Most people leave mentoring relationships significantly underutilised — not because the relationship lacks potential, but because they never figured out how to use it well. A mentor’s time and attention are genuinely valuable and finite. Here is how to make sure you are getting the most out of the relationship.

Understand What You Actually Want From This Mentor

Not all mentors are useful for the same things. Before you invest in a mentoring relationship, be specific about what this particular person can help you with — and make sure that maps to what you actually need.

Some questions worth working through in Blomma before your next session: What decisions am I currently wrestling with where their perspective would be valuable? What experiences have they had that I want to understand better? What doors might they open, and are those the doors I want to walk through?

The answers should shape every session. A mentoring relationship without a purpose is just a nice periodic conversation.

Come Prepared Every Time

The fastest way to waste a mentor’s time and enthusiasm is to show up without preparation. Even five minutes of thinking in advance — what do I want from this conversation, what have I tried since we last spoke, what specific question do I want to explore — produces dramatically better sessions than arriving open-ended.

A useful structure for preparation:

• Where I am since we last spoke (brief update, including what I tried)

• The one or two things I most want input on

• Any specific asks (an introduction, a perspective, a piece of advice on a concrete situation)

Take Notes and Actually Act on Them

Mentors notice when nothing changes between sessions. If you receive advice, input, or suggestions and make no observable progress on them, the mentor’s motivation to invest in the relationship diminishes.

After each session, note the two or three things you took away and what you are going to do with them. Use Blomma’s accountability partner to track the commitments you make — the mentor will not always remember to follow up, but you should behave as though they will.

Ask Better Questions

The quality of a mentoring conversation is largely determined by the quality of the questions asked. Closed questions get short answers. Generic questions get generic advice. Specific, well-constructed questions tend to produce the most useful input.

Instead of: “What advice would you give to someone at my career stage?”
Try: “I am deciding between X and Y and here is my current thinking — what would I be missing or misweighting?”

Instead of: “How did you get to where you are?”
Try: “The decision you made to move from X to Y is exactly the kind of decision I am facing — what did you see at the time that made you confident about it?”

Be Honest About What Is Actually Going On

Many mentoring relationships stay at the surface because the mentee presents only the polished version of their situation. Mentors — who are often further along in their careers and have made most of the same mistakes — are most useful when they understand what is actually going on, not what you wish were going on.

Frequently Asked Questions

How often should I meet with my mentor?

Monthly is a common cadence that balances regularity with enough time between sessions for meaningful things to have happened. Quarterly is fine if that is all the mentor has. More frequently than monthly can become burden on the relationship if each session is not packed with genuine progress.

What if the mentoring relationship is not delivering value?

Name it gently and directly: “I have been reflecting on how I am using our time and I want to make sure I am making the most of it — can we talk about what would make these conversations most useful for both of us?” That conversation usually improves things. If it does not, ending the relationship graciously and finding a better-fit mentor is reasonable.

Is it OK to have more than one mentor?

Yes, and for most people it is advisable. Different mentors can cover different areas of your career or life, bring different perspectives, and open different networks. The key is being intentional about each relationship.

How do I give back to my mentor?

Time, updates on where your career goes, gratitude expressed specifically (not generally), and introductions or value where you genuinely can. The thing most mentors want most is to see their mentee succeed — sending a note when something they advised contributed to a good outcome matters more than most people realize.

Can Blomma and a human mentor work together?

Very well. Blomma handles the day-to-day accountability and goal tracking. A mentor handles the less frequent but deeper conversations that benefit from lived experience. They cover different layers of the same development need.