in the whole institution, and you don't
want to be the one mentee who fails in their expectation.
And so then you don't share.
You don't share that that's not where you want to go.
And then you start on a project that you don't really want to be on.
And it can be challenging.
And so that's why you need to maintain open and honest communication with your mentors.
And if there's something you disagree with, if there's a direction they're trying to take
you in that you don't want to go, the importance of stopping and saying, hey, I really love
that idea.
And that's not where I want to go.
And that's where it goes back to number one, setting clear goals and expectations.
So you do know when you're veering off tangent, and you can be very clear and communicate
it to a mentor.
And so you want to make sure that you are open and honest in your communication.
And if you're not able to do that, I will tell you that this is where a coach can be
helpful to help you clarify what is your desire.
What is the challenge that you have?
What is your true feeling about it?
So that you can then choose how to best communicate with your mentor.
So you definitely want to make sure that your communication is open, it's honest, it's effective.
You want to keep them up to date on your goals.
And you know, as goals are changing, because goals are not static things.
You master something, you want to move on to the next thing.
Or you see that you have a new direction you want to set.
You want to be able to communicate them clearly so that as the mentor is trying to help you
move forward, they know exactly how to do that.
Okay, so that's number two, communicate effectively.
Number three is to be proactive.
You've got to be proactive.
I was not a proactive mentee.
I was the one who was always waiting for the mentor to find me and say, hey, how's it going?
What do you need?
And to be honest, when I finally, I think grew up in my mentoring relationships, I recognized
that the mentoring relationships were for me, therefore I needed to be proactive in
the mentoring relationships.
And part of that is making sure you're clear on how this mentor helps you like, how does
this mentor help you?
And if you are very clear about the gap that you're trying to fill with this mentoring
relationship, then take ownership and fill the gap.
Help the mentor help you schedule the meetings as you need to prepare questions and topics
for discussion.
Don't let them don't don't show up.
And then they're like, oh, great, I'm glad you're here.
This is what I want to talk about.
I mean, it's great if they want to do that.
But you have a clear purpose and a plan for this mentor in your life.
So you want to make sure you are proactive in, you know, preparing the questions that
help you, the help lead you to the answers that move your research forward.
And so when you're proactive and demonstrating your commitment, it helps.
It helps because well, the person who has specificity around where they want to go is
so much easier to help than the person who's just not sure, doesn't really want to reach
out.
And to be honest, you know, mentors have so much going on in their lives that if you never
showed up, they might they might wonder where you are, but they may not necessarily have
the bandwidth to reach out and say, how are you doing?
And remember, a mentoring relationship is not like a mother, son or mother daughter
relationship.
This is not like a nurturing, like, oh, my love, how are you?
It's great if you have that and if you have that wonderful, good for you.
But it doesn't need to be that way.
It really is a professional relationship.
And if you are getting what you need in your personal and professional goal, I'm sorry,
if you're getting what you need in terms of your research growth, good for you.
That's pretty much you have what you need.
And maybe your mentor is not warm and fuzzy.
Remember, you're not there for this mentor for warmness, warmth and fuzziness.
You can have other mentors, especially outside of academia, to give you the warmth and fuzziness
needed.
But you want to be clear about how this mentor helps you.
And then you want to be proactive about getting them to help you.
The other thing is the importance of learning from your mentors experiences.
So your mentors are living in a different world, or at least they came up at a different
time, a different era than you are.
They had different challenges.
But overall, the themes are similar.
And so it's helpful to learn from their experience.
It's helpful to listen more than you speak.
So yes, you're the one being proactive.
You're the one who's bringing the agenda.
You're the one who's saying, hey, this is how I want you to help me.
But when you do ask questions, you want to make sure you listen.
You know, let them ask them questions about their past successes and their failures.
Ask especially about the failures.
People don't talk about failures enough.
And sometimes hearing about the failures is enough for you.
It inspires you and encourages you.
Because you're like, oh, you failed.
And you're still here or you're doing awesome, even though you failed.
And it just helps you move forward in a different way.
But the only way you find out is when you listen.
And so in listening, you are able to get insights that perhaps you wouldn't have been able to
get before when you're very focused on just, you know, the challenge that's ahead of you.
And so definitely take time to listen and learn from their experiences and make sure
that you are able to really leverage that to the growth and advancement of your own
career.
Another thing that's important is to really show them gratitude, is to show mentors gratitude.
And it's just that, to be honest, this is something that applies to everybody, anybody
who at any time meets with you to speak with you about your career.
It's just to say thank you.
It's really just simple just to say thank you.
It says, hey, I value your time.
I value expertise.
Thank you for taking this time to meet with me.
And it may be that you're supporting your mentors program and your work is also moving
their work forward, which is great.
And I think it's just important actually that we acknowledge each other and we thank each
other for the things we do that allow us to move forward in a big and important way.
And anyway, so it's important.
It's important to do these things.
So I want to just go through these five things again.
You want to make sure you have clear goals and expectations.
You want to communicate effectively, honestly, openly.
You want to be proactive and take ownership and direct your own career.
You want to learn from their experiences and you want to show gratitude because it is so
important that we show gratitude to people who help us move forward.
So I say all that and I want to share with you and remind you that you are leading your
own career.
You absolutely are.
And part of finding the way to make the most of your mentors is being clear about where
you're going.
And if you're not clear, to do the work of getting clear.
And that's where I think a coach can be helpful.
And if you're a clinician looking for a coach who can help you make that transition, build
the infrastructure in your life to be able to successfully make that transition from
clinician to clinician scientist, I would love to work with you.
Please come work with me.
Send me a DM.
I'm on Facebook, Instagram and LinkedIn.
And let me know how I can be of help to you.
And if it makes sense for both of us, then we move forward.
But it is important to recognize that you need to take ownership.
Whatever is necessary to do that so that you can make the most of the mentors in your life
is absolutely worth doing.
Ultimately, you are responsible for your career.
You're responsible for the choices that are made.
Even if your mentor strongly recommends something and it doesn't work out, you are still responsible
for the fallout.
So definitely make use of the people that you have around you.
And remember that you ultimately are leading your own experience and you get to you get
to choose.
You absolutely get to choose.
All right.
It has been a pleasure talking with you today.
Thank you for taking the time to listen.
Thanks for listening to this episode of the Clinician Researcher podcast, where academic
clinicians learn the skills to build their own research program, whether or not they
have a mentor.
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