Ask HN: How do you find a mentor in software engineering and in life?

There's plenty of successful people 10-20 years older than you, who want nothing more to tell a younger person what to do and then have them ACTUALLY FOLLOW the advice they are given.

I have a close friend who's about 12 years older than me. He told me I'm the only person he talks to who actually takes action on the advice he gives. Because of that, he gives me more advice (pro tip: none of it is complicated).

My recommendation is to ask people for small pieces of advice who you respect, implement the small things, then follow up and thank them for their advice and show them you've implemented it. Sooner then later, they'll start sharing more unsolicited advice that you can continue to follow.

Joining an organization (club, church, or charity) where you can be around people who are older than you is a great way to bump into people like this.

Some companies will assign you a mentor, particulary if you are in a group that historically does not utilize mentors much. I have not seen this work very well. First of all, there are never enough senior people to be mentors to the vast number of mentees that participate in the programs. Each mentor has to "cover" several mentees leading to less time spent with them and less investment by the mentor.

A good mentor is someone relatively senior and definitely not your boss or your boss's boss (grandboss?). You want someone who has seen/experienced many things. Someone who has seen and understands things like office politics. You also want someone who will be honest with you. You need them to be invested in you.

These relationships can start from either side. I have seen young, talented people that look like they could use some assistance and reached out to them to offer my help. Usually they accept as I was a relatively senior person by the time I started doing this. I was looking to pass on my hard-earned experience and knowledge to someone I thought would use it and benefit from it. The best relationships I had as a mentor occurred when the mentee asked me and not as part of a program. In these cases they were motivated to learn and improve. Most importantly, they acted on what we talked about. To be clear, a mentor does not tell you what to do. They are a sounding board that has seen many more situations than you and can help you think things through. If you never act on their advice or always argue against it (Hey Boomer!), you are simply wasting their time. A good mentor always has other things to do - their time is a valuable gift.

As for what you can learn from a mentor, it depends upon the mentor and for what you are looking. I found mentees frequently did not understand how decisions were made at the senior level and/or what the corporate strategy was. They did not understand how what they did fit into the bigger picture and how important what they did was to the company. Some, usually new managers, wanted to understand how to motivate and retain their employees. Others wanted to understand KPIs that they could design a measure for their team. Others wanted to understand how they should think about promotions and differnent job opportunities (even outside the company). Each one was different.

The single best mentee I ever had was at a company where we all worked remote. We had regular Zoom discussions every couple of weeks (in office jobs, I preferred to go to lunch or get coffee with a mentee to get away from the office). He showed up prepared - an informal status on what was going on with him and his team, a list of questions/topics to discus, and feedback from implementing what we discussed in prior meetings. He was very thoughtful about what he wanted to learn - how to be a better manager, how to prepare himself to be better positioned for promotion, how to consider various career opportunities. After a year, he surprised me with a summary of what we had discussed, what he had done differently as a result of our conversations, and what was the impact. He even walked me through his metrics to describe his success. It was phenomenal. Incredibly satisfying for me as the mentor. I was definitely invested.

One final thought in the long post - mentors who are invested in you will work to advance your career when you are not around. They will recommend you for positions of which you are not aware (this is how many positions are filled). They will refer you to friends and associates at other companies where they think there is a great opportunity. They will advocate for you. This is an incredibly valuable aspect of the mentor/mentee relationship.

For success in mentorships you need to be invested, you need to get your mentor invested, you need to be comfortable having honest discussions with them and believe that nothing will be repeated to others, and you need to act on what you discuss.

I would not discuss a specific job change outside the company with your manager. You put them in the untenable position of trying to be helpful to you and doing their job in representing the company. If their are matters which cause you concern about your job by all means discuss them with your manager. However, if you are evaluating pros and cons of leaving the company it will most likely permanently impair your situation at the current company. Even if your manager convinces you to stay at the company, you have put them on notice that you are looking around and were about ready to leave. Depending on your role, that will likely cause your manager to look elsewhere when selecting people for key projects, advancement, etc.

Coming to a manager with a discussion about another job, especially if you initiated the search (out of the blue offers are not so bad), feels like an ambush. Usually the manager has little time to respond with a counteroffer and must use lots of political capital to make it happen. They cannot help but wonder why you did not discuss the issues that are causing you to leave earlier when they could have done something about them.