Consumers Credit Union has been implementing a successful employee mentorship program for several years. Tune into this week’s episode of Money, I’m Home as Lynne talks about how this innovative program was started and how you could implement something similar at your business or organization.

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0:00:06.7 Lynne Jarman-Johnson (LJJ): Money, I’m Home. Welcome in. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union. From finance to fitness, we have it all. And today, we have such a special topic. It’s really something that’s close to my heart and to our guest’s heart as well. This is Kristen Davidson, she is our [now former] VP of Organizational Development here at Consumers. Man, what a great title, Kristen.

0:00:28.0 Kristen Davidson (KD): Thanks, Lynne. It’s a lot of fun. I absolutely love it.

0:00:31.7 LJJ: Let’s get into what your background is. Our topic today is something I think you’ll all want to really pay attention to and it’s all about mentorship. And it’s something that can truly change your life, whether you’re a mentor or a mentee. Kristen, tell us, how did you get into organizational development? And then we’ll get into the mentorship side.

0:00:51.0 KD: Yeah. Absolutely, Lynne. Thank you for having me and for sharing this part of the story. I really got into organizational development; it’s just happened very naturally. My passion is adult learning and training, all realms of how to help somebody love their job and do their job great while learning from me and my mistakes. Don’t do what I did, right? And that’s really kind of similar to the mentor side of I want to share my experiences and things that were good and things that weren’t so someone else can learn from those passions and those situations that have happened along the way. As I’ve been with the credit union almost 10 years now, what started as a training and development manager role has then grown into more succession planning, performance management, other aspects of human resources including DE&IB. I’m here for the Credit Union and that’s really grown into what we now have as a VP of Organizational Development.

0:01:50.3 LJJ: Well, here is what is so exciting to me. We are a Best and Brightest national elite company, we have been for many years, and that actually takes a lot of hard work which you and your team are constantly opening doors for us as we learn and grow, and it doesn’t matter what level you are in the organization. I think that’s what the coolest part about all this. And one of the programs that we have here at Consumers, and if you’d like to know anything about this, just reach out to Kristen or I, we can get you information, is our mentorship program. And this is a program that’s an internal program that connects individuals to really help us both succeed, and I don’t say that lightly. I have been a mentor and I am currently one right now with just a wonderful female professional. It fills my bucket, but it is so much fun to learn growth and where we want to get to professionally in an organization.

0:02:46.7 KD: Absolutely Lynne. You know, what you said, most people say it from a mentor perspective, I think our mentors, myself included, get more out of it than the mentee. And that is, it’s incredibly rewarding and fulfilling experience that people love to do. You hit it on the head too, that we have everyone in the organization from a brand-new employee, they might be here for three months to somebody that’s been here for years to somebody that’s an executive. We really work hard and it’s incredibly intentional on how we pair our people together and we really try and pair based off of the balance of strengths, so that’s something we have at the credit union. We don’t just say, “We give you the book, discover your strengths and what are your top 34,” but we truly have it ingrained through our leadership development programs, we have it ingrained through your profile on our intranet. So, people can pull up and say, “Okay, what are Kristen’s top five and what does that mean?” And when we say, oh, maybe she has woo in her or Lynne has woo in her. We have definitions to understand what does woo look like and woo can be positive and negative depending on our situation. And then we balance that to their mentor, so the mentee and the mentor, we have a balance of who can complement each other by their strengths, who can complement each other by their behavior styles and overall, their career growth. What are they wanting to accomplish?

0:04:14.3 LJJ: Hey, tell us a little bit about how you started this program with us and how it’s grown, and what are you saying… Give us an example of this year, have you already heard stories… I mean, I personally could tell one, but I’d love to hear from you.

0:04:28.1 KD: Yeah, so we started this… I would say we had a very informal mentor program in the beginning, about maybe eight to nine years ago, we said, “Let’s take us to the next level,” and it really started with actually our young leaders, young in their career leaders wanting to grow into an office manager as an example, that was the most common back then, and then it started to become a little more formal and several… Wait a minute, I’m in another role in a support department, and I also want to grow into the next level manager, but I’m not really sure who to connect with or what do I need to do. And that really started with the foundation of people coming to us saying, “What do we need to do to get to that next level?”

0:05:09.3 KD: And while we have a phenomenal internal leadership series, and we work with local institutions to also help us with leadership development, such as Kalamazoo Valley Community College, we also then have another layer of our mentor program, and it’s getting them together, it’s completing a form, it’s understanding what somebody is what we call passion and purpose is, and that is, I would say it’s a form unique to us at Consumers Credit Union, where we really say, “Hey, what are your strengths? How do you like to be recognized? What’s your statement? What is your purpose statement? What do you want to do in life?” We really kind of threw out what people know as traditional Individual Development Plans or IDPs, and really wanted to form something that was more of a culture and more of who we are and said, what makes you thrive? What do you want to do? Why do you love to do that? And then let’s get you to that next level.

0:06:00.2 KD: And that’s really where our mentor program speared from, was taking our leadership groups and taking our individuals who have said, “I want to go to the next level, I’m not sure how” and said “Well, let’s pair you up and let’s learn from others within the credit union.” I have people that have been paired up now four years, the attention is, we do this every spring, we have a kick-off together, every spring where they get together. They start to align. We have a series of questions in a workbook that are completed with mentor and mentee after we have done the facilitation of the morning session, and then what’s really neat is we ask that they commit to one another once a month, and that commitment is by both mentor and mentee, it is wherever and whenever it works for the two of them where they can thrive.

0:06:47.5 KD: That is the most important piece is, where do you thrive and where can you thrive together? It’s a lot of fun. We have met… Like I said, we have some people who never stopped, they still meet with their mentees and their mentors four years later, and it’s just discussions and its relationship and its transparency and it’s trust, and it really helps us grow from the inside.

0:07:09.8 LJJ: So, Kristen you mentioned something that I think is very important, that’s the word culture, and there might be companies that are listening, HR professionals, CEOs, any business leader who wants to go to the next level with intentional mentorship. Do you have some ideas for kickoff?

0:07:25.5 KD: That’s a great question, Lynne. And I really think it starts with understanding, what do your people want? What makes you think you need a mentor program, and then start to dig and ask questions and ask deeper questions, and you might find that they really don’t want an individual mentor, maybe they want a networking group in the area, maybe they want to grow within the community, or maybe it is somebody specific that wants to grow in a certain role at the credit union or at your company, it’s important to know that we don’t partner… If I want to be the next CMO, I’m not going to partner myself with you Lynne as the CMO, we don’t partner people by a role that they think they want to have or a department that they think they want to have. It really comes back to understanding what is it they want to grow. Why do they want to grow? What do they feel that you have some opportunities to grow in, and then matching and having incredible intention to understanding the mentors needs and the mentees strengths and why we would put them together and how they can balance one another that I really… I can’t stress that enough. Don’t focus on somebody that wants to grow and partner by department or role, but partner and grow by their strengths and their personalities.

0:08:41.4 LJJ: Well, I can tell you that for me, on a personal note, I had a mentor for many, many years, and her name was Lauren Kennedy, and she was a CEO of a non-profit, was absolutely one of the most integral persons in my life that changed the direction of my life that I to this day, know that I would not be where I am today if it weren’t for Lauren. And then being able to mentor now is so rewarding and heartfelt, and I can’t thank Consumers enough, Kristen, you give everybody that opportunity, but you also give us the time, and it truly is something that is so important, so I can’t thank you enough for your passion to lead this, but also for your time today.

0:09:27.3 KD: Well, thank you, Lynne, and I appreciate it. And I think it’s really important, again, I grow too, right? By helping others and sharing experiences and learning from others, and this is always one of those areas with my role with the Michigan Society of Human Resource Management and taking in my Michigan role and understand and meeting with fellow leaders, I ask those same questions, and I’m indirectly being a mentee and asking them to be a mentor, and it’s about starting to hand a different lens on what does the mentor program look like? It’s not necessarily a formal, here’s what I want to do and meet with that person, but it’s really getting with people who can have influence for you and be vulnerable with you and really help you grow no matter we work together or not work together. Right? It’s just about helping one another get to the next level.

0:10:15.6 LJJ: Well, you could not have said it better, and if you have any interest of being connected to a mentor or becoming a mentor, there are so many organizations that are in our communities that can help you do that, if your company doesn’t have a program that’s set up like that. And I guarantee you, I guarantee you if you’re listening, that you probably already are a mentor to someone and you don’t even know it, and…

0:10:44.0 KD: Absolutely.

0:10:44.6 LJJ: Yeah, and I think that’s the best part about this is it’s truly about helping others.

0:10:48.7 KD: It is. Absolutely Lynne. Very well said. And thank you so much for having me.

0:10:52.8 LJJ: Well, thank you. Hey everybody, if you would like a topic that you think… Oh boy. People sure would love it. We would love to hear it. So, send it our way. I’d like to thank Jake Esselink, his production skills. Always spot on. And hey folks, I want you guys all to have a good week. Money, I’m Home from finance to fitness. I’m Lynne Jarman-Johnson with Consumers Credit Union.

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