John Y’s Musings from the Middle: My Little Big Idea

My big little idea. And the importance of mentoring–a dying art.

Several years ago Leadership Louisville and the Courier-Journal spearheaded a project to identify the 128 “Connectors” in our community. These are the people who are descri…bed as often the unsung heroes but also the glue in a community to help bring people and groups together and help get things done. They are energetic, trusted and enthusiastic and play an integral leadership role but aren’t necessarily in the most visible leadership position. And they exist in a variety of fields— profit and non-profits, commercial and public sector.

I was honored to be selected as one of these 128 “Connectors” (the concept came from Malcolm Gladwell’s breakthrough book Tipping Point).

The most important byproduct of this program was that it highlighted the idea of so-called connectors in our community as a role that is important and worth doing. I think in some small but important ways it “upped our city’s game” in this department. It inspired those identified connectors —and those who could or should have been on that list— to embrace this role that they play and to try to do it even better. It gave a name to this vague art and identified it as important and worthy of development.

The downside of this exercise is the “Now what?” conundrum. What do we do with this group now that they’ve been identified to improve the community. So that it doesn’t end up appearing to be little more than a high school senior superlative exercise. There was a study done and suggested, among other things, that connectors don’t necessarily work at their best with a group of other connectors. And so it was difficult to galvanize the group in some formal way…but it was a worthy project that was more than just a self-congratulatory yet probably didn’t leave as deep or as broad a legacy benefiting our community as its sponsors had originally hoped.

Which brings me to my big little idea.

Does Louisville have another group of individuals who are integral to our community’s growth and future but too often fly under the public radar and aren’t encouraged or thanked enough for the important role they play? And–here’s the pivotal question– if a similar project to the “Connectors” was established for them could leave a significant and lasting legacy?

I think the answer is yes! And I propose we have a project identifying and celebrating “Mentors” in our community. Those who take the time to show their younger eager counterparts the ropes and serve as role models and sounding boards and touchstones and are relied on for the sound sober guidance so critical when the stakes are high and emotions running higher.

By identifying and cultivating our city’s mentors everyone wins. We don’t value our wiser and more experienced elders enough in our world today–and it is to our detriment. And these mentor-types derive great personal satisfaction in giving back and helping facilitate new and better leaders for the future. But there is no formal mechanism to identify and encourage this practice. At least right now.

Louisville has a lot of great natural resources and is blessed with a central location and rich history. But perhaps our greatest resources is the fund of experiences so many accomplished people in our community have —and have in a host of different fields and professions. And our other great resource is we have some highly energetic, dynamic and ambitious young people who have more confidence than experience and more smarts than judgment. Their shortcomings begin where the untapped expertise of the mentors in our community begins.

Think of the underutilized mentors in our community as an internal brain drain we can’t blame on our sister states bleeding from us. We can only blame ourselves.

Wouldn’t it be great if we found a way to connect these two powerful but currently fragmented forces? I think so.