Oprah Winfrey had Maya Angelou as her mentor. Richard Branson had Sir Freddie Laker, Mark Zuckerberg had Steve Jobs, and Bill Gates had Warren Buffett. Why would any of us try making it in life or business without a mentor?
The best gift you can get yourself in 2026 is a mentor! While I operate in the world of business, I was born to teach. The richness of my life and professional experience prepared me to mentor young individuals when time permits.
This year, I experimented with a light mentorship programme. Apart from individual meetings with my mentees, I have arranged Saturday morning sessions with specialists such as tax and investment experts. I plan to intensify this programme.
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Around 1990, Richard Branson was already a successful entrepreneur worth millions of pounds, having founded Virgin Records in 1970. However, he was also building Virgin Atlantic (VA). This move had earned him the ire of British Airways (BA).
The latter was using dirty tricks to stifle VA’s growth, including anti-competitive pricing and even grabbing certain routes to stymie Branson’s venture. Branson sought the advice of Laker, whose airline had collapsed due to the same anti-competitive tricks of BA. Though Laker had successfully sued BA, he worried that VA would suffer the same fate.
His powerful advice to Branson, his mentee: “sue the bastards!” Branson did, eventually forcing BA to settle out of court and pay him damages. The rest is history. Why a mentor?
The isiZulu proverb,“indlela ibuzwa kwabaphambili,”is the answer. To “find the right path, we need to ask those who have walked it before”. A mentor is not a coach, though there are overlaps.
I call my persistent mentees ‘warriors’, as opposed the ‘doodlers’ ― who will request an appointment and never follow up. Be a warrior, not a doodler, once you find your mentor. A coach tackles specific, short-term skills and performance (how-to), while a mentor targets long-term, holistic growth by sharing their experience and knowledge.
To paraphrase the title of Mark McCormack’s classic leadership book, there will always be “what they do not teach you at Harvard Business School”. As a mentor, I do my best to work with aspiring young entrepreneurs (already expecting great results) by telling them the naked truth, which is the first pillar of mentorship. I have a mentee, into his late 30s, who lives an amazingly structured life.
His personal routine, preferences, how he conducts himself every day with an amazing business, how he is driven by a clear vision, purpose and direction, makes him stand out among my mentees. He can handle the truth, unlike what Colonel Nathan R Jessup thought of Daniel Kaffee in the 1992 filmA Few Good Men. Trust is vital because in mentorship both parties end up being vulnerable.
Without trust, confidentiality will be violated. Without openness in conversations the mentor cannot give informed contextual counsel. Sir Freddie Laker was able to advice Branson correctly because the mentee had bared his personal and business vulnerabilities.
The second pillar of mentorship is about making time for my mentees. Aa busy as my schedule is, my avid belief that I was born to teach compels me to be punctual for appointments with my mentees. This is not only a sign of respect for them, but my way of being exemplary. The same goes for you, the mentee; be persistent in asking for a slot in their diary and then show up on time.
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