3 tips for focusing on warmth, 'wants' & wisdom

How can you help people to reach their goals? One approach is to follow the steps taken by good mentors and workshop leaders. First, warmth. They provide a warm environment in which people feel at east. Second, ‘wants’. They find out what the person – or the people – want to achieve. Third, wisdom. They use their wisdom to help people to get what they want.

Imagine you are facilitating an individual mentoring session or a team workshop. Before the session you will anticipate what people want to achieve. If you are meeting an individual, you will set-aside time to rehearse the possible scenarios – including the challenges they may want to tackle. If you are running a team workshop, you will have talked with the leader and agreed on crystal-clear goals. Whether working with an individual or a team, you will then take the following steps.

* You can focus on warmth.

Great mentors make people feel valued and the centre of the world. They are warm - but in a real way. Why? There are at least three reasons. First, they are generous and want to encourage others to succeed. Second, they are educators at heart. So they pass-on tools and knowledge that people can use in their own way. Third, they want to provide an environment in which people can explore - which is why they create a stimulating sanctuary.

Great workshop facilitators also make people feel welcome. They start by ‘getting the physical things’ right. So they will go out of their way to create a learning environment in which people feel at ease. The room, chairs and food have to be right. They then open the workshop in an inspiring way. Why? Creating a warm environment encourages the participants to explore, receive honest messages and work hard to reach their goals. Warmth – rather then sternness – is more likely to deliver great results.

Everybody has their own style of creating these conditions. How can you do it in your own way? Try tackling the exercise on this theme. First, describe a specific situation where you want to help people to achieve their goals. Second, describe what you can do to create an environment where people will feel at ease. Try completing the following sentences.

The specific situation in which I want to help people to reach their goals is:

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The specific things I can do to be warm and create an environment where people will open-up are:

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* You can focus on ‘wants’.

You have already anticipated what people want from the session - but now it is important to make this ‘official’. Mentors do this on several levels. First, they obviously ask the person what they want to explore in the session. Second, they get the bigger picture by inviting the person to describe their longer-term aims - such as the legacy they want to leave – and listen for the key themes in what the person is saying. Third, they link the short and long-term aims to agree on what the person wants to take away from the session. Workshop facilitators explain the anticipated goals and check these fit with the team’s agenda. If appropriate, they may ask if people want to add any other topics. They then embark on the workshop.

How can you do this in your own way? Let’s return to the situation in which you want to help people to reach their goals. You have already established a warm atmosphere – now it is time to clarify their aims. Try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to clarify people’s ‘wants’ – the specific goals they want to achieve – are:


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* You can focus on wisdom.

Great mentors pass-on their wisdom in a way that enables people to reach their goals. They offer practical tools that the mentee can use in their daily work and life. Bearing in mind the results the person wants to achieve, the mentor ask: a) What is the person doing well – and how can they do more of these things? b) What can the person do better – and how? c) What are the models, tools and knowledge I want to offer to help them to reach their goals? How can I pass these on in a way the person can accept? Mentors aim to add to and expand a mentee’s repertoire. The person then has more options for making good decisions and achieving their picture of success. Workshop facilitators also pass-on their ideas. But one of their greatest talents is creating environments in which people share their knowledge. The participants can then draw on many resources to reach their goals.

Let’s return to the situation where you want to help people to achieve success. How can you pass-on your wisdom? How can you channel the wisdom of a team? Try completing the following sentence.

The specific things I can do to pass-on wisdom – or channel a team’s wisdom – to help people to reach their goals are:

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“Warmth, ‘wants’ and wisdom,” sounds simple in theory – but it can be hard in practice. People who follow these steps, however, are more likely to help others to reach their goals.

You can find out more about this approach in The Art of Mentoring, which can be found here:

Theartofmentoring