Mentoring at work

More and more organisations are using mentoring to help staff develop at work. This web-based course provides ideas, resources, support and feedback to improve mentoring effectiveness.

Mentoring varies from casual, informal agreements to give colleagues feedback about work, to formal supervision and assessment processes. The course works across the range of approaches.

It builds on and uses your own competence as the key resource for helping others unearth their own skills. The course helps you understand your workplace as a learning environment. You'll undertake activities that help you and your mentee/colleague improve your performance at work.

What you will study

On this course, you’ll learn how to use mentoring – both formal and informal – to help staff learn and develop at work. You work at your own pace through study material and activities that examine key areas:

• how to fit the mentor role within your work time
• using your workplace as a learning environment
• optimising development opportunities from ordinary work experiences
• tools to use to make mentoring effective.

You assess your own practice and skill as a resource for mentoring and undertake and write up an episode of mentoring.

There are five main parts to this course:

• taking on the mentoring role
• understanding your workplace
• logging competence
• learning moments
• work-based activity.

By the end of this course you will be able to:

• profile your work environment in terms of the learning possibilities it offers
• recognise and deploy your own competence as a resource for mentoring
• support a colleague in ways agreed to support and develop their learning at work
• identify significant moments for learning during the course of working together with your mentee
• identify and refine a set of tools that help you undertake mentoring
• evaluate a mentoring project you have undertaken.

This course is for managers and professionals who use mentoring to help their staff learn and develop at work. It will also be of interest to you if you are:

• mentoring new or recently promoted staff who have an opportunity to be mentored as part of a corporate leadership/management programme
• in a profession where permanent mentoring is part of the career structure
• teamed up with a co-worker to support each other in developing your professional expertise
• formally assessing pre- or post-qualifying trainees/students who have come to your work setting and have been designated as your mentee.

The strong link between course learning and your work practice creates relevant, enduring and transferable outcomes. The course will take 30 hours to study and includes web text, interviews, self-assessment questions and activities. The course contains a series of bite-size chunks, each devoted to both technical and managerial topics. Register online today and start tomorrow – no need to wait!

The course features the distinctive strengths of The Open University from its years of expertise in work-based learning:

• The convenience of accessing its clearly presented and sequenced materials, activities and support whenever suits you and wherever you have access to the dedicated website – if you prefer, you can print key materials to work on them offline.
• The support of an expert learning adviser who can clarify study materials, answer questions and help you relate the course to your specific needs.
• A work-based activity helping you to connect the course to your individual and organisational context and needs. At the end of the course you send this to the learning adviser, who provides personal feedback.
• Certification of completion from the OU for those who complete the course. You can use this to demonstrate your continuing professional development (CPD) activity to your employer and/or professional body. (N.B. The course does not carry academic credit points.)

Entry

Although there are no formal academic requirements to study any of our CPD courses, you are expected to have some experience in the field and the course assumes a familiarity with the subject.

For each course you can register and begin at any time during the life of the course. You can study at your own pace and submit your work-based activity at any date before the final submission date for the course. Information about the final submission date is available when you register for the course.

If you have a disability

The course is delivered online and makes use of a variety of online resources. If you use specialist hardware or software to assist you in using a computer or the internet you are advised to talk to the Student Registration and Enquiry Service about support which can be given to meet your needs. If you are a new learner with the OU, make sure you look at our website.

Study materials

What's included

All learning materials, exercises, study support and work-based activity are delivered entirely online.

Computing requirements

You will need a computer with internet access to study this course as it includes online activities, which you can access using a web browser.

• If you have purchased a new desktop or laptop computer since 2007 you should have no problems completing the online activities.
• If you’ve got a netbook, tablet or other mobile computing device check our Technical requirements section.
• If you use an Apple Mac you will need OS X 10.6 or later.

You can also visit the Technical requirements section for further computing information including the details of the support we provide.

Learner support

Expert, confidential learner support is available when you need it from a learning adviser, who will respond to you direct within 24 hours. Other support is available via the GK016 forum, library, StudentHome website and computing helpdesk.

Work-based activity

The work-based activity for this course is a written report and has been designed as an integrated ongoing activity that you submit at the end of your study. It will allow you to reflect on your learning and how to use it in your professional work.

Professional recognition

Successful completion of the course enables us to recognise your achievement of the course learning by issuing an OU certificate that you can use to document your commitment to continuing professional development in your personal portfolio or to provide evidence to employers or professional body.

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Students who studied this course also studied at some time:

• Start listening to music (A179)

Student Reviews

Student Reviews

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