Why mentoring is not a one-way street.

This is about a great young talent, who started as an intern, continued as a working student, and became my mentor along the way.

Fresh out of her bachelor’s degree in IT and with a master’s program ahead of her, she wanted to use the time in between to get a taste of technical writing. Fair enough. Little did she know. Or I, for that matter.

What I expected was a smart young woman exploring a field she was curious about. What I got was someone who would quietly challenge my assumptions about mentoring, growth, and maybe even life itself.

Her own project, and everyone else’s methods

She had one project that was fully hers to shape: research, concepts, outreach to the target audience, workshops. Hers, start to finish.

Alongside that, she rotated through small tasks with me and the other technical writers on the team, so she could learn their working methods, too. How do you write? What do you pay attention to? On purpose, so her sense of how this work gets done wouldn’t be shaped by just one person. Not just mine.

Even in that supporting role, she wasn’t just watching and taking notes. She brought her own technical background into the room, asked critical questions, and made suggestions I hadn’t thought of. Working with her was enriching in a very specific way. I was learning, too.

What are you curious about?

Every so often, I asked her the same question in different forms. What do you enjoy? What do you want to look into? What interests you about software development? I wanted to open doors, not point her down a hallway.

She told me, more than once, how much that meant to her. And she gave something back for it, too. She got up to speed fast, became someone I genuinely leaned on in my day-to-day work, and in her own way helped put the technical writing craft in the spotlight inside the company.

She had her own struggles to deal with and plenty of situations that pushed her out of her comfort zone. But she never waited for someone else to rescue her. She dug her way through unfamiliar topics, asked good questions, came up with thoughtful concepts, and showed a level of initiative that made working with her an absolute joy. She was reliable, approachable, full of ideas, and remarkably strategic and composed for someone this early in her career.

Staying on

When she asked to stay on as a working student, I was thrilled. She kept building on her project, wrote concepts, and helped optimize processes. And she kept pushing back on me, too. Questioning decisions. Handing me ideas I hadn’t had myself.

Organizationally, we kept a rhythm: daily check-ins, and dedicated sparring sessions for whatever she was working on at the time. She also kept working tickets alongside other technical writers on the team.

Watching her grow into the role was wonderful. And I noticed somewhere along the way, something unexpected happened:

I grew, too.

Because while I might have introduced her to technical writing, she taught me things I didn’t know I still needed to learn, such as how to remain curious about the world, or how growth doesn’t happen because you suddenly stop being afraid, but because you decide to move anyway.

She challenged me, too. With her quirks. Her phases. Her doubts. Her determination. I saw her wrestle with uncertainty and push herself into uncomfortable situations. And I watched her come out stronger on the other side, again and again.

Not a one-way street

Which is why I sometimes smile when people talk about mentoring as if it’s a one-way street. The experienced person teaches. The younger one learns. Simple.

Except it isn’t. Not when you build in room for someone to ask their own questions, choose their own doors, and push back on you along the way. Because who was mentoring whom, really? I honestly don’t know. What I do know is that she became much more than “my working student.” She became someone who means a lot to me.

And then she left

For a semester abroad. Which, if you know her, is almost funny: she’s the one who likes plans, who needs structure, who wants to know exactly what’s coming next. And then she just packed her bags and went to a country that isn’t exactly known for its structure and plans.

I missed her more than I expected. But maybe that’s what she taught me, too: life isn’t something to optimize. It’s something to live.

So, who mentored whom?

I know this: we grew together. And I have a feeling that’s exactly how it’s supposed to be.