Share a mentee success story

I have mentored so many people over my career, so its hard to just share one. I would rather discuss how we have mentored people internally within our organisation over the years, and the success story they all wrote. In particular, two ladies.

One, lets call her Sandra, came to work for VCA at the tender age of 18. Her mother was a caregiver to my granny, who had gone blind, and used to come with my granny for family lunches. One day she told us how Sandra was battling to find work, and that nobody was willing to give her a chance. At the time we were not in need of any staff members, but decided to let her come in for some experiential workplace time. She said we didn’t even need to pay her, just giving her a chance was enough.

She started the next Monday. Wet behind the ears and very eager to learn. Sandra ended up working for VCA for nearly 10 years. She was the first person in her family to obtain a diploma, or any tertiary education. She was the first person in her family to get a driver’s licence, and to buy her own car, and then she became the first person in her family to buy a property. Eventually, Sandra left for a bigger corporate, that could provide her with more growth than we had been able to.  But what a feeling, knowing that single-handedly, you had that impact in her life.

The second lady, we will call her Monique. Monique came to us as a little shadow of a woman, in an abusive marriage, with no self confidence at all. This was evident in her demeanour, in her dress, in her style, and in her eyes. She came as a part-time bookkeeper, but again we soon spotted the raw talent in Monique, who at this stage had been retrenched twice, had two small children, and was in dire need of a job. She was hungry and ambitious and with the right coaching, Monique became a force to be reckoned with. She obtained her first post-matric qualification, managed to leave her husband, get divorced, rent her first place of her own ever, and buy a new car. Monique was unfortunately poached by one of our clients, but such is the way of the world, always a bigger fish.

Just the stories of these two women makes me beam with pride. It is stories we forget, we dismiss, as part of the job, and part of what small businesses do. But we forget that in this way, we change narratives forever. We do not just have an effect on the employee, but their spouses, children, mothers, fathers, siblings. We have an effect on their communities, and eventually, as our small ripple expands, our country.

Lets not forget our stories, or our small or large successes, but celebrate them and recall them with pride.