The Act Of Mentoring Others
A successful person without a successor is a failure in disguise
This is a very popularly used quote in relation to success and I see truism in it. If your success ends with you without raising others to take after you, then you have not succeeded. Success should be passed on to others in order for it to be sustained. When you are making progress, you also need to ask yourself who are you mentoring to continue what you have started? A lot of businesses have gone with the founders, not because the businesses were not potent but because there was no one to take after the founder.
There are businesses in this present time that have outlived their founders. Now consider if the founders did not deem it fit to raise people that will succeed them, the businesses would have folded upon demise. Hoarding of knowledge is a disservice to oneself. Imagine if something happens to you, it will greatly affect your business. As a matter of fact, if no one can fit into your business in your absence, then you have not succeeded. Okay consider the fact that you may be challenged in your health, does it mean that your business will be halted until you have recovered?
The truth is that you even get more successful when you help mentor others to be successful too. Yes, it may be the person you groomed in the pathway of success that will eventually become your support tomorrow. I remembered when I was doing a part-time work many years ago in a particular firm during the school holiday. The owner of the firm understood the need of mentorship, so he put me through a whole lot of things. After the school resumed, I returned back to school. Then the next holiday, I went back to see how things are, and I noticed that the founder was not around but the business was running seamlessly.
When I enquire about the owner of the business, I was told that he had been having a health challenge for over 1 month and was indisposed to be at work. But no one will notice because virtually everyone was taught how to use all the machines in the company. I also joined them to work and everything was moving well. Now imagine if he had hoarded his knowledge or have done everything by himself, at that challenging time of his life, his business would have suffered a great hit. However, because he had replicated himself in others, his absence was not felt and everything was moving on as usual. Mentoring is simply an act of replicating and recreating oneself in others. The benefits of this is immense and can also lead to more success. This reminds me of a popular statement in this part of the world:
We rise by lifting others
You will be surprised the level of success you can attain by helping others to achieve their own success. When I was in school, there are times that some of my friends would come to me to help put them through in certain topics. I discovered that the more I taught them that particular topic, the more understanding I got from it. This also happens when you help people to rise, you will rise with them.
A few months back, a very popular businessman held an event in his hometown. Just by merely announcing the event about 2 weeks to the time, people started rallying around him with financial and material support for the event. This is because he had trained many people in his line of business and they are doing very well.
The event was held; which was so massive that it made the round of news for days; but amazingly, he did not spend a dime of his own money. Support was excess that even after the event, he had abundant of resources left, which he also used to raise some more people by giving them to establish or improve their own business. You see, the people that he supported yesteryears are the ones to come through for him. One of the best forms of investment that anyone can have is investing to raise people - human capital development.
When you raise money, you may secure prosperity in the present, but when you raise people, you will secure posterity. If no one can comfortably attribute their own success to your own, then you have not actually created impact. The impact you create is not a function of what you have but how you have helped humanity with what you have.
Thanks for reading
