Mentorship for All Librarians: Collaborating to Create a Statewide Mentorship Program

Abstract

This article will describe the steps taken to create a statewide mentorship program for interested and motivated library staff. The authors will share a pilot project in Colorado that was founded with a commitment to increasing diversity in library leadership, and fostering equity, diversity and inclusion by empowering library workers, library administrators, and information professionals to connect with each other and share professional knowledge and experience for career growth. Included will be group formation and logistics, how work was created and operationalized, evaluation results from participants, program sustainability, and lessons learned.

Keywords:

• Mentorship
• career/professional growth mentoring
• peer mentoring
• group mentoring
• job shadowing
• informational interviews
• speed mentoring
• statewide mentorship program

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).