Workers seek good role models

NEW YORK (AP) — One chief executive tutors another. A mother on flex-time shows her younger counterpart how to mesh career and family. Working together on a short project leads an older man to push his younger self to follow in his footsteps.

Young people flooding into the work world often need someone to advocate for them: guidance on how to navigate office politics; how to balance work and a personal life, and direction figuring out a career path.

“Look for somebody that you can connect with,” and who you can help too, said Kim Post, vice president at management consulting firm Global Lead LLC, who has been helping companies develop and retain employees for 20 years. “You can’t expect a mentor to own your life or career. ... Their job can be to advise you, advocate for you, help you meet the right people.”

The three relationships below illustrate different ways these relationships are formed and what benefit they gave to those involved.

UThe flex-time role model. As Helena Yoon was coming to the end of her maternity leave at the accounting firm PricewaterhouseCoopers, she struggled with whether or not she could return to work full-time and still put her family first.

She strongly considered leaving, but then looked to her former official mentor and close friend, Lillian Borsa, as an example of a working mother whom she could trust to tell her the truth.

UThe B-school guide. There weren’t very many blacks at Lehman Brothers in 2003, said David Neverson. So when the young analyst ran into senior vice president Ken Allen near the elevator bank, the casual meeting led to his being taken under Allen’s wing.

The two never directly worked together at the now-defunct investment bank, but Allen asked Neverson to help him out with a minority-recruiting project, because Neverson had gone to the historically black college Morehouse.

When Neverson left Lehman four months later for a private-equity firm, the two kept in touch. They met about once every three months, with Allen strongly encouraging him to go to business school, as he had done.

UThe mentor turned investor. In 1999, Seth Goldman had recently struck out on his own with Honest Tea, an organic bottled-tea company. He spent sleepless nights worrying over cash flow and how his family was going to make ends meet — until he found a guide in Gary Hirshberg, CEO of Stonyfield Farm, a 10-years-wiser organic dairy entrepreneur.

After repeatedly running into Goldman, now 43, at various conferences and workshops, Hirshberg, 54, became intrigued by Goldman’s product, his charming manner and his willingness to answer tough money questions.

He signed on board as an advisor, helping Goldman persuade a difficult buyer for Whole Foods Stores Inc. to carry the brand nationwide. Whole Foods is now Honest Tea’s largest distributor. Hirshberg also carried Goldman’s tea in his O’Naturals restaurants and taught Goldman how to fend off venture capitalists who could have poached control of the company.