Reverse mentoring is where the mentor (or more senior person) garners just as much knowledge and experience from the mentee as they’ve been offering them. The mentor and mentee come into the relationship offering two very different perspectives, with both parties being open and keen to hear the other’s way of thinking and to understand the vastly different experiences the other person has lived or is living.
Reverse mentoring began as a diversity tactic. Diverse, talented people were set up with more senior people to support the more junior individuals’ careers and to offer them the experience and advice they did not have access to. It was a way of allowing diverse talent into closed networks.
