General advice

• Meetings are proposed to be once a month. If that frequency is not possible, any calendar that best suits both members will be equally acceptable.
• To optimize the investment of time in TEJEDOR, we recommend establishing a calendar for the 6 regular meetings from the beginning (for example, the first Thursday of the month) and trying to stick to it. Subsequently, you can reschedule as needed by mutual agreement. In any case, it will be the responsibility of the telemachus to contact the mentor and confirm each meeting.
• Take some time to build a space of trust and connection between the two of you: introduce yourself to each other, agree on some basic points that will define your mentoring relationship. Try answering the following questions as a guide in this step:
  • In what ways do you think your experience and knowledge could be beneficial to both of you?
  • Can you think of the other's mindset (mentor / telemachine)?
  • What are your expectations of each (telemachine / mentor)?
  • What is the best way to communicate your concerns or suggestions to each other?
• Do some preparatory work for each meeting, such as reading a bit about the topic to address or compiling personal experiences about situations, attitudes, and behaviors related to the topic at hand. Here are some ideas on what to think about before each session, along with content suggestions for some of the meetings.
  • To make your meetings more productive, you can also share items and documents in advance for your next tutorial session.
  • To make the most of this experience, experts suggest keeping track of each meeting that takes place: remembering key points discussed and agreed or disagreeing can be very helpful after a few sessions. This can be done by using the post-meeting forms.
  • To share experiences, articulate the conversation around:
    • Stories from your professional life (yours or that of colleagues and family).
    • Specific situations: how you dealt with them, what could you have done differently, etc.
    • Self-awareness: look at yourself as others see you.
    • Skill Development - Review the skills you had or needed at the time. How did you develop them? How were they useful?

 

Topics to be addressed

Depending on the nature and purpose of TEJEDOR, it is suggested that mentor pairs address some or all of these issues during their meetings:

1. Professional aspirations
2. What is “Moving Beyond Academia” about?
3. Key social skills
4. Delve into some soft skills:
   1. Gender considerations for STEM professionals
   2. How to network / network
   3. Conflict management
   4. Time management: work-life balance
5. Self-awareness: overqualification against the impostor syndrome
6. What have we achieved? What comes next?

 

To make each session more profitable for both of you, we suggest that you think a little earlier, try to analyze some specific and predefined questions during the session and pursue a predefined, measurable and achievable goal. The mandatory post-meeting forms are designed to facilitate this process.
You may not be an expert on some of the suggested topics, however it will be a healthy and useful exercise to discuss about them.

 

* Skills for teamwork, skills in negotiation and decision-making and ease to relate, communicate and lead a project. Skills for problem solving and planning tasks, projects or implementations. Ability to correctly acquire and process information on the service or project.

Meeting guide