Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together

‘Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together’ is the newly updated Olympic motto intended to spur the athletes on to embrace the Olympic spirit and perform to the best of their abilities. ‘Together’ has been added very recently and seems especially relevant for the last few years as the whole world has been dealing with the Covid-19 pandemic together, yet we have, on the most part, been kept apart.

The Olympic motto is well known throughout the world, and it is followed by the Olympic creed, which says ‘the important thing in the Olympic Games is not so much to win but to take part’. Both the motto and the creed resonate for all of us but none more so than our current students who have navigated their studies through such difficult times together and who will finish faster, higher, stronger as a result.

(Photo of some of our mentors and students last week at the assessment centre evening)

Last week saw over 30 students take part in a mentoring assessment centre evening; whereby final year business students received experiences of, and feedback from, a number of assessment centre activities; a group exercise, a mock interview with a Director from the local region, a CV discussion and opportunity to sit some psychometric tests. The assessment evening was an example of togetherness, as it involved the co-ordination of IoD (Institute of Directors) mentors, the university Careers Department and busy, final year students. Trying to get 60 people in one place, hasn’t always been easy!

The students were all part of the IoD Student Mentoring programme run by the Business School to support students towards the career of their dreams. Students are matched with a local Director from the IoD to enhance their CV, encourage their applications and prepare them for their graduate job interviews. The mentors share their expertise, their networks and where they can, provide short placement opportunities to further develop essential employability skills. The scheme has been running for 12 years now and has had over 300 student successes.

More details are here; Mentoring - University of Wolverhampton (wlv.ac.uk)   

This mentor assessment centre evening was particularly good timing as students, now in their final semester have a sense of urgency now towards their job hunting. They need to move faster to be ready for that graduate job. The valuable practice and feedback they have been given from this assessment evening has put them in a higher position than those who have not had the mentoring support, and as a result their preparation towards their dream jobs and their confidence in their abilities and career choices has become even stronger. From working together with both their mentor and the wider mentoring team, they will be much better placed for future competition towards jobs. They have been taking part and as a result, they will be the ultimate winners. As one of the mentors pointed out on the evening, they have developed huge additional employability skills to survive their last 2 years of turmoil within their university educational journey (not least resilience, persistence and tenacity to carry on), and as stated by the Olympic Committee; it is not the triumph but the struggle that counts.

We may not have ended our GB Winter Olympic journey on a huge high in Beijing this month but we have learnt lessons, we have gained huge learning from our experiences and we will come back Faster, Higher, Stronger – Together. Elite athletes have coaches and mentors too. They nurture them, they guide them and they give them the tools to be the best they can be. Our mentors have done the same for our students. With this support, they have taken part and they have fought well; the future looks bright.         

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By Dr Jenni Jones, Associate Professor in Learning and Teaching, University of Wolverhampton Business School