Pollinate Approach
Pollinate worked with PLT Canada to develop a mentorship program that would meet the specific needs of the mentees by providing tools and supports to ensure their success in an agile manner. Program creation involved collaboration with like-minded partners with the goal of incorporating the unique viewpoints, cultures and customs of the diverse populations being engaged. The program involves careful mentor selection, feedback, and training. Other priorities include ensuring respectful, honest communication, and seeing evidence that mentees are participating in a meaningful way in return for the benefits provided.
Additional highlights:
- Pollinate created a unique mentorship standard operating procedure to meet PLT Canada’s specific needs, which encompassed consultation, assessment, measurement strategies and recruitment.
- The program intake was tailored to meet the unique needs of the industry.
- Pollinate provided assessments and tailored the mentor-matching process to meet PLT Canada’s specific goals.
- Pollinate provided support for the creation, testing and hosting of learning materials for career development.
- Pollinate delivered expert webinars for mentors and mentees.
- PLT Canada licensed Pollinate’s mentorship education content for best practices learning materials.
Results
Pollinate matched 25 mentee-mentor pairs for the pilot, using a proprietary algorithm that takes into account individual personalities, learning styles, goals, locations, interests, and existing skills and expertise. The pairs met virtually for six months, with mentees also taking part in a parallel learning process (the Green Pathway Plan) to help them develop their career pathway in the forest and conservation sector. The Green Pathway Plan included a career development guidebook and an online workbook.
Additional highlights:
- 96% of respondents gave a satisfaction score of 7 or more out of 10.
- 92% met with their mentor/mentee 4 or more times. 88% stated that their mentor-mentee interactions were “really good.”
- 96% felt that they and their mentoring partner were able to work towards the goals that they set for the program.
- 96% stated they received sufficient training and support to be successful in their mentoring relationship
- Mentors were “amazed at how easily they were able to connect with their mentees.”
The second cohort of the My Green Mentor program launched in the fall of 2020 with 75 mentoring pairs.
CLIENT TESTIMONIAL
“The algorithm-based mentor-matching is a great strength of the program. Our mentors tell us that the matching was a little uncanny: they were amazed at how easily they were able to connect with their mentees! Everyone who committed to the program was matched really well and are finding great success because of the connections made.”
— Tara Topping, Manager, Career Education Project Learning Tree Canada
Highlights
High participation in a blend of successful live and asynchronous engagement despite the global pandemic
Successful recruitment of mentors and mentees + experiences designed to serve underrepresented populations
Participants had the opportunity to complete a substantive career plan within the 6-month program
“I also really enjoyed when my mentor shared her experiences working with different stakeholders in the environmental sector and lessons she has learned during her career.”
— Mentee, My Green Mentor Program
“My favourite experience has been hearing about my mentor's journey to his current position and how personality traits that were similar between the two of us got him there.”
— Mentee, My Green Mentor Program
“One of the things that I found interesting was that my mentee was/is experiencing some of the same issues and uncertainties that I did early in my career, so I could really relate and empathize with him. I hope I was able to provide him with some tools to help him meet his career goals but my greatest hope is that I provided him some comfort and hope that things will improve and that his future is bright.”
— Mentor: My Green Mentor Program