Mentoring the Mentor: The Importance of Professional Curiosity

One of the things I value most about mentoring is that learning rarely flows in only one direction.

We tend to think of mentorship as a relationship in which someone with more experience shares knowledge with someone newer to the profession. And certainly, that is part of it. But some of the most interesting conversations I have had as a mentor have reminded me that experience does not mean having all the answers. Sometimes the person you are mentoring is the one who causes you to stop, question something you have taken for granted, and look at your own practice differently.

Recently, a conversation with one of my mentees did exactly that. We were discussing professional language when she mentioned that some organizations are moving away from the word stakeholder, preferring alternatives such as aligned partners. I had encountered discussions about terminology and language during graduate studies, and they are issues I continue to think about in my own professional practice. Still, her comment made me pause. It wasn't really the particular word that interested me. It was the larger question behind it:

How often do we stop to consider the language we use simply because it is the language we have always used?

Language Shapes More Than Communication

In vocational rehabilitation, disability management, vocational evaluation, case management, and other helping professions, we communicate for a living. We interview people. We review records. We write reports. We communicate with treatment providers, insurers, employers, lawyers, rehabilitation professionals, and the individuals receiving services.

The language we use matters because words do more than communicate information. They can influence how we understand a situation and, at times, how other people understand the individual being described. Consider some familiar examples.

Calling someone non-compliant may describe an observable lack of participation, but it may tell us very little about why that participation is not occurring. Are there financial barriers? Transportation problems? Fear? Cognitive difficulties? Cultural considerations? Previous negative experiences with treatment? Competing responsibilities? A lack of understanding about what is being asked?

Similarly, describing a failed return to work can inadvertently place the failure on the worker when return to work is rarely dependent on one person alone. Job demands, accommodations, workplace relationships, treatment, functional capacity, communication, expectations, and timing may all contribute to the outcome.

Even the way we speak about disability continues to evolve. Person-first language has long been encouraged in many professional environments, while some individuals and communities prefer identity-first language. There may not always be one universally preferred term.

That is precisely why curiosity matters.

Language Is Not Static

Professional terminology changes because our understanding changes. Words that were once routinely used in healthcare, psychology, rehabilitation, education, and disability services have been reconsidered as our understanding of disability, stigma, identity, culture, and human behaviour has evolved. That doesn’t necessarily mean that professionals who used older terminology were acting with poor intentions. Language develops within a particular historical and professional context. But professional growth requires us to recognize when that context is changing.

For me, the goal is not to memorize a constantly changing list of acceptable and unacceptable words. Nor is it to assume that changing terminology automatically changes practice.

It is to remain willing to ask:

Why do I use this term? What does it communicate? Is there a more accurate way of describing what I actually mean? And how might the person I am describing understand it?

Those questions are useful well beyond discussions about inclusive language.

Curiosity as a Professional Practice

If I had to choose one word to describe how I try to approach this part of my work, it would be curiosity.

For me, that means asking questions before making assumptions and trying to understand what might be behind something before reaching a conclusion. This is particularly important in vocational rehabilitation, where the answer is rarely as simple as it first appears.

If someone says they cannot return to work, I want to understand why. If someone is having difficulty participating in rehabilitation, what is getting in the way? If assessment results do not seem consistent with someone's education or employment history, what might explain that? The same applies when the medical evidence, the person's reported experience, assessment findings, and occupational information do not seem to line up. Those discrepancies are often worth exploring.

Being curious does not mean setting aside professional judgment. I think it is part of developing good professional judgment. We still have to weigh the evidence, consider different explanations, recognize what we know and what we don't know, and be willing to reconsider an initial impression when new information gives us a reason to.

What Mentoring Has Taught Me

This is also one of the things I have come to appreciate about mentoring.

I expected that I would be sharing what I have learned through my own education and experience, and of course that is a large part of it. What I didn't necessarily expect was how often mentoring would make me think about my own practice.

A mentee might ask me why I approach an assessment a certain way or introduce me to terminology or an idea I haven't encountered before. Sometimes I know the answer. Sometimes I have to look it up. Other times, the question makes me realize that I have been doing something a certain way for so long that I haven't stopped to think about why.

I actually really value those moments.

Experience gives us knowledge, but I don't think it should make us less willing to question what we know. If anything, the longer I work in this field, the more comfortable I have become saying, "That's a good question. Let me think about that."

That's part of what I enjoy about mentoring. I may have more years of experience, but that doesn't mean I am the only person bringing something to the conversation. Someone newer to the profession may have recently learned something I haven't encountered yet, come from a different area of practice, or simply ask a question that makes me look at something differently.

Continuing to Learn

A conversation about the word stakeholder may seem like a relatively small thing, but it reminded me of something much bigger.

Lifelong learning doesn't only happen through courses, conferences, credentials, or continuing education. A lot of it happens in ordinary conversations with colleagues and other professionals.

Sometimes someone asks a question you weren't expecting. Sometimes they challenge terminology you've used for years. Sometimes they simply ask, Why do we do it that way?

Those are good questions to keep asking, regardless of how long we have been working in a field.

I don't want experience to make me so certain of what I know that I stop being curious about what I might not know. One of the things I enjoy most about vocational rehabilitation is that there is still so much for me to learn.

And sometimes, the person I'm supposed to be mentoring is the person who reminds me of that.

Has there been a word, assumption, or professional practice that you've reconsidered over the course of your career? What made you look at it differently?

Heather Mallard, BA (Hons.), CVRP-TSA, ICVE, CCVE, RVP
HM Vocational Consulting