How to make the most out of Command+J as a Mentor
By: Anshuman Dhar
Tags: India, Best Practices, Mentorship, Design, Advice

How does Cmd+J work?

Once you’ve signed up on the homepage of the website, you can simply sign in using your email and password, anytime. Mentees would schedule time with you through a page that lists all the mentors on the platform together in one place.

Each mentee is given only 4 opportunities to schedule time with various mentors every month, to make sure that nobody misuses the facility and it isn’t overbearing for our mentors. So if a mentee has chosen to connect with you, there’s a good chance they’ve done so after going through your bio and/or experience.

As a mentor, you always have the option of pausing or opting out of Cmd + J for any reason.

When you schedule time with your mentee on the website, you and your mentee will be CC’ed in a mail with details of the scheduled time. You can then connect with the mentee to discuss what to talk about, what medium to use, and so on. However, if you pause/opt-out and have calls scheduled for the future, we will either re-assign the call or keep the call as it is and simply remove your name from the cohort based on what you want.

This was a short summary — You find out more details about how the platform works here.

(Note: With every platform with potential for good, there is potential for misuse. Please note we do not condone using it as barter for personal gain -eg. getting Google Play Reviews or finding users to test your product, treating Cmd+J as a job portal for hiring among other things which violate our Code of Conduct. There exist appropriate portals for the above. The sole purpose of Cmd+J is connecting a mentor and a mentee.)

What are the Next Steps?

So you’ve set up your Cmd+J account, and already have a good idea of how the platform works. But you’ve never scheduled video calls? Worrying about all the things that could go wrong?

We get it. We’ve been there, having enthusiastic young designers looking up to you and hoping to get the best advice can be a lot of pressure 😬

We know how much giving back means to you and we love that you want to do it right! We’re here to make sure you can make the most out of the time you have with your mentee🌟

Here are a couple of good practices which will ensure that-

1. Give yourself a Break

Make sure you schedule breaks between conversations. As much as you may enjoy the conversations, and talking to people or getting to know their story.

Don’t underestimate how taxing it would be to be so deeply engaged, even at 30 minutes at a time. Consider spreading out the chats over a few days, or scheduling breaks between calls so that you can put some time into processing before leaping directly into a new one.

2. Gauge the Goal of the Conversation

Every mentee is different. Some might be students looking for career advice or portfolio feedback. Some might be young professionals looking for leadership advice or more nuanced design reviews.

All mentees have picked certain topics they need help with, along with answering two prompts. You can initiate a conversation based on these responses and should help you keep the conversation flowing.

3. Confirm the Call

A great way of establishing the first contact can be in the form of a reminder email the night before/morning of your conversation and can alert you to last-minute cancellations on the mentee's side.

This can also be helpful to give a small reminder to yourself. Sometimes, in the course of the day — we might get tangled up in meetings or might not always have our phones with us to remind us.

Make sure to include the time of your chat (write down your time zone!) and how you’ll be contacting them. Here’s a template I use:

Subject: Looking forward to our Cmd+J conversation today Hey Hey 👋, Looking forward to talkig with you today at 8:00–8:30 PM IST. I’ll call you on Google Hangouts at that time to your Gmail (myemailid@gmail.com)! Stay Warm,

Anshuman

4. Going Forward

Depending on how many conversations you’ve agreed to take on, it's important to consider if and how you’d like to continue this conversation with each mentee.

A simple “let me know in a year how you’re doing” might be as much as you’re willing to commit to; other options include inviting them to visit your office if they’re ever in the city, offering to answer any questions they have in the future via email, or referring them to another industry professional who can elaborate on specific topics they’re interested in.

It’s not a mandatory part of Cmd+J to continue the conversation, but think about how much time you can reasonably spend on follow up meetings/conversations so that you don’t over-promise in the moment.