[pjettter]

I wish I'd had a mentor ever since I was a teenager (80's).

The reason I answer is because I just had an idea. This doesn't help you, personally, right now, I suppose.

Google had a 10% rule (not sure if they still do) where 10% of the time, an employee could spend time on personal projects.

What if a company said, 10% of the time, you mentor. Those who seek a mentor can just apply to the company and get in line and wait.

Possibly, these mentored people could be future hires, and the employees are improving their abilities/knowledge by having a "teacher" role.

If I was Google's or any company's CEO, I would try this!

[legerdemain]

I haven't seen anything exactly like your suggestion, but every company I've worked for (from 400 to 40,000 people) had an internal mentoring program that would set up early-career people with more senior people. I've never heard anyone say they tried it and found it useful. Every company I've worked for also practiced a culture of discreet secrecy around every topic a mentee could conceivably want to know about: compensation, performance evaluations, where you, your boss, and your team stand within the company, etc.

It's sad, but gossip is ever-present at companies because it is the best and most informative kind of mentorship. Far from accurate or reliable, but still the best among a field of bad candidates.

[codegeek]

Funny I have been thinking about this a lot lately as a small company CEO who is looking for hungry people who want to learn. I might just start this if I can get my lazy butt to do a bit more outside of the business. If you think about it, it could be a win win for both parties. I get to mentor people and whoever seems to be the person I would like to hire, I hire them (unless of course they go to another employer :)).