Advising & Mentoring
As a mentor, I seek to make a meaningful contribution to the development of everyone who I train. This varies based on everyone’s stage of professional development, as well as his or her future goals and ambitions. As each person I mentor is different in these respects, I aspire to help mentees develop certain universal skills—asking critical questions, recognizing assumptions, communicating effectively considering opportunities, and acknowledging shortcomings. In the sciences, I believe it is critical to be guided by curiosity and challenge assumptions, but also learning how to function as part of an integrated team. In this manner, I think that one of the best ways is to 'learn by doing.’
Therefore, I encourage trainees to experiment and question with my role being to provide guidance and training, without a fear of failure. Over the years and in my personal experience, I’ve found things going ‘wrong’ is one of the best ways to learn or discover something new. While I enjoy training, I recognize that I alone cannot and should not be the sole source of your personal and professional development. As such, I encourage the development of other relationships with different mentors, who all have different strengths and areas of expertise. In this way, trainees can learn a variety of different skills, be exposed to many different viewpoints, as well as build up a stronger professional network that will further support their future career goals. In so doing, I hope to help develop the people I am privileged to work with and support their choice and pursuit of different career paths.