The powerful secret that Bill Gates and Richard Branson know that most business owners don’t

In a recent survey of small business owners by Sage, 97% of those that use the services of a Business Mentor highly valued the benefit that it brings. In addition, 93% reported that having a mentor helped them succeed.

This is why highly successful business owners like Gates and Branson use a mentor, quite simply it brings enormous benefit.

But, before you ask ’where do I find a business mentor near me’? what exactly is a Mentor?

The word Mentor comes from Greek Mythology, Mentor was a friend of Odysseus who placed Mentor in charge of his son Telemachus when he left for the Trojan wars. Over time it has come to mean a ‘Trusted Adviser’.

So, what does a ‘Business Mentor’ do for an owner?

Ultimately, their role is to help you grow and develop your business and they do this by listening and questioning you, challenging your thoughts and ideas and giving you advice or options/alternatives to consider. They may also coach/train you in a particular area of business for example people management/leadership etc.

At UK Business Mentoring we like to describe ourselves as the owner’s ‘Unreasonable friend’. We are there to support and guide but even though a strong personal relationship develops between the mentor and owner we are there to ask the questions that maybe they don’t want to hear or answer.

In summary: “We enable business owners to achieve their goals by helping to remove barriers to performance and releasing the potential in their business”.

A few statistics for you:

• 94% of businesses using external support see real benefit (source BIS)
• 97% of business owners with a mentor value them highly (Sage)
• 70% of SMEs receiving mentoring support survive beyond the first five years (source FSB)
• 67% of SMEs report increased productivity due to mentoring (source mentorsme.com)

So, with this in mind why don’t more owners use mentors?

In our experience the reason for this is quite simple, most owners don’t know where to find one or they are nervous about being seen to ask for help.

Well if Bill Gates and Richard Branson can ask for help why shouldn’t you?!

And in answer to the question ‘Where can you find a Business Mentor near me’ here’s a great start for you.