Become a mentor

Becoming a mentor is a very rewarding way to help someone else, while developing yourself. As a mentor, not only do you have the satisfaction of sharing your knowledge, you’ll inevitably also learn from the mentoring experience. You can agree on the expectations around how often to meet and the type of support you can provide.

You don’t need to wait to be very senior to become a mentor. Your knowledge may centre on the legal profession, law as a business, or you might have expertise in how to use technology or adopt new ways of working. Either way, you can offer support and career advice to help other lawyers along their professional journey.

“Mentoring is inherently valuable at any point in your career...it can provide meaningful advice on practical steps moving forward.” 
Victoria Rea, Solicitor at Wilson Harle

Looking for a mentor

A mentor can help you think about what you’d like to achieve in your career and get you to start making steps towards getting you there. Often this can be about having someone challenge you and get you to think differently about achieving things. At the very least, it can be a great way to meet other lawyers you wouldn’t otherwise know and be better networked in the profession.

At some point, many of us have sought guidance either to help find new ways of looking at things or to provide direction on career issues. You don’t need to be junior to seek the advice of a mentor, people in the Programme come from across the profession and are at all stages of their career.

Who can join

The national Mentoring Programme is open to all lawyers. You’re welcome to participate in the Programme from all areas of legal practice – regardless of the stage of your career, ethnicity, mode of practise, gender or place of work. You can join as either a mentor, a mentee or both. We welcome interest if you:

• hold a current practising certificate
• have been admitted but are not yet practising
• are between roles and do not currently hold a practising certificate

Join the programme

Our Mentoring Programme uses an online platform called MentorLoop, which matches mentors and mentees based on their profiles. The Programme is free to join, to get started:

1. email mentoring@lawsociety.org.nz for more information
2. you will be sent details of how to sign up to MentorLoop and will be asked to agree to the Terms and Conditions, and Code of Conduct
3. create your profile by answering a series of questions about yourself; every fortnight MentorLoop matches mentors with mentees, and you will be notified if you have been matched with someone.

The matching process might happen quickly for some people and for others it may take more time.

Once a match has been made, you will both have the opportunity to see if it’s the right match for both of you.

To have a successful relationship, both parties need to be committed, self-aware and respectful of the other’s time and skills.