July 2006 ISSUE
Enrich Your Life Through Mentoring,
Says Mentor of Year
BY GEORGE LEE
THE PEGG
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MENTORS AND MORE |
APEGGA’s second-ever Mentor of the Year says that a life without helping humanity is a life of poverty. By that definition, Champak Mistry, P.Eng., is a rich man indeed.
The Edmonton husband and father has mentored no fewer than 59 people. Sixteen of them are actively searching for engineering jobs, eight are seeking non-engineering jobs.
“Mentoring is a process of life that starts with self-acceptance,” Mr. Mistry told a small crowd honouring him on his award, June 26. Those who are mentored well end up becoming good mentors themselves, he added.
The evening was designed to recognize Mr. Mistry in front of his peers, as well as promote APEGGA’s Mentoring Program before actual and potential mentors and protégés. Under the program, a mentor is an experienced APEGGA member who coaches a less-experienced member on work-related soft skills — things such as communication, teamwork, employment and networking.
A protégé, on the other hand, is an APEGGA member seeking enhancement of soft skills and willing to be coached by a mentor.
Successful mentors say it’s worth it to take part in a formal mentoring program, such as the one APEGGA offers. Studies back them up — mentoring results are better when the process is formalized.
Mentors receive an education of their own, says Tom Greenwood-Madsen, P.Eng., who emceed the evening and has mentored three people.
“It’s all about the protégé,” said Mr. Greenwood-Madsen. “You have to relinquish control. And for me that was a unique experience.”
It’s changed the way, in fact, that he coaches on the job. “That generally wasn’t the way I did things. But I started to employ the techniques I learned with students and engineers-in-training, and I’ve seen their development and confidence soar.”
Being a mentor has made him examine what it means to be a professional and take a closer look at his own life experiences. “A little introspection is not a bad thing,” he said.
That kind of growth doesn’t surprise Arlene Lack, B.Sc.N., APEGGA’s coordinator of the program. Ms. Lack initiates the matches, and coaches and monitors the mentoring pairs.
Mentors, she says, gain the satisfaction of giving back to their profession and watching a less-experienced member develop, and become aware of new ideas and talents. Mentors can also claim, by the way, up to 20 continuing professional development hours per year for active mentoring.
Protégés gain
skills, non-judgmental coaching, and perhaps a reference or a network of contacts.
The APEGGA program has a pool for protégés who need workplace skills
and another for protégés who need employment-finding skills. APEGGA
permit-holding companies are also showing an interest in joining the program.
Most of the companies want internal matches, but they can match externally as
well.
Protégés pay $50 for their first year of mentoring, $25 for subsequent
years. Mentors pay nothing. APEGGA developed its own mentoring tools, which are
user-friendly and time-efficient to use.
Len Shrimpton, P.Eng., APEGGA Director, Internal Affairs, told the reception
that mentoring at APEGGA has been around since the early 1990s, when the first
mentoring guideline was published. “I’ve seen it grow with improvements
in the guideline and now a program to match mentors and protégés.
We’ve enhanced our online information and hired a coordinator,” he
said.
“I believe mentoring is a very important part of the development of members and one that can’t be underestimated.”
Mr. Mistry would agree. He came on board the official program in 2004. A few years before, he had begun volunteering with the APEGGA Outreach Program, passing his love of science along to youngsters. Then in late 2004 he joined the APEGGA Communications Planning Committee, which he now chairs.
Born in Gujraat, India, Mr. Mistry moved to Tanzania at a young age, where
he would return after graduating from the prestigious Engineering College of
the University of Poona in Maharasthra State.
It wasn’t long before he became head of the civil engineering section of
the largest construction company in Tanzania — at a mere 27 years of age.
Mr. Mistry moved to Ontario at age 35 and then became the vice-president of a mid-sized consulting firm in Edmonton.
In the early 1980s, he began his own firm, Zircon Projects Ltd., which continues to this day. Municipal engineering services were its mainstay at first, but more recently it has focused on community development projects involving community programs and infrastructure development.
Throughout his career, a social conscience has shone through. Mr. Mistry helped create and begin a skills and management training program for Africans in Tanzania. He’s a founding member and five-time president of a group dedicated to practicing and preserving the Gujraati prajaapati culture, language and traditions, and to promoting harmony among cultures in multi-ethnic Toronto.
Fundraising at the Edmonton chapter of the Crohn’s & Colitis Foundation of Canada increased from $60,000 to $250,000 under his presidency, preventing its closure.
He’s also founded a group to remove generational poverty around the world through education and employability training. Plans are to move the program into Aboriginal communities in Alberta — communities Mr. Mistry has been working with for the past 15 years.
One of his major concerns is helping internationally educated graduates become registered and employed. Many foreign-trained engineers who arrive here don’t become Canadian engineers. “That’s a huge loss to this country,” says Mr. Mistry.
MENTORING INFORMATION
Visit http://www.apegga.org/members/Mentoring/tocmap.html
Or Contact
Arlene Lack, B.Sc.N.
780-426-3990
1-800-661-7020
Ext. 2820
alack@apegga.org