Reverse Mentoring Reverse mentoring

Reverse Mentoring
Reverse mentoring is a process in which older employees learn from younger ones. There are people in organizations who are approaching retirement who do not want to retire, and who have tremendous knowledge that should not go to waste. There are young people who know things others do not know and who are anxious to expand their horizons. The existence of these two diverse, but potentially mutually helpful, populations has led to reverse mentoring. At Procter & Gamble, the reverse mentoring program allows senior management to the mentored in an area such as biotechnology. It pairs scientists and top managers in order to explore the potential impact of biotechnology on P&G’s customers, suppliers, and overall business. General Electric’s reverse mentoring program was so impressive that the program grew to include the top 3,000 managers in the company. GE even recruited a mentor for the board: Scott McNealy, CEO of Sun Microsystems.