Mentorship is a proven approach to advancing in one’s career, particularly for those new in their field or place of employment. Mentorship goes beyond training and education by helping newcomers navigate through the sometimes confusing or complex situations they can face. Mentors and mentees can be of any age or career stage.
Mentors benefit by giving back to the field, enjoying the satisfaction and impact of sharing their knowledge and experience, expanding their networks, and learning new things from their mentee, to name a few. Mentees benefit from new perspectives on their work, expanding their networks, gaining a sounding board for ideas and projects, and increasing their sense of self-worth.
About the Program
The HFES Online Mentorship Program connects professionals at all career levels and provides both mentors and mentees opportunities to develop new relationships, share experiences, and learn from others outside their organizations. It enables established professionals to serve as mentors as a way of giving back to the discipline of human factors and ergonomics, and paying forward the support and guidance they received during the development of their careers. The program aims to connect members of HFES for the purposes of professional development, information exchange, networking, personal growth, and career advancement.
Mentorship can help one identify potential career paths by expanding their knowledge of career options within the industry and providing learning experiences outside of their workplaces. It can help shape the future leaders through expansion of their professional competencies, and, therefore, cultivate a diverse and high-quality pool of candidates in the workforce in the process. Mentorship is a critical component to attracting a more diverse workforce by providing opportunities for professionals new to the industry to learn about the culture of scholarly communications, make new contacts, and feel welcome in our community.
How It Works
Mentors and mentees apply online to participate in a mentorship cohort, or a group of mentors and mentees that begin and end the program during the same timeframe. Each cohort will have a published open and close date and accept a limited number of participants. Mentor relationships are one-to-one matches.
A mentor can have multiple mentees, but a mentee can only have one mentor per cohort within the HFES Mentorship Program. A member can be a mentor and a mentee at the same time; however, first-time participants will be given preference for open spaces. Interested members should apply via an online application found on HFES Connect. Members can reapply for each cohort; however, precedence will be given to first-time mentees.
After the enrollment period ends, mentors and mentees will be moved into the matching phase and will be sent further instructions on how to search for and request a mentor or mentee relationship. Once these mentorship relationships have been formed, the mentorship relationship will officially begin.
Eligibility
All active member of HFES are eligible to participate. Interested parties must sign up online by the posted deadline for consideration in a given mentorship cohort.
Questions?
Visit our Online Mentorship Program FAQ page to learn more about the HFES Online Mentoring Program!