Tuesday Tips: Two pieces of advice about mentoring and social media

Taken from The Chronicle of Evidence-Based Mentoring.  Below is an excerpt from their Mentoring Summit (read the full article here).

Manage expectations
We discussed the importance of mentors communicating with mentees about their social media habits, so as to help manage expectations. One speaker gave examples of how things could go awry: A youth disclosing something time sensitive over Facebook or texting something vitally important to their mentor, and receiving no response. This, in turn, could lead to hurtful or even dangerous lapses in the provision of timely support. Likewise, mentors may have good reasons to exclude their mentees from their Facebook pages, but the rejection (or simple ignoring) of friend requests can be hurtful to young people. Staff and mentors are encouraged to set expectations and policies around social media at the onset of the relationship—before such lapses and requests.

Be mindful of your public persona 
It’s easy to see how problems might arise when mentees search the Internet and discover controversial information, opinions, or photos of their mentors. Mentors are encouraged to occasionally search the Internet and view themselves through the eyes of their mentees. To the extent possible, mentors should delete controversial public images and postings so as to protect the relationship.