Unlock your career's potential with a mentor

Law Society of Scotland Careers and Outreach Coordinator Georgia Turnbull outlines how matching up with a mentor can help you find and navigate the career path that's right for you.

Many top solicitors acknowledge that they wouldn’t have gotten very far without the help of some colleagues along the way. Their rise to their position was not just through their own hard work, but through the support of one (or many) unofficial mentors.

Do you ever look at successful solicitors within the profession and wonder how they got there? Well, most trainees and newly qualified solicitors wonder just that, and that’s where career mentoring comes in. A mentor is a person who is able to listen to and help you with your career goals, challenges, and concerns. Your mentor is normally someone who has been through the same steps you are going through today, such as the LLB, Diploma or traineeship, and they can help you reflect on that shared experience.

With the Law Society of Scotland’s mentoring programme, you can find a mentor and request their assistance.

How beneficial is career mentoring?

The short answer is you won’t realise the benefit until you start your mentoring journey.

Assessing your ambitions

Talking about your career ambitions with your mentor can help you to assess your options – possibly some you had not previously considered – and help you get the support and guidance you need. This might be thinking about what type of traineeship you should apply for, or if you should apply for that new job. Their outside perspective of your skills could even lead them to encourage you to aim higher that you would have done!

Encouraging and inspiring

The encouragement you get from your family and friends is important, but it doesn’t compare with the advice you would get from someone who has experienced the same problems as you. A mentor can provide a sounding board for new ideas, encourage you when you’re struggling and provide inspiration for a new way of thinking. Most successful people – regardless of what industry they’re in, how old they are or where they came from – recognise the impact of those who were willing to teach them and believe in them.

Widening your perspective

It doesn’t matter how good you are at your job or how well you perform in your year group at uni, you will always need someone to give you an outside perspective. When you experience a challenge at work and need some external input, your mentor can be there for you. When you are pleased with an excellent piece of work you have completed, your mentor can help you reflect on why it was successful. A mentor will often understand these situations all too well and that’s invaluable to your career.

Sign up for a mentor today

Career development requires deliberate and purposeful engagement with your mentor and the information they provide. A mentor can have a tremendous impact in helping to guide your professional growth in the legal sector. So make the most out of a mentor relationship, with the Law Society of Scotland’s mentoring programme. The payoff is well worth the effort, you can sign up here with your Law Society login. 

If you are a student and do not have a Law Society of Scotland login you can sign up here then follow steps for the mentoring registration.