ULI London Young Leaders is pleased to launch the 2013 Mentorship Programme
What is it about?
The mission of the ULI UK Young Leader’s Mentorship Program is to foster an exchange of professional ideas, career experience and industry expertise among young real estate professionals and industry veterans. This program matches young professionals (“Mentees”) with more experienced professionals (“Mentors”) for guidance and support in their career, while offering mentors an opportunity to strengthen ties with the younger future leaders in their industry and share their experience with them.
The program will allow participating Mentees to gain industry knowledge and seek career advice through one-on-one interaction with Mentors outside their direct workplace and develop lasting relationships with senior industry professionals. For Mentors, this will be hardly time consuming, but a very rewarding experience sharing some of their career and industry insights with younger professionals.
Trial Program
Having run a six months trial period with four groups of Mentors/Mentees from which extremely positive feedback has been received, the ULI Young Leaders have decided to roll out the program to a wider audience. All the valuable feedback kindly shared by the participants has been taken onboard, in order to further improve and optimise the program before its official launch.
Feedback from Participants
“An invaluable opportunity to tap into the knowledge of a highly experienced professional.”
“My mentor was an affable and inspiring person. Not only did he share the experiences of his distinguished career, but he provided valuable advice regarding the personal development and career challenges that I face. The experience has been beneficial and rewarding.”
“The ULI YL Mentorship Programme encompass for what ULI YL stands for – education through exchange of knowledge, networking with peers and higher ranking professionals in an informal atmosphere.”
“It feels good to provide guidance to smart young people and to help their professional development.”
“Having a mentor helped me to focus on my career trajectory and think about alternatives that I had not considered”
“This came at the perfect time in my career and it was extremely valuable to get advice from an influential, well respected leader that understood my business.”
“The ULI has provided an extremely valuable programme with access to a wealth of experts!”
Format of the Programme
We will launch two separate mentoring programmes, one targeted at the current Young Leaders as Mentees and Senior Industry Leaders as Mentors, and one for Students/Graduates and potential future Young Leaders as Mentees and current Young Leaders as Mentors.
We will offer a choice of pairing the participants one mentee to one mentor or in groups of three mentees to one mentor, in order to respond to individual preferences and given the very positive feedback received from the trial group participants. We will ensure that nobody is paired or grouped with someone else from the same company to allow for an open and free dialogue.
The Programme will run for one year. The number of meetings held will be determined by the participants, however, given the feedback from the trial programme, we would advise meetings to be held roughly every 6-8 weeks depending on the time constraints of the mentors.
We believe that the process will be most efficient when tailored to the individual’s preferences within the mentoring pair/group and it is important that the Mentor and Mentee (s) develop their own suitable format in the first meeting. Based on feedback from the trial programme we do however recommended that the Mentees initiate the first contact with their Mentors, providing a short summary of their personal and professional background and preparing a list of questions or discussion points before the first meeting. Comments from the trial programme also showed that participants preferred meeting outside the office (neutral ground), that it was best to set up the next meeting at the end of each meeting and that confidentiality should be established at the first meeting so trust is ensured and an open dialogue can be achieved.
Application process for Mentees
To apply to participate as a Mentee in the 2013 Programme (start date 14th October 2013), the Mentee should be ULI Young Leader member and submit the following in PDF format by 20th September 2013 to [email protected]. Mentors and Mentees will then be matched by the ULI YL Mentorship Chairs based on Mentees experience and interests.
1. One page cover letter which includes the following:
-Number of years you have worked in real estate
-Real estate sector focus or interest: e.g. Development, Leasing, Management, Public Sector, Construction, Finance, Sustainability or Consultant
-Product type expertise or interest: e.g. Residential, Office, Retail, Industrial, Multifamily or Hospitality
-Geographical focus or interest: e.g. Regional, National or International
-Why are you interested in the Mentor Program?
-How do you think you will benefit from participation in the Program?
-What are you looking for in a Mentor?
-If you would like to join the one – on – one or group of three Mentoring?
2. Current CV
We hope that you’ll find the Mentor Programme very rewarding. Should you have any questions in the meanwhile, please do not hesitate to contact us via [email protected]
Don’t have an account? Sign up for a ULI guest account.