Mentor Volunteers
VIN Veterinary Mentorship Academy (VMA) Mission Statement
- Provide clinical and non-clinical mentorship and support to any colleague, anywhere
- Not leave any colleague unsupported in whichever phase of their career pathway
- Help colleagues grow into the best professional version of themselves
- Help colleagues identify their professional happy spot
We do this by offering structured clinical and non-clinical programs (which run alongside a colleague’s current clinical job). In addition, we try to recruit kind colleagues with mentorship SUPER powers and connect them with those in need of such mentorship. The Virtual Veterinary Internship (VVI) is the flagship program of the VMA.
- The VVI is a program aimed at helping new and not-so-new grads (re)find their feet within the profession.
- More information can be found here.
- You have a minimum of 3 years as a practicing veterinarian in your subject area.
- You have a “mentor’s mindset”: you get energy out of sharing your SUPER power.
- You are willing to spend some of your valuable time guiding your mentee’s learning.
- You are open to being asked questions and are happy to answer them in a way that “teaches mentees to fish”, rather than merely “handing them the fish”.
- You understand that there are different personality types within our profession and can interact with those in an empathetic and constructive way.
- Absolutely not – you can just be the master of your own SUPER power.
- Mentors are not expected to be board-certified specialists.
- If a mentee asks a question that the mentor does not know the answer to, the great breadth and depth of the VIN community will be at hand to help both mentee and mentor.
- A team of VMA senior mentors will also be available for consultation.
- Internship (VVI) mentors have regular online meetings with their mentees (15-30 minutes, every 3 months). Less formal interactions also occur in-between meetings.
- There is no specific training required, though RACE-approved mentor training materials will be made available through VIN.
- For Virtual Veterinary Internship mentors, we recommend mentors complete this mentor training.
- This training will help mentors to be the most effective mentor and to get the most enjoyment from the mentorship.
- All mentors are part of a mentor group where issues and ideas can be discussed and shared with fellow and senior mentors.
- Newly acquired mentoring skills will be useful to mentors in their work outside the VIN community as well.
- We do not expect being a mentor to take a lot of time and we think you will like it.
- As a mentor, you will be supported by other mentors who can cover for you during busy times or during vacation.
- If however, you find that being a mentor is not your thing after having mentee(s) assigned to you, we will find a solution.
- For Virtual Veterinary Internship mentors, the mentorship lasts the length of the internship: 1 year.
- We would love for you to be involved with subsequent cycles too so that more colleagues can benefit from your mentoring skills (however, you can decide).