20 Oct 15 Facilitating the Administration of a Key Mentoring Programme at Oxford Brookes University

Mentoring is an important concept for Oxford Brookes University. The Accounting, Finance and Economics Department is one of the departments in the university that uses MentorNet for their mentoring scheme. A larger scheme is run by the Oxford School of Hospitality Management, that also uses MentorNet to help manage the large number of mentors and mentees.

The Accounting and Finance team believe that the mentoring programme is crucial in preparing undergraduates for the world of work. The scheme they have set up is one that helps final year students with their future careers, by linking them to mentors in industry and practice. Jane King is the Senior Lecturer in Accounting and Finance at Oxford Brookes and she runs the scheme alongside her lecturing role.

Students have the opportunity to improve their CVs, receive input on job applications, have interview practice and arrange work experience with their mentors. Are you thinking of running such a scheme, but don’t have an administrator? Well, you can. Or if you are running one that is paper-based, technology can help. Of course it never removes the need for human intervention, but mentors and mentees in this instance are able to upload their profiles onto MentorNet and Jane King can pair them and know they can then securely get in touch with each other to start the mentoring process. The above image is one that was taken when mentors and mentees met.

The software helps reduce the amount of administration time needed to run the programme. They also had lots of paper in different places beforehand – a LinkedIn group here, emails there. Now, with MentorNet, they have everything in one place. Jane King can also easily send out an email to everyone in the system and communicate as and when is needed. She comments, “We used to have a paper-based system, with lots of paper, emails and LinkedIn groups, but they were all separate. Now we have MentorNet, everything is in one place and it is so much easier.”

So don’t let paper get you down! Nor does the lack of an administrator need to stop you running the mentoring programme that you so want for your students. Feel free to contact us with any questions you have.

“We used to have a paper-based system, with lots of paper, emails and LinkedIn groups, but they were all separate. Now we have MentorNet, everything is in one place and it is so much easier.”

Jane King, Senior Lecturer Accounting and Finance at Oxford Brookes