Executive outlines the benefits of spontaneous interaction, addressing isolation and career silos with the possible benefit of solving recruitment and retention issues
Urban design uses a concept called the ‘third place.’ Not the first place (home) or the second place (work), third place are physical places where people exist together, that have no or minimal cost to use, and where community is fostered. These are town squares, libraries, gyms, cafes, bars, churches, and parks. They create something of immense value, spontaneous interactions between people of different backgrounds. These spaces can make for great ideas, communities, and relationships that occur spontaneously. As many people live increasingly isolated lives their access to third places has become limited and many of their horizons have narrowed. Asif Nasim wants to change that.
Nasim is one of the co-founders of mentoree, an online mentorship platform built around creating more community and spontaneity. Nasim is a seasoned financial services executive, currently operating as the principal of Nasim Management, a boutique consultancy specializing in financial services. He outlined why he wanted to build a mentorship platform, what he hopes it can achieve, and how a spontaneous and multi-disciplinary mentorship program might help to address the advisory business’ specific recruitment problem.
“I saw models where people would be assigned to a product, mentored in it, given a certain period, and asked to have specific results, and I thought ‘is that the way the real world works?,” Nasim says. “People have different interests, mentors come from different backgrounds, people are in transition, they want more of a global source of information. I think a lot of the work done at mentoree is driven by diversity of thought. In this hybrid work world, people are struggling and if you can give them a space to experience people with different careers and backgrounds you can see how many doors it opens up.”
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Nasim highlights isolation as a core source of political and personal polarization. Without access to those diverse ideas and backgrounds, people begin to lose empathy for one-another. Though mentoree facilitates one-on-one mentorship relationships, they also facilitate what they call ‘Mentoree Mondays’ where larger groups are brought together for more spontaneous interactions.
Nasim likens those events to the experience of sitting in the stands to watch live sports. When you’re sat shoulder to shoulder with other fans, even if they are strangers you create community through the shared experience of supporting a team. He contrasts that with watching from a box, where a smaller group are isolated and removed from the communal experience, losing much of what makes sports special in the first place.
Nasim’s view is that increasing polarization can hold back careers, especially in the early stages of work as multidisciplinary as financial services. Even the application process is isolating, with many people applying all day online, talking to nobody. They may not be aware of their horizons or the options available to them. Through mentoree Nasim says he has helped people in the early exploratory stages of their careers talk with advisors, reporters, and executives who each offer a different perspective on that person’s career.
“I want to create a place where people can feel comfortable to learn from others, to feel like there’s acceptance, and an exchange of ideas as part of their regular routine,” Nasim says.
Those conversations don’t have to be about careers to have a positive impact. They could be about music, art, sports, or film. They could be about all sorts of ideas that might offer a new view or perspective. As much as Nasim wants to see people succeed through mentoree, he wants to encourage greater perspective and context emerging. He wants people to be given the opportunity to turn the news and stimulus they get on their phones every day into meaningful conversations.
Applying that to the financial advisory business, Nasim sees a lack of engagement as a challenge that the industry continues to face as it struggles to recruit the next generation of young talented advisors. Participating in a platform like mentoree, he says, can give senior advisors hands-on exposure to the people they want to recruit and give those recruits a sense of what advisors may expect from them.
“When we think about mentorship, there’s a functional element in the exchange of experience, but there’s an emotional element,” Nasim says. “You come to care about a person and you’ll have a vested interest in making the time to support them. Some people do mentorship in fixed organizations and silos, but the humanity is not there. When things are more open people can exchange wisdom.”
