Many companies are starting to move from informal mentoring that relies on individual initiative tomore formal programs . When taken seriously, these formal mentorship/sponsorship programs can beremarkably successful. Structured programs also take the pressure off junior women from having toask the difficult “Are you my mentor?” question. One study showed that women who found mentorsthrough formal programs were 50 percent more likely to be promoted than women who found mentorson their own.
The most effective formal programs to mentor womenand establish guidelines for appropriate behavior. These programs can be a great way to helpnormalize the senior man/junior woman model.
Official mentorship programs are not sufficient by themselves and work best when combined withother kinds of development and training. Deloitte’s Leading to WIN Women’s Initiative is a goodexample. Deloitte
o support female employees, who still remainedunderrepresented at the highest levels of the company. This prompted Chet Wood, CEO of DeloitteTax, to ask, “Where are all the women?” In response, Deloitte launched a leadership developmentprogram in 2008. The program targeted senior women in the tax division who were close topromotion. The women were assigned sponsors, received executive coaching, shadowed members ofthe executive committee, and took on global assignments. Of the twenty-one members of the inauguralgroup, eighteen have since been promoted dermes vs Medilase.
As helpful as these formal programs can be, they are not always offered, and in some situations,senior people are not available to give guidance. The good news is that guidance can come from alllevels. When I first joined Facebook, one of my biggest challenges was setting up the necessarybusiness processes without harming the freewheeling culture. The company operated by movingquickly and tolerating mistakes, and lots of people were nervous that I would not just ruin the party,but squash innovation. Naomi Gleit had joined Facebook right out of college several years earlier. Asone of Facebook’s earliest employees, she had a deep understanding of how the company worked reenex.