This year’s International Women’s Day Theme was ‘Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress’. This theme feels meaningful and like a real call to action. Invest in Women: Accelerate Progress is a real call to action. It says it as it is – Invest in Women – Accelerate Progress. It’s applicable across many sectors, communities, causes, policies, and even countries.
You may have seen the words ‘inspire inclusion’ being floated around and whilst creating a culture of inclusion goes someway in creating more equity, without continuous investment in to addressing systemic barriers, gender equity is not accelerated.
So how can businesses, employers, and employees alike Invest in Women and Accelerate Progress? This article focuses on investment in women through mentorship and sponsorship and seeks to highlight the difference between sponsorship and mentorship, exploring in what circumstances one is more beneficial than the other for true acceleration of progress.
A logical place to start for those of you scratching your head right now asking ‘come on then, what is the difference between sponsorship and mentorship, cos they sound the same’ is really to explain that and dive in.
Our founder, Chloe Wallace, HR consultant and coach, explains them here as she has understood and utilised them throughout her career -
“Mentorship is typically a relationship where a more experienced or knowledgeable person provides guidance, advice, and support to a less experienced or knowledgeable person. Typically, they impart their experiences and provide feedback to help their mentees to navigate challenges and opportunities. This can be an informal relationship and lots of us probably mentor and have been mentored naturally without knowing it. We do it because we have a desire to see other people succeed, develop, and grow. We want the best for people, and we want them to do their best for us too, as usually we manage them, or just want to reduce the amount of time we spend imparting our knowledge and experience to them so we can crack on.
Sponsorship on the other hand usually involves a senior leader, influential person, or person with specific privilege, actively advocating for and promoting the career advancement of another person. And I wouldn’t necessarily say a more junior person, as I’ve witnessed sponsorship in action between peers sitting at the same level – say where there is a board of 7 people, 6 men and one woman. That woman probably does need a sponsor on that team in that situation for sure!”
Sponsors use their position of privilege and power to influence the organisation to create opportunities, provide visibility and endorse the sponsored person for career advancement or enhancement opportunities such as promotions, high profile projects or maybe leadership roles if they are more junior. Sponsorship although it can be informal, is usually a more formal transaction with sponsors actively championing the people they are sponsoring through this increased visibility, aiding them to overcome barriers to career progression.
Chloe says “a simple way to break the difference down between them is to think that mentorship says ‘I will help you do that by showing you the way and we will do it together’ and sponsorship says ‘I believe you can do that, let me help to create the space, circumstance and opportunity, so that you can.’”
Mentorship is certainly not redundant, there is both a time for mentorship and a time for sponsorship. However, there are many women who are experiencing mansplaining disguised as mentorship, and there are too many women without the provision of sponsorship opportunities in the workplace.
If you want to know what mansplaining is, go and Google search Georgia Ball Golf Coach … say no more! That was mansplaining disguised as mentorship, when actually all Georgia needs is more sponsorship so she can keep smashing it out the park. Cheeky pun there, did you like it?
Despite perceived progress our gender pay gap in the UK is not improving, it’s not getting better and if we call a spade a spade, it’s getting worse. Women are underrepresented in senior leadership roles and decision-making positions, and this isn’t because they aren’t choosing to progress their careers, it’s because there aren’t systems and frameworks in place to support their choice to pursue and flourish in those careers. Unless things change systemically, and/ or you have the right framework of support around you, it’s difficult as a woman to ‘have it all’.
Sponsorship plays a pretty crucial role in creating opportunities for women to advance in to leadership, through ensuring that they are considered for high profile projects, promotions and career-enhancing opportunities. It is saying ‘I believe Jane Doe can do this and she deserves the opportunity, irrespective of her gender, familial situation, marital status or fertility bloody status’.
A sponsor really can help increase a woman’s visibility so other people believe in them too by endorsing them for key projects, giving up speaking opportunities to them, or putting them forward for them. This helps to enhance a woman’s professional reputation and influence in the workplace, breaking down biases and barriers as to what women can achieve. It gives them an opportunity to a great job and be recognised for that by others, so that they get invited to the table to do more great jobs and make decisions about how great jobs are done!
One of the more key elements of sponsorship is its impact in developing those all-important self-advocacy skills and building confidence and agency.
Chloe says, “a lot of women do struggle with self-promotion and advocating for themselves at work, and I believe this is where the term ‘imposter syndrome’ was coined”.
Having a sponsor there that believes in your abilities and actively supports your career goals is as simple and effective as boosting their confidence, so they go after ambitious goals and career opportunities in the same way that their equally or less qualified male counterparts do.
Mentorship lacks real and direct influence on career advancement. Mentorship can keep people tied down in to one position, especially when their skills in that position are developed into a way that helps the mentor become more effective at their role. It is often done informally and is about them being able to do more so you can crack on and don’t have to hand hold them. In this way, it often lacks visibility and recognition- a mentor will take credit for the work and progression of the mentee, maybe not with words as blunt as “I taught you everything you know” or “you wouldn’t have been able to do that without my input” but often with words and actions that infer that.
Sponsorship is much less about perpetuation of existing power dynamics and more about a real senior level endorsement that raises a person’s visibility and provides opportunities for advancement by a shared belief in the ability to do it.
So on both sides of the table, here are some things you can do sponsor a woman at work, or things that you can ask for as someone requiring sponsorship as part of your plans for career development and advancement –
Nominate them for high profile projects OR ask to be nominated for high profile projects.
Nominate them for speaking /presenting opportunities OR ask for more speaking / presenting opportunities.
Endorse women for promotions and pay increases.
Speak up and mention their names in rooms they are not in to recognise their contributions and raise their profile.
Speak up on their behalf during meetings and put them forward, like “Oh so and so can answer this, has the answer, if you can let her speak please”
Provide them with relevant access and introductions to people in your network that will be beneficial for them.
Take an active interest in how their career is going and ask – what do you need now? Helping them to overcome barriers.
And for the untamed and fearless women seeking sponsorship, be direct and speak out, assert your needs and be a vocal advocate for yourself. Ask for an introduction, volunteer for assignments. Force people to sponsor you and make them active in advancing your career, not passive.
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