MENTORSHIP, AND RESTARTING CIVILIZATION FROM SCRATCH If we lost everything, and had to restart civilization from scratch, could we do it?

REVOLUTION 2 seasons, 2012-14, NBC

What if everything as we know it stopped working, and we had to make do with what was left - or recreate everything from scratch?

Jeremy Meiss Director, DevRel & Community

How did the ancients pass on what they knew to the next generation?

Orality - thought and verbal expression in societies where the technologies of literacy (especially writing and print) are unfamiliar to most of the population. - Wikipedia

Orality gave us the stepping stones that allowed us to get where we are today, it was a necessity for the growth of civilization. - Couch, Carl J., Information Technologies and Social Orders

Storytelling and the Lakota People from the Luritja people from the Chickasaw Nation

Oral tradition is a form of human communication wherein knowledge, art, ideas and cultural material is received, preserved, and transmitted orally from one generation to another. - Wikipedia

ancient Egyptian apprenticeship source unknown apprenticeship in England

Apprenticeship

“ After the fall of the great Egyptian, Mayan, and Roman empires we had evidence and examples of their engineering achievements all around us. But aqueducts or senate buildings are worthless without a society around them to maintain, contextualize, and protect them. - Alexander Rose Executive Director, Long Now

Coaching vs. Mentoring

Image credit quiettenacity

Mentoring ⬆ :⬇

Practical steps to mentoring / being mentored

For the mentor…

Understand why you are / want to be a mentor

Hard to identify mentee’s ways of learning, but essential

Set a timeline and an outcome you both want to see

When setting up meetings with your mentee…

  1. Set focused topics for when you meet with mentee towards that desired outcome

When setting up meetings with your mentee… 2. Recap what was discussed / learned after each

When setting up meetings with your mentee… 3. Keep a shared doc of meetings notes and progress

It’s OK to not know

Use questions to shape decision-making, not robots 1. 1. Get around biases for assumed knowledge 2. 2. Understand their thought process 3. 3. Identify gaps

Can’t save someone from stupid mistakes, but can tell them how you fixed them

Pair with mentee, think out loud, try wild ideas, fail together, and debug together

Normalize “I have no idea WTF I am doing”

Model how to get others promoted

Show you aren’t finished learning

Help them share to a broader audience if they desire

As a mentee…

It’s OK to not know

Come prepared with what you want to learn, questions you want answered

Specific takeaways… for white males

Specific takeaways… for non-white males

A bit on mentorship wins and failures

You can’t mentor someone to success

The good and the bad, together

Remember people are humans with feelings and personal lives

So what are some of the takeaways from all this?

Always be learning

Mentorship isn’t always from older to younger

Make yourself available - people are looking

Recognize as a Mentor when it’s time to pass the baton - make a connection for the Mentee

A quick note on sponsorship

MENTORS SPONSORS people who can give us people who help us find helpful advice new opportunities and improve the visibility of our work Lara Hogan, Tech Management Coach and Trainer

Illustration by Catt Small

Scott Hanselman at RenderATL 2022

Mature teammates list the skills and expertise AND NAMES of those around them. - Lara Hogan, What does sponsorship look like?

Marginalized people are over-mentored, and under-sponsored. - Lara Hogan, What does sponsorship look like?

Thank you to…. Rachel - @sundyclan Beth - @bethqiang Cecilia - @ceceliacreates Heidi - @wiredferret Erin - @erinmikail Jason - @StCyrThoughts Dan - @mooreds Tamimi - @TweetTamimi Gareth - @garethgreenaway David - @davidgsIoT Ben - @RabbiGreenberg Jason - @2jase Ross - @datahowler

Thank You. timeline.jerdog.me IAmJerdog jerdog /in/jeremymeiss For feedback and swag: circle.ci/jeremy