If you're wondering why I'm writing about mentors in a personal finance blog, it's for a good reason.  While mentors can help you greatly in your personal life, they can also help you with your personal finances as well.  I was once told "if you want to learn how to make a million dollars, ask a millionaire".  While I have yet to find my millionaire, I have found people who have helped me personally, and upon occasion, even financially.

 

How can a mentor help you?  Since I am only focusing on personal finance, I will attest that a mentor can help you significantly in that aspect.  Probably the biggest area a mentor can help you on is your career, which is most of this writing.  You can also have people mentor you regarding investments, savings, applying for jobs, edit your resume, even doing things like teach you how to fix your house instead of having someone else fix it. 

 

Why people mentor.  While a lot of this sounds great, you may have wondered why would anyone spend the time mentoring you in the first place.  The benefit to the mentor himself would be the opportunity for personal growth.  While you learn from your mentor, your job is to teach them as well.  Someone who has been in an industry for a while for example could also learn about new technologies and how to apply them.  Also, a mentor who is so well respected in the first place, has probably learned a little about networking with people.  He has probably found that people like yourself who is networking and asking questions may be able to help him later down the road.

 

How to find a mentor.  There are many types of mentors to chose from, depending on your needs.

 

1.  See if there is a mentor program within your company.  I personally know a woman who recently found that her company has a mentor program that she could sign up for.  When she signed up, she actually was able to pick the V.P. over her division as someone she could be a protégé to.  It also helps nicely in her case, since by simply being in this program also gives her something to add to her yearly review.

 

2.  Job-Shadowing programs.  Many companies also have a "job shadowing" program, where you can sit in and watch someone doing the job that you would like to do.  You should try to connect with the person you are shadowing with and get contact information from them, so that you can ask for advice later on.

 

3.  Mentors for hire.  As you can see from this article in CNN, you can hire a mentor who has worked his way to what you consider your ultimate dream job.  The article mentions that for $5,000, your mentor can check up on you every few weeks to help you with questions and guide you.

 

4.  Keeping in  touch with old college professors.  College professors in your industry are often well connected with other people.  Much of the time they have had a very successful career in the "outside world", and have chose to come back to college to teach.  They also tend to continue their outside careers by being highly-paid consultants.  Keeping in touch with your professors is one of the best things you can do in your early career.

 

5.  Check out industry groups.  Most careers have industry groups tied to them.  These groups can also help network you to successful people within your industry who would make great mentors.

 

6.  Bloggers on the internet.  There are a lot of experts today who are writing blogs to share their knowledge with others.  Many of them have even blossomed into having large, active communities in which they share information with each other, and offer questions and topics for the blogger to write.

 

7.  Books.  While most people will never have the once-in-a-lifetime opportunity of being mentored by Warren Buffet regarding investments or a successful career, we can at least read about it from several books he has written.  Find yourself a high-profiled, successful person that you would like to emulate in your own life.  More than likely, they've already written a book on how they've reached their success.

 

Now it's time to act.  I've given some significant reasons as to why a mentor can help your finances, as well as ways to find a mentor.  Now your job is to act, and pursue the help you need.  You don't have to reinvent the wheel when someone has already done it for you.  Finding a mentor can help you significantly, shaving off years of mistakes that you could potentially put yourself through, and help you reach your career goals. 

 

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