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The Lost Art of Mentoring

The Lost Art of Mentoring
By Bobby Bock
NAPS Southeast Area Vice President

Among the ranks of EAS employees are those who have a vast amount of experience. There also are new supervisors hanging on by their fingernails, trying to comprehend the challenges of being a supervisor in the Postal Service.

In days past, when a newly promoted supervisor would arrive at an office, a seasoned supervisor would serve as mentor and take the new supervisor under their wing. They showed them the ropes and helped them adjust to their new role as a supervisor.

Perhaps this informal mentoring ceased to be prevalent once the first Associate Supervisor Program was implemented in the mid-90s. Since that time, the Postal Service has made changes in supervisor training and, regardless of your position in the latest supervisor training program, those of us who are considered seasoned supervisors should be looking to help our newly promoted supervisors adjust to their new jobs.

Look at it this way: A new supervisor reports to your office or on your tour. You see they are having problems with addressing employees or moving employees to other operations. Don’t you realize the quicker the new supervisor gets their feet under them, the more it will help the overall operation?

As an example, I had a new acting supervisor, 204(b), who just had received a grievance regarding the USPS contracting out. I asked the supervisor about the issue. Once he told me about the grievance, I explained the grievance process and the timelines. I got a Form 2608 and we walked through it together.

The grievance was not his fault; the union violated the national agreement. We completed the form and provided information about the grievance, denying it at the initial step. Because we both worked on the grievance, the documentation was clearly stated so the grievance could be appropriately dealt with at the next step of the process.

Being a seasoned supervisor and seeing a rookie supervisor dealing with a problem is like seeing your younger brother or sister being taunted by a bully. You wouldn’t stay on the sidelines if a family member was having problems! You need to step in and help a new supervisor when they are being pressed by a belligerent employee, harassed by a union steward or you can see they are struggling.

I remember when I was a new supervisor and senior supervisors took a few minutes to show me how to do something, write up a grievance or handle a boisterous employee. These are things I still remember to this day.

Because someone looked out for us, now it’s our turn to pay it forward and help the next generation of supervisors.