Communications skills for mentors and mentees in entepreneurship: theory and practice

ENThe purpose of this monograph is to examine barriers to communication competencies between mentors and mentees and propose solutions how to enhance and maintain the business mentor network. In the first chapter, the authors’ theoretical literature review indicates that mentoring refers to relationships and communication that involve sharing experience and support provided by an individual who shares his/her knowledge, experience and wisdom to another individual – a mentee – who is ready and who has a wish to benefit from the exchange and to improve his/her professionalism. Since mentoring requires the mentor to go deep into in the mentee’s problems and the matters to be discussed, the mentor does not teach but encourages the mentee to make a decision him/herself. The authors conclude that mentoring is a knowledge transfer process implemented by experienced mentors and mentees. Mentoring in entrepreneurship is based on the mentor’s knowledge and experience, which allows the mentee to assess the opportunities and resources being at his/her disposal and use them to solve a particular problem or achieve a goal. The authors believe that mentoring is one of the most effective ways that contribute to a number of new entrepreneurs and economic growth. Overall, entrepreneurship expands and develops if experienced entrepreneurs give guidance to beginners in entrepreneurship. Mentoring positively affects the national economy as new enterprises are founded, unemployment declines and the competitiveness of enterprises increases. [...].In the tenth chapter, the results of the survey on communication competencies in mentoring in Lithuania are presented. In oral communication, mentors and mentees distinguish face-to-face communication as the most important, and a face-toface group meeting is the least important for both groups of respondents When evaluating the effectiveness of communication in business networks, mentors indicated that communication is most effective when the message leads to a specific action, while mentees said that the most effective communication in the network is when the content is understood. The least effective online communication in the opinion of both groups of respondents is when emotional support is gained. The research highlighted critical communication skills of mentors and mentees. According to mentors, the essential communication skills are: the ability to actively listen (reflect, ask questions, conclude, discuss), the ability to create a wish to communicate and cooperate and honesty, and according to mentees – the ability to create a wish to communicate and cooperate, the skill to listen actively and the ability to adapt to conversation strategy and tactics. It was found that, in comparison to mentors, mentees consider the ability to listen actively and the honesty of the communication partner as less significant.