The FAR mentoring program pairs postdoctoral research staff with more experienced research staff. For one year, the pairs meet in a safe and confidential environment to share skills, knowledge and experiences from their professional careers. The purpose is to guide professional development, facilitate mutual learning and promote talent through exchange, while also revealing new interpersonal skills.
It is key that the person who takes on the role of mentoring actively listens, asks questions and poses stimulating scenarios to investigate new answers and, at the same time, contributes to promoting the professional development of the person being mentored.
The initiative is promoted by Teresa Rosas, head of Academic Talent and EDI (Equity, Diversity and Inclusion) at CREAF, for whom it is key that the person who takes on the role of mentoring actively listens, asks questions and poses stimulating scenarios to investigate new answers and, at the same time, contributes to promoting the professional development of the person being mentored. Rosas also emphasizes "the importance of the non-hierarchical context, beyond supervisory relationships", such as that generated when launching an experience of this type.
The difference between mentoring and supervising is that the former involves generating a conversation with someone to whom one does not report. And, therefore, apart from the freedom it entails, the exchange is governed by codes of anonymity and confidentiality.
Questions that open doors
To accompany and train the mentors, CREAF has counted on Louise Schubert, a specialist who has been accompanying research centres on this journey for years. Regarding her work with specialists who take on the role of mentoring, Schubert highlights the particularity of “introducing a new skill to research staff who are really wise and experienced, but who perhaps have not developed interpersonal skills as much.” This is why she highlights that one must “help them to reflect,” with the final intention of “establishing relationships, creating trust, asking the right questions, listening, helping to find answers.” And she sums up the journey as a way to “enrich everyone and open doors.”
The second edition of FAR at CREAF coincides with the second Severo Ochoa scientific excellence award that the center is currently receiving. In this context, Teresa Rosas reflects on the importance of "institutionally actively promoting these spaces to promote a good research culture."
