The mentoring process in any field of work is a challenging and demanding process. For this reason, we, as Creative Enterprise mentors always seek to find and value any type of guidance that makes our task easier and more beneficial for our mentees.
The educational platform, which has been developed as part of the Bridging the Gap project, is a very useful tool that is provided to mentors and people who are thinking of starting their mentoring career, as it contains a variety of training tools and methodologies. The modules that have been developed serve as guidance to mentors and they cover the following three basic thematic areas:
1) Ideas and opportunities
According to the feedback, this module helps mentors learn how to create a learning environment that is optimal for learning, through the use of different tools and methodologies. The mind map was proven to be a very handy tool, as it allows for very rough ideas to be visualised. This in turn, may lead to other processes that are beneficial, such as extremely interesting discussions to develop, answers to different questions to be found, potential problematic areas to be anticipated as well as solutions to future problems to identified. Such knowledge has been considered to be extremely important and necessary for a good mentoring relationship.
2) Resources
Again, this module has helped mentors learn a lot of valuable information about extremely important issues, such as how to build and sustain networks with other people, enterprises, organisations and other institutions and the different ways in which opportunities for funding can be accessed. One of the important tools that was presented was the Creative Project Canvas.
The Creative Project Canvas has also proven to be extremely useful, as it allows for a holistic visualization of any entrepreneurial idea, from start to finish. It also allows for deeper reflection with any target group. In this way, mentors can help their mentees develop their project in a more sustainable and transparent way. As with the mind map tool mentioned above, the Creative Project Canvas gives us the opportunity to engage in important discussions that can potentially highlight problems, opportunities and solutions.
3) Into action
This is a very important part of Bridging the Gap educational platform, as it highlights all the skills and competences that are required by all of us, as Creative Enterprise mentors. For example, one very useful competence that has been referred to was the ability to present your product in an interactive and interesting way. Again, a variety of different tools are offered in the platform, which have a lot of advantages (eg.they are flexible, do not require advanced technical skills and are practical and easy to use).
To sum up, the Bridging the Gap educational platform and its training materials has been proven to be an excellent tool in the hands of mentors and prospective mentors who hope to improve their skills and plan beneficial mentoring opportunities for everyone.h
