Coaching and Mentoring: What's the Difference?

People often confuse coaching and mentoring. Though related, they are not the same. 

Coaching is action oriented. The focus is on concrete issues, such as managing time more effectively, speaking more articulately, and learning how to think strategically. This requires a content expert (coach) who is capable of teaching the coachee how to develop these skills.

A coach is trying to direct a person to some end result, the person may choose how to get there, but the coach is strategically assessing and monitoring the progress and giving advice for effectiveness and efficiency

Mentoring is relationship oriented. It seeks to provide a safe environment where the mentee shares whatever issues affect his or her professional and personal success. Mentoring is a process in which an experienced individual helps another person develop his or her goals and skills through a series of confidential one on one conversations.

A mentor is like a sounding board, they can give advice but the mentee is free to pick and choose what they do. The context does not have specific performance objectives. 

In a nutshell, I have listed some of the most distinct differences between a coach and a mentor below:

COACHING	MENTORING
Action Oriented	Relationship Oriented
Short Term	Long Term
Performance Driven	Development Driven
Easily evaluated and measured for ROI	Less easy to measure for ROI
Coach gives feedback on progress	Mentor may not give feedback
Coach paid for services	Mentor receives no compensation
Focus is more on business issues than personal	Focus on both personal and professional development
Coaching is done one-on-one	Mentoring is usually done on a one-on-one basis but other models may be used as well
Content expertise is more important in coaching	Interpersonal skills are more important in mentoring
Coaching is one–directional	Mentoring is bi-directional
Coaching is focused on the business person	Mentoring involves the whole person
Behavioral transformation	Personal transformation
More structured in nature	More informal (no formal structure in place)
Agenda set on achieving specific goals	Agenda set by the Mentee

I hope this clarifies any misconceptions you had about coaching and mentorship.

Get in touch with me for your first free consultation: wwmahinda@gmail.com