How to Create a Mentoring Culture in your Organisation

mentoring culture

Antoinette Oglethorpe talks to Gregor Thain of Intercontinental Hotels Group about bringing the 70:20:10 model to life

Gregor Thain is Vice President Global Talent & Leadership for Intercontinental Hotels Group (IHG).  He leads the global centre of excellence for talent and leadership across the organisation.

Gregor has had a diverse career.  He started as a mechanical engineer where he worked in the defence industry (with Marconi) through the petrochemical industry (with ICI) to manufacturing (with Mars).  He then took a big leap into sales management roles within Mars before broadening into corporate finance with GE Capital.

Gregor’s official roles within learning started at GSK, looking after sales training before shifting into talent management across manufacturing worldwide and then global leadership development.  Gregor moved to IHG in 2011 to be the global head of leadership development, and he expanded his role to look after talent in mid-2014.

Gregor Thain’s experience of leading in different sectors and specialisms means that he has a real understanding of the business and the challenges faced by leaders on a day to day basis. He is known for bringing pragmatism and an end-user focus to the solutions he creates.

Developing a mentoring culture

One of the most quoted “rules” in Leadership and Talent Development is the 70:20:10 model.  The model is based on research that shows 70% of adult learning comes from experience in the role, 20% comes from a reflective discussion (coaching and mentoring) and 10% comes from formal learning.

Yet, the majority of organisations will still admit that 90% of their investment is spent on the 10% of learning that comprises training courses, e-learning etc.

How can we put more focus on the job experience and developmental discussions?

In this interview, Gregor shares what he has done at IHG to bring the 70:20:10 model to life and to create a mentoring culture that builds leadership development across the business.

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1 thought on “How to Create a Mentoring Culture in your Organisation”

  1. The aspect of teaching people how to have great conversations feels paramount to me. I think we have assumed in the past that this should be easy, but people shy away from them, so it’s important that we focus on what a good conversation looks like. I know Antoinette has built a great resource to help managers have great conversations with their people.

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