Frequently Asked Questions

 

• What am I expected to do? Mentors are expected to provide their mentee with at least one hour of support and interaction every three weeks. This support and interaction can take place 'face-to-face' either in person, or over video-conferencing. Support and mentoring can also take place through emails, phone calls, and texting.  Mentors should work with their mentee to determine what kind of support will be most useful—specific feedback related to leadership development, academic success, mental and emotional wellness support,  Coast Guard career advice, information on higher studies, technical information, personal encouragement, and so on. To help you do that, we provide Chronus with a vast array of capability for you to use in  your mentoring relationship. We are providing the system for widest use with all of its capabilities to any and all who want to engage and leverage the tool. However, we are only requiring a very small portion of the capabilities be used by everyone to capture strategic metrics to evaluate the benefits and impacts of the system.  As mentors, we want to remove most of the CMP administrative burden from the cadets, so we as mentors are signing up acknowledging we will shoulder that responsibility.

    

• How long will the commitment be? We require our mentors to make a commitment of one year, from CGAS Summer through Reporting Day in order to ensure that the mentee is able to fully benefit from the relationship. If a mentor must leave the relationship early, we request at least one month's notice in order to search for a replacement mentor with similar background. It is our hope your relationship will continue past the first year and long into the future. 

    

• Are there any potential risks to me or the Coast Guard? It is important to always be vigilant in what information is entered into a data system. Refrain from entering any potential harmful information that would be compromising such as PII, HIPAA, OPSEC , or PERSEC information. 

    

• Who is this program open to? The program is open to 1/c-3/c cadets to be mentors. Cadets on a probationary or disciplinary status will not be eligible to be a mentor until they are restored to normal status.

    

• What should I do if my mentoring relationship isn't going well?​ We encourage letting the mentee know about the situation and contacting a program administrator as soon as possible. We will provide our full support to resolve the situation in a positive and satisfactory manner.

Mentor DO's

1. Commit at least one interaction/hour of support every three weeks. Do so being flexible in schedule with the needs of the mentee. 
2. Set aside time for the mentoring process and honor all appointments.
3.  Provide the required administrative work within the Chronus platform. This will include logging your meeting events, completing surveys, and following the connection plan checklist. This will take about 15 minutes a month. 
4. Invite the mentee to meetings or activities, as appropriate. Schedule meetings with planned topics.
5. Be flexible on meeting times and places. Take advantage of free coffee at the Drydock provided for mentoring meetings!
6. Leverage all means of communications, like videoconferencing, emails, texts, phone calls and always as much face-to-face contact as possible.
7. Use the vast array of resources provided in the Chronus electronic library, such as career guides, podcasts, etc. 
8. Respond to emails from your mentee within one day of receipt.
9. Keep information that your mentee has shared with you confidential. If something concerning the mentee needs to be discussed with others, it should first be discussed within the mentoring relationship.
10. Establish open and honest communication and a forum for idea exchange.
11. Foster creativity and independence. Help build self-confidence and offer encouragement.
12. Provide honest and timely feedback to your mentee.
13. Provide opportunities for the mentee to talk about concerns and ask questions.
14. Be open to the possibility the connection may not work out. Be flexible and understanding if the Scholar requests another mentor
15. Above all, LISTEN.

Mentor DON'Ts

1. Try to give advice on everything.
2. Drive a rigid inflexible schedule that would make the cadet feel trapped.
3. Provide your personal history, problems, animosities, successes, failures, etc., unless they are constructive contributions.
4. Be too busy when the mentee needs your friendship or your support. If you do not have time, give the mentee a heads up, so that they know when they can reach you.
5. Criticize or interrogate.