Informal Mentorship in Education: The Influence That Changes Everything
What’s the difference between formal and informal mentorship?
There are two types of leadership or influence you can have in someone’s life. The first is formal or direct, shaped by the nature of the title you carry (e.g., teacher, mentor, parent, pastor). The next is informal or more peripheral, and it is often given power through relationship and genuine care. What makes you stand out as an educator is how you engage with that unique relationship with more informal influence.
How can educators identify the informal mentors in their own lives?
Reflect on the people who are influential in your life. This could be people who have leadership titles and those who might not have formal titles. Think about the similarities in the influence they practice. Think about the differences. Recognizing who the people are who influence you is an important step in growing in your role as a person who influences others, and in growing more familiar with who you are. Discover more about the power you have as a mentor when you make this your next read.
How do you honor someone who informally mentored you?
Celebrate your reflection on the influence they’ve had in your life by honoring them and the role they’ve had in your life. Write them a letter. Share the story of their influence with those you influence, so that their influence carries forward. Or, hold 5 minutes to make space to remember and even to pray for this person who’s been influential to you. You can also pray about causes they care(d) about.
What does it mean to show up authentically as an educator?
Showing up as yourself means sometimes stepping into a situation prepared with the knowledge that no plan of action survives as it is in the draft when met with the realities of life. Creativity and innovation come from this inability of plans to survive the external stressors that come with real life. What’s left is the organic and lasting difference authenticity makes in the life of the person or people in front of you.
How does informal mentorship impact educators in the classroom?
Informal mentorship affects you as an educator both through your role as an educator and as you operate as a mindful influencer. When you’re mindful of your role as an influencer, it encourages you to come more from a place of authenticity. This also facilitates your showing up in any environment, confident in who you are, in what your strengths are, and in how you operate most naturally through those difficulties. That confidence carries into how those you teach understand the environment present in your classroom. By doing this, you create an environment that fosters and facilitates learning. Students are met with instructors who care, and the difference that makes to the learning process and to the lives you affect means more than you know.
Can peripheral influence be as powerful as formal mentorship?
Peripheral influence is often at its strongest when one is living in a space of care. You might be a link in a chain that makes a difference in someone’s life. Or, your first insights into how someone understands an interaction you’ve had with them could be wrong, and it could’ve meant more than you know. You don’t always know. But you can always operate from that place of care, even when that seems like a scary place to operate from.
When I was in the ninth grade, my English teacher threatened to hit me upside the head with the relatively weighty English/Language Arts textbook, the then-standard for classrooms in the state of Texas. More specifically, she threatened to hit me upside the head with it if I ever stopped writing. At first, I was shocked that she actually said that. Then, I realized what she meant.
At that time, school had been a nightmare for me that I just tried to make it through from a sensory and experiential point of view. My earliest conscious memory of school was in my earlier years. Students were lined up in rows in the dark, sitting outside on the school’s basketball court, surrounded by a fence made of metal cross-wire. And, it wasn’t just one class. It was every class from the school.
And, as we sat there in this unfamiliar environment, I felt a sense of disorientation as the sun began to light the dark sky. Learning how to make it through the environment of school had been a struggle since then, as I tried to navigate the noise of the typical school day and the different personalities of the children that came with it.
But, on this day of ninth grade, sitting in my English class after reading in front of the class a poem I’d written, I was met with these words from my teacher. It had meant a lot at that time that someone had recognized a strength in me. It wasn’t something I had been ready to hear, but hearing that vote of confidence planted a seed that grew into something more.
That’s something I want you to keep in mind. The mentor you are, or the influence you are, might not be something that the person you’re influencing is ready to hear in a moment or can recognize in a moment. But what you do matters.
The Teacher as Mentor: Direct and Peripheral Influence
Part of recognizing this starts with reviewing the different types of influence. There are two types of leadership or influence that you can have in someone’s life. The first is formal or direct. These direct avenues can be shaped by the nature of the title that you carry—teacher, mentor, professor, parent, pastor, Christian Leader, etc. Your title in this role makes people understand that you are someone who should be listened to. The next is informal or more peripheral. In your role, you have that more direct influence already, even if it might not feel like it sometimes. What makes you stand out as an educator and as someone operating authentically is how you engage with that unique relationship with more informal influence.
More peripheral influence is often given power through relationship, and when those you’re interacting with realize that you’re a person who genuinely cares. There can be a crossover between these, but peripheral influence is often at its strongest when one is living in that space of care. Because of that, it might not even be realized when it’s achieved.
Recognizing Informal Mentorship in Education
Reflect on the people who are influential in your life, both the people who have leadership titles and those who might not have formal titles. Think about the similarities. Think about the differences. What stands out to you?
Now that you’ve taken the time to reflect, honor that reflection. Celebrate that reflection by honoring those who’ve inspired you and the role they’ve had in your life. Here are some ways you can do this:
- Write them a letter. If they’re still living, it could mean a lot to know that they’ve influenced you, how they’ve influenced you and your life journey, and to know that this influence was meaningful enough to you that you wanted to reach out.
- Share the story of their influence on your life with those you influence, so that their influence carries forward.
- Hold 5 minutes to make space to remember and even to pray for this person who’s been influential to you. Or, if they’ve passed on, take time to thank God for their influence and maybe even to pray for a cause that was close to their heart.
Never underestimate the power of showing up authentically as yourself. Even in interactions that may feel like failed ones. This is super important, especially in today’s environment, where social disconnect can make interactions that once might have seemed simple, more polarizing. You might be a link in a chain that makes a difference in someone’s life. Or, you might have an interaction that seems to have failed or been filled with difficulty or blocks and barriers. But that person could walk away from that interaction with an entirely different perception than you’ve had.
Recognizing who the people are who influence you is an important step in growing in your role as a person who influences others. And, it’s an important step in growing more familiar with who you are and how you can be more authentic in your interactions.
The Teacher as Mentor: When The Plan Falls Apart
Showing up as yourself means sometimes stepping into a situation, prepared with the knowledge that no plan of action survives as it is in the draft when met with the realities of life. Creativity and innovation come from this inability of plans to survive these external stressors that come with real life. What’s left is the organic and lasting difference authenticity makes in the life of the person or people in front of you—sometimes in ways you can imagine. Other times, it happens in ways you don’t expect.
The very first time I led a training, I showed up woefully unprepared. I had prepared to present with slides and had shown up for that with spirals and pens to hand out because my training topic was about how writing was a healing instrument that could be used to encourage people to open up in counseling sessions. I used the knowledge I had to present and, by the end of it, was sure I’d failed. I followed up a week later with the group I had walked through this training, expecting to hear them say that the training was a bad experience and nothing had come from it. I was surprised to find that not only had they viewed the training as a success. They had also started to experience success with the implementation of the information and practices I’d trained them on. Something I’d viewed as definitely a failure was something that had been used by God to help people I’d met once help people I probably will never meet. And that’s also what happens with more peripheral types of influence. You don’t always know. But you can always operate from that place of care that, as an educator, may seem like a scary place to operate from sometimes. Ultimately, the benefit is that you get to show up to interactions as authentically you.
Another great way to learn more about mentorship is to connect with Ruth and Scott on the Ruth and Scott Podcast. Have you listened to the newest episode yet?