Startup Mentoring Program
Mentors are committed individuals with deep industry, investment, or entrepreneurial experience. They work with the companies pro-bono, without expectation of reward or compensation, will share of their knowledge and guidance freely, and will open their networks when appropriate.
The E-Center facilitates two kinds of mentor relationships – the main difference comes down to time committment and availability.
Paired Mentors
Paired Mentors work directly with one or two teams. They commit to help a team get launched – through the business planning process, navigating funding, and most continue to serve in deeper capacities to the company beyond. To make matches, the E-Center sends a quarterly guidebook listing of teams and what they are looking for. Mentors are then free to connect with any team they find interesting or aligned with their experience.
Executive Office Hours
Each week the E-Center hosts a different experienced entrepreneur who holds office hours to meet one-on-one with teams. Teams sign-up for 30-minute time blocks to discuss any issue they need help working through. Mentors can participate at their convenience and the time committment is usually about 2-hours. It’s a great way to meet a variety of students. Many mentors who participate in Executive Office Hours often decide to become a paired with a team.
More than 100 startups at MSU have a CEO under the age of 22.
They need your experience.
The primary role of a mentor is to provide feedback, perspective, new ideas, and judgment. Successful mentors teach their mentees problem-solving approaches rather than merely give them the answer.
As soon as you sign-up for our mailing list, we will send you our Mentor Pairing Guide PDF, which shows you all of the teams looking for assistance. You can simply contact an entrepreneur you specifically find interesting from there! From time to time we may also reach out and make a formal introduction with a team that we believe may align with your interests, but we want the process to be as easy as possible with you in control.
Mentoring is not the same as consulting. Your goal is to guide the founding team in how to make strong decisions by sharing your experience, wisdom, and political savvy, not simply tell the team what to do.
Sometimes things won’t work out, and if that happens, we hope you’ll inform us quickly to resolve. Either the team or the mentor can end the mentorship relationship and can be reassigned.
For our Paired Mentors, you and the entrepreneur will work one-on-one to determine when and how they will meet, and for how long. We recommend that you establish at least one monthly check-in call. To sign-up for Executive Office Hours, please call or email Brooke Lammert to pick a date that work with you!