Introduction to Mentoring

At any stage in your professional journey there is often a need for mentoring alongside the other forms of practitioner development that are on offer.

But how do you find the right Mentor if you aren’t sure who to ask?

The Guild has put in place a pilot process of assisting this quest for practitioners who have completed their training. On the mentor register page you will see a register of experienced practitioners whom the Guild has approached who are willing to offer mentoring. You will see that some are interested in personal meetings whereas others in online, or in some cases both, some are interested in individual sessions only whereas others will be interested in small groups. There is a range of experiences that each practitioner offers as well as a range of fees.

Everyone on the register:

• Is a full member of the UK Feldenkrais Guild
• Has practised for a minimum of 5 years. (This is the minimum and we expect most Mentors to have practiced for more than this.)
• Has well developed skills of asking exploratory questions, active listening and understanding multiple perspectives 
• Will engender action-reflection learning, and appreciates the implications of differences in thinking and learning styles
• Practices effective time management 
• Is aware of the competency profiling tools developed by the IFF and other practitioner development opportunities.

Please look through the register and contact a Mentor about your personal learning. An initial discussion will help you decide if this is the right person for you at this time.

We suggest that you and your chosen mentor work out a simple contract between
you that would cover:

• A clarification of the kind of mentoring envisaged by the mentee and that this is not better met by other models of post-training development (e.g. apprenticeship, peer learning, Advanced Training, study groups, “Cultivate your Practice” and “Successful Practitioner”). This could include FI exchange, shadowing or observation of mentee’s teaching.
• Mutual confidentiality
• Whether the sessions are individual or groups
• Whether the sessions are live or online.
• Frequency, and length of sessions
• Fee per hour
• Agreed times for sessions.

As this is a pilot the Working Group welcomes comments on how you have found this process and how it could be developed. (Please see the contact page)

NB The Guild does not take responsibility for the mentoring relationship, that is between the mentor and the mentee, or for the quality of the mentoring.