Network

Using the Internet, research and read about mentoring. Based on your reading, post your responses to the following topics of discussion:

• What are the benefits and drawbacks of entering into a mentoring relationship?
• Brainstorm and create a list of potential people who you might add to your network. Identify the relationship of each person to you. Highlight which ones you think have the most potential to be valuable to your network and why. Then, for the remainder of the week, help at least two other students identify potential valuable networking contacts and refine your own list. By the end of the week, post a list of at least three people who you will include as permanent networking contacts.
• Either using your networking contacts or others not on that list, identify one or two potential mentors.
• Using information from other students and the articles you read, define how you could go about establishing a mentor or mentee relationship with this person. Who is responsible to establish the mentoring relationship?
• Discuss what qualities you think will be most important in a potential mentor. Who can serve as a mentor? Are IT mentors different than mentors in other fields? Why?