Request for Proposal: Can I be your mentor (and vice versa?)

I’m posting a request for proposal for my next mentorship relationship, not because I’m such a fantastic catch, more because I want more people to engage in these relationships.

I’ve enjoyed two awesome mentorship relationships (see: Now Reading: Don’t hand the keys over, collaborate with Gen Y | Ted Eytan, MD and Being a mentor, enjoying colleagues who are millenials. Look at these SMARTER Goals | Ted Eytan, MD). It’s time for the next one.

Why? Because (a) if someone knows how to do something better than me, I’m interested in knowing about it (b) I’m not that smart and my ideas are not that unique and (c) I and others have been conversations lately that confirm I am not the only one who believes in (a) and (b), which is a more important discovery than that any of us knows how to solve a problem.

A little background

I took a look in my electronic files and I remember a time, oh around 2008-2009, when I read stories of other companies who had set up so-called “intergenerational mentoring” programs, iconic places like Time Warner, Cisco, and Booz Allen Hamilton (How Gen Y & Boomers Will Reshape Your Agenda – Harvard Business Review) and wondered if we could be one of those companies and have programs like that. It turns out that we could, we are, and we have such a program, and are listed as one of the … The 10 Companies With The Happiest Young Professionals.

It’s what we wished for, so let’s take advantage/let’s keep it that way/spread it to others. If we did it, you can too.

Here’s what I’m looking for, then. Hint: copy, modify, and create your own (and share the results with me in the comments or via twitter).

Thanks for the use of this template that I modified slightly.

Request for Proposal: Mentorship relationship

Project Description

  • Mentorship relationship: Structured, ongoing connection with another person who seeks to perform at their best for Kaiser Permanente members and help our organization produce total health for our members, their families, and communities, and maybe change the world also.

Requirements – Mentee

  • Must be an employee of a Kaiser Permanente entity (medical group, health plan, doesn’t matter) – need to support the home team!
  • Must plan to stay employed by a Kaiser Permanente entity during the mentorship term
  • Ability to drive the relationship, which includes setting goals, sharing experiences, arranging times and venues to communicate – that’s the recommended approach, it has worked so far
  • Ability to break the relationship, if a good fit is not achieved – suffering is optional
  • Ability to place a focus on the mentee’s goals and wishes for the future – we won’t make this about me, that’s for my mentor 🙂
  • Open to experiences that connect you to the member experience more closely and in different ways – we are here for them, after all
  • Able and interested in promoting mentorship to others

Technical and infrastructure

  • Work location flexible, California or Washington, DC preferred – greater likelihood of in person checkins – in person is the new online
  • #activetransportation strongly encouraged, walking meetings will be involved

Assumptions and Agreements

Estimated Duration, Frequency, Type of Contact

  • 1 year
  • Contact approximately every 3-4 weeks, more frequently as needed
  • Any and all modalities (experimentation encouraged, we’ve broken every high tech meeting device already): in person, phone, video, text, tweet

Submission information

Basis for Award of Contract

  • Everyone is awarded a mentor and vice versa, if it’s not me, I’ll help find you one

Here’s my mentorship profile to see if it fits your RFP

My Profile

LinkedIn Profile Ted’s LinkedIn Profile
Last Updated: 09/09/2014
First name Ted
Last name Eytan
Gender (optional) M
Social networks all of them. Try @tedeytan first
Office phone (does anyone have one anymore?)
Preferred contact method Email, Text, Tweet, if I can walk to it, I’ll do it
Current job title Physician Director, Kaiser Permanente Center for Total Health
Job Level Director/Sr. Director
Department/Functional Area The Permanente Federation, LLC
Regional Affiliation The Permanente Federation, LLC
Office location Washington, DC
Year I started at Kaiser Permanente 2008
I want my role to be: Both
Number of Mentees I’m willing to Mentor 1
  ✓ Click to Read Expectations of Mentors and Mentees       I have read, understand and agree to the ‘Expectations of Mentors and Mentees’
As a Mentor…
  ✓ I want to share my knowledge and help KP be the Best Place to Work
  ✓ I want to know what others are doing to be more patient and member-focused
  ✓ I want to improve my performance in relationship to the value compass
  ✓ I want to expand my network
I have subject matter expertise (SME) and/or experiences in the following areas: Information Technology, Clinical Medicine, Diversity
I Have These Skills Being more productive
Developing career path
Discover and develop my strengths, talents, abilities
Interviewing for a new position or Interviewing others
Navigating Kaiser
Setting goals
Time management
I Have These Behaviors Champions Innovation and Change
Collaborates
Communicates Effectively
Deals with Ambiguity
Develops Self/Others
Drives for Results
Focuses on the Customer
Takes Accountability
Highest level of education Medical School
Schools attended University of California, University of Washington, University of Arizona
Employee Resource Groups GenKP
KP Pride: Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, Transgender and Intersex employees
Other groups I belong to and other projects/activities in which I am involved with at Kaiser Permanente Transgender Member Health Equity; Transportation/Food/Physical Activity and Health; Kaiser Permanente Center for Total Health – part of the Kaiser Permanente Innovation System
Activities or groups I am involved in outside of Kaiser Permanente ActionDesignDC, ActionDesigner.net

2 Comments

I tell you, Ted, I so want to work for KP just so we can do this together. I am stunned at the brilliance of so many of your colleagues and you can pretend all you want to not be the brightest bulb in the pack, but you are and I wish I had a day a month to bask in the light – it would probably be more effective for SAD than the stupid vitamin D and the SAD lamp.

But since I can’t be the one, I suggest you get together with Melanie and mentor her. And she could mentor you. Together you would be unstoppable.

cheers,

kait

Ted Eytan, MD