How Assisterhood works
FAQs

This year (2023) applications open Wednesday 29 March. Keep an eye out on our socials @assisterhood for more details, or subscribe to get our updates delivered straight to your inbox. 

Fill out a mentee application here. You’ll be asked a few questions about yourself and your professional journey so we have the best chance at matching you with the right mentor. Be yourself, show your personality – and remember, this isn’t a job application! Vulnerability is encouraged. The process takes about fifteen to twenty minutes.

You’ll be notified of your application result via email a couple of weeks after applications close. Best of luck!

We feel the same, all our mentors are AMAZING! We’ve introduced an option to select your #1 mentor preference, or leave it up to the Assisterhood match-makers to set you up!

Mentee applications close at 11.59pm Friday 14 April, 2023. But don’t fret, we’ll give you plenty of notice on socials and over email. We recommend getting your application in ASAP – don’t overthink it!

Not at all! Work experience is not a requirement to apply. All ages, abilities, and experiences are welcome.

Abso-bloody-lutely! We welcome anyone who has applied in the past to try again, you never know your luck.

Send us a message here, or contact us on our socials @assisterhood. One of our friendly squad members will get back to you ASAP.

Nope! We’re a not-for-profit, non-political organisation. As our founder Linh often says, Assisterhood is a passion project – one fueled by hard work and a dedication to enriching our community.

Assisterhood officially runs between May and November – but is really a year-long mentorship program. Once paired up, you and your mentor should aim to catch up once a month. Of course, this is just a guideline as every mentorship is different. You do you!  

Nope! We welcome all ages to apply.

We’re committed to ensuring Assisterhood is inclusive and accessible to people of all backgrounds, diverse perspectives, identities, and abilities.

Our goal is to create a supportive, respectful and welcoming environment for people who share these values.

We encourage people of all unique perspectives and underrepresented groups to apply. We acknowledge there is not an exhaustive list, but we can strive to continually expand our definition of it. Intersectionality is an extremely complex topic and we are always open to improving our understanding and the inclusivity of Assisterhood. Please reach out if you have any thoughts, feedback, or questions on this.

We recognise the unique strengths and skills that people with diverse backgrounds and experiences offer – we also recognise how limited real representation is in many roles and fields. 

A great quote that sparked the idea of Assisterhood is “You can’t be what you can’t see.” and it still rings true today.

We’d love you to! Drop us a line here and tell us more about why you’d like to become part of the Assisterhood as a mentor.

Communication may be in person, via phone, e-mail, zoom, snapchat, smoke signal or any other form of communication you can think of. It’s best to meet in person, especially when you’re meeting for the first time.

• Backgrounds and interests
• What challenges you might be facing
• What your expectations of the program are
• Set goals and/or timelines for the year
• Identify upcoming dates that might impact the program e.g. holidays or work commitments
• Setting calendar dates for meetups

As much as we try to perfectly pair mentees with mentors, sometimes it takes a bit of work to build a strong connection. After all, relationships take time to grow and trust takes time to build. We’ve put together a few handy tips to help build your relationship and make each meeting meaningful:

 

• Get to know each other! Build a rapport with one another by chatting about personal interests. How do they spend their free time? What books are they reading or what are they working on at the moment? You’ll probably have more in common than you think – which will make it easier to relate when talking about career goals.

 

• Talk about mentoring. Every mentee / mentor relationship is different. Sometimes it helps to understand what each of you want to get out of your meetings. Have either one of you participated in a mentorship program before, or had a mentorship relationship? What did you learn from it? What part of the approach did you like and what would you do differently?

 

• Meet consistently and be reliable. It’s important to honor your commitment to your mentor / mentee. Make sure to show respect for each others’ time and be fully present in your discussions. You’ll get way more out of it if you do!

 

• Communicate often and take action with clear expectations. As a mentee, it’s great if you can act on any suggestions made by your mentee and communicate your progress in between meetings. Having great communication and following through on discussions means you’ll both feel that you’re investing time wisely. 

 

• Be open and honest. Be straightforward with each other and welcome transparency. Be open to all types of feedback and communicate your assumptions, needs, limitations and expectations. Just be yourself and the rest will follow! 

 

If you’d like to get in touch with us about your experience in the program, please reach out to us here.

We host a number of events throughout the year. You can expect an initial kick-off party and a fun-filled end-of-year event. We also offer several informational events available to the wider Assisterhood community, to which mentees and mentors have special access. Keep an eye on your inbox for all upcoming events!

You betcha! Mentorships are encouraged to continue after the official program has concluded. Some Assisterhood mentorships last the duration of the program and some continue well beyond it. Both are great outcomes. No matter if your mentorship lasts one year, or twenty – all of our mentees and mentors are encouraged to get the most out of this incredibly rare opportunity as they can.