Benefits of Investing in Mentoring Software
As the need for employee career development opportunities becomes more and more necessary, so does the number of organizations implementing mentoring programs. In fact, 71% of Fortune 500 companies have a mentoring program in place. And mid-sized organizations are following closely behind.
These programs are bringing benefits to organizations that include attracting top talent, improving employee engagement, and increasing retention rates. It’s no wonder that everyone is jumping on the mentoring bandwagon. However, having a mentoring program and having a “successful” mentoring program are two very different things.
A common factor in organization’s that have seen success with mentoring is that they have invested in mentoring software. Stakeholders have found that mentoring software is an affordable and effective way of managing a mentoring program.
Mentoring Software Features
All mentoring software is not created equal. Each vendor offers different solutions that may not be easily compared. It’s important you understand the features you need, and those being offered to you, before choosing the right mentoring software.
To achieve the most benefits, we recommend that you focus on the following mentoring software features.
- Mentor Matching Capabilities will save your organization time and resources and improve the likelihood of successful mentoring relationships.
- A Goal Tracking Tool gives your mentees the ability to create their goal plan and track their progress. It also allows your program administrators to monitor the mentoring relationship and determine if it is successful.
- The Content Library gives you a place to store resources for your mentors and mentees.
- An Automated Message System allows you to continuously communicate with your participants. This tool can be used during the recruiting process to market your mentoring program. It is also helpful in distributing content to your current participants.
- The Reporting Tool is essential in measuring the success of your mentoring program. This tool allows you to analyze program data and create reports to present to stakeholders.
When your mentoring software includes these features, you will achieve more benefits and realize a larger ROI.
The Benefits of Investing in Mentoring Software
Once you understand the features that are available through mentoring software, you have will have a better understanding of the benefits that you can achieve. Keep in mind that the features will directly impact the benefits.
1. Save time and resources
The time and resources that it takes to run a successful mentoring program can be tremendous. Mentoring software helps you to cut those costs while still effectively managing your mentoring program.
Mentoring software allows you to streamline your administrative tasks in a single system. With mentor matching tools that facilitate self-matching and message systems that allow you to automate your communications, mentoring program administrators will have more time to focus on the success of your program.
2. Improve participant engagement
Simply having employees participate in your mentoring program is not enough. These participants must be engaged in their mentoring relationship for your program to be successful.
Mentoring software helps to improve participant engagement through continuous communication and resources distribution. These resources should include information about each participant’s role and tips, to be successful in their mentoring relationship.
Participant engagement can be measured through surveys automatically sent through your mentoring software. You can analyze the feedback you receive from participants and create reports to help you determine how to keep them engaged. When they are engaged, they will become an ambassador for your mentoring program, helping to increase participation and engage others.
3. Build your succession pipeline
Having a solid succession pipeline is important for the ongoing success of your organization. Mentoring software gives you the ability to determine who is best suited to be part of your succession pipeline. By having the tools needed to monitor and track the success of your participants, you can review
- The skill sets being developed
- The knowledge being shared
- The participants that show leadership qualities
This knowledge aids you in creating a succession pipeline to maintain a strong leadership team through the years.
4. Measure mentoring program success
The success of your mentoring program is determined by several factors. These factors include a participant engagement, relationship success, and organizational goals. Without the right tools, it’s impossible to measure these factors and the overall success of your program.
Mentoring software gives you the tools needed to gather detailed program analytics to effectively measure your program’s success. Analyze the data and create reports to export and show stakeholders why it’s important to continue to invest in mentoring.
Are you ready to learn more about mentoring software? Schedule a demo to speak with one of our mentoring experts.
Through innovative web-based SaaS technology, Insala partners with organizations to accelerate performance and drive evidence-based decisions for organizations and their people.
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