[00:00:00] Debbie Goodman: Welcome to On Work and Revolution where we talk about what’s shaking up in the world of work and ed tech. I’m your host, Debbie Goodman. I’m CEO of Jack Hammer Global, a global group of executive search and leadership coaching companies. I’m also an advisor to venture backed edtech founders. And for those of you in edtech who are hiring, we have launched a fractional leaders offering. I’ll put a link in the show notes. 

My main mission with all of my work is to help companies and leaders to create amazing workplaces where people and ideas flourish. So today I’m really excited to have Erin Mayhood as my guest. Erin has recently been appointed CEO of Mentor Collective, which is an organization devoted to providing mentorship to higher ed students, while also providing insights into student needs, retention issues. We’re going to get into all of this in a lot more detail in a bit. Erin has more than 20 years’ experience in higher ed and education technology development. She’s a former higher ed administrator, so she’s been in the bowels of the beast. And prior to joining Mentor Collective, she spent seven years in executive leadership roles at Interfolio.

She launched Interfolio’s first B2B enterprise solution and helped the company define and win the faculty information system category in the US and UK higher ed. And today we’re going to chat to Erin about her own career story, growing up in a low-income community with no one around who’d been to college. She’s now in the role of CEO, and we’re going to dig into the truly transformative power of mentorship if it’s done well. Welcome Erin.

[00:01:46] Erin Mayhood: Oh, thank you so much for having me here today.

[00:01:48] Debbie Goodman: Okay, well, let’s dig in right away. What’s it been like to be in the CEO seat for the last few months?

[00:01:56] Erin Mayhood: Well, as I’m sure you know, it’s quite the transition, but first things first, it’s just been such a tremendous honour to lead this company and this team. And moving into the CEO seat Has really brought a different perspective, even though it was an internal appointment, it was different than I had imagined.The new perspective, the reach that you have, it has really opened my mind into different ways of thinking, which is really, really energizing experiencing the community of investors, peer CEOs, leaders at our customers. It’s all been incredibly supportive and continues to reinforce what I already knew. Support is always around us and sometimes the toughest thing to do is to reveal where you need the support and to ask for where you need it. But fortunately, I’m surrounded by a fantastic group.

[00:02:47] Debbie Goodman: It is interesting what happens when that job title changes, because you were formerly chief product officer and then you’re operating in a senior leadership role. You’re being involved in all the leadership discussions, but somehow that change of title does amplify, magnify, and mean that you have access, but also, you’re the throat to choke. So, when it to when things are not going so well too but. Things have been going very well. I want to actually just ask you about your successor transition because you were chief product officer and had you known that you were going to get the CEO role or were you part of an interview process? How did that all come about? 

[00:03:27] Erin Mayhood: It was definitely not a given that I was going to be moving into the CEO role. What I will say is that when I joined Mentor Collective, our CEO at the time, Jackson Boyer, CEO and founder, he’s now chairman of the board. He had asked me about my career aspirations when I joined Mentor Collective and what would be most helpful to help me get there. So all my time working at Mentor Collective we discussed leadership growth, having access to the board, learning more about the investor community and Jackson, I’d say, really took his development of me very, very seriously. I had contact and coaching from the board, from a great group of advisors, mentors from the investment community. And for that, I’m incredibly grateful. So I was very, very glad when I got the call. But I did not know beforehand that it was going to be me.

[00:04:18] Debbie Goodman: Right. Have, did you ever contemplate what might have happened if it had been somebody else? Because clearly you were being sort of groomed into this transition, but there’s always a chance that perhaps that doesn’t happen.

[00:04:33] Erin Mayhood: It’s true. It’s true. You know, I think about CEO transitions a lot, to be honest. So having worked at smaller companies, it happens, you know, founders, 10 years for a founder is an incredibly long time. So yes, it was at the back of my mind, at which point will the founder transition into a more board based role?

And I did think about pros and cons of external versus internal appointment. You have to think really carefully about those things. So I had given some thought to it. We were not actively engaging in that, but I think Jackson just realized that this was his 10-year mark. It was the perfect time for him to transition, and we had really hit an inflection point in terms of scale for the company and felt that it was time to bring in leadership who had experienced this particular growth point as a company. So I appreciate it. I admire all founders out there who make that decision. What a tough one. It’s almost like your child’s growing up when you start a company. And so, I’m always grateful for this opportunity and really excited about it.

[00:05:38] Debbie Goodman: Let’s get into, I mean, that’s a really great transition story, Erin. We do this a lot. We’re an executive search firm. We help founders and CEOs and boards and leadership teams to make these transitions and they’re not always so simple and they’re not always so peaceful. And they often leave some people not feeling so openhearted about the process. So I’m really glad this one worked well for you. But let’s go into your pretty remarkable career story. You grew up in a low-income community, no real role models around who’d been to college. Here you are as CEO. It’s most certainly not been a straight line to get here. Tell us some of the defining moments that sort of marked your journey along the way, college and then into the world of work.

[00:06:24] Erin Mayhood: Yes, happy to share that. And I think I think the takeaway will be we understand why she’s leading a mentorship company. So I know that so many people can share similar stories to mine. I hear from others that there are multiple moments that happen moments and people that really help you persevere things that leap out at me. I had a single mom who, when I was a teenager, she became an adult student at a community college to become a nurse because she was hoping for a better future for herself and her children. At that time, we had to move in with family members to help care for us and for her financially and we had tough talks during those times.

And I remember very clearly family member saying to me, you have a choice to make about your future and laid bare how I could change my trajectory. And yes, those talks included encouragement to do well in school, to find something that I love and to really work hard at it. And so it was very clear to me that at age 15, that I played a major part in changing this path for myself. At that time, I discovered music and it really helped me finding new, very healthy way to express myself. And through music at school had the encouragement of a high school teacher to audition for a music program at university and that was something that I didn’t even realize was a thing and that could be possible. So I did it and I got in to my local university and the music professors there, they pushed me. They performed with me at gigs around the city to help me bring in early income. And they talked to me not only about my instrument and musical performance, but my career options, about the value that I can bring, about doing what I love and how to succeed at it. So no, I didn’t go on to become a professional musician, but I really look back at all of those experiences and they were really, really formative and, and working hard and going after what I was passionate about and the encouragement to do that really defined me.

[00:08:42] Debbie Goodman: I can’t believe how similar our stories are actually. And that idea of the balance of hard work, discipline, talent, and passion is really what propels one forward. So I from a young age knew that I was very passionate about dance. And that’s all I wanted to do with my life and didn’t really want to go to college.

I wanted to be a professional dancer. And my parents nevertheless said you have to do something, and so, beyond just dance. And so I managed to find the discipline and the hard work in order to be able to sort of pursue a professional dance career whilst I was actually at college. Didn’t do dance at college, I was doing them on two sort of parallel tracks. But I think that People ask me, what did you learn in your formative years that have stood you the test of time as you’ve progressed? And honestly, that willingness to just put your back into it, but also your heart into it, because you’re doing something that you love.

And I, I honestly wish that for everybody. If people could just find something that they’re really passionate about, it’s not necessarily the end destination, but that helps them to cultivate that feeling of what’s it like when you combine hard work and passion.

[00:09:56] Erin Mayhood: Absolutely. It builds you up and grows your creativity, your problem solving, your belief in yourself. I say the same thing, you know, look for your passions. The other things will work themselves out because you learn so much in pursuing them.

[00:10:12] Debbie Goodman: I think some people feel that well, that’s just for the lucky few who find their passion. And I think that is a dilemma for a lot of young people is like necessarily know what they want to do. They don’t necessarily know what they, where their passions lie. And so, yes, for those who can find it early on, that is some in some respects fortunate. But I would, I would absolutely say that that is like a critical building block to success in life. It doesn’t necessarily need to be success in one domain. These people that came along in your life, your family, your music instructors, did they just like magically appear like fairy god parents? Did you seek any of them out?

[00:10:48] Erin Mayhood: Did I seek them out? I guess in one way, the music influences at one point I did seek out right because I was being encouraged to find something and so I showed up and but seeking out and showing up very different things, right? Just show up, go there and then people around you, if you’re fortunate, will step in. For the family, we always came from a tight knit family. And but also didn’t have the academic background or the professional background in the ways that we talk about today. I was so fortunate that my mom’s Family could talk about what could be or how to be different or what could be pursued and how you might get there. And that is a big game changer because I think I’ve spoken to some others in similar situations. It’s not always true that your family encourages you to try an alternative path to what members of the family have done. And so I see that I was pretty fortunate to have that influence. I didn’t feel a ton of pressure to follow a specific pathway.

I was more encouraged to find what worked for me. And I think that could be unique for some people, which is why I think there are things beneficial through structural, organized mentorships because not everybody has somebody that they just fortuitously connects with and who gets encouraged in this way.

[00:12:21] Debbie Goodman: Brilliant transition there Erin. Okay. Let’s just talk about the core offering of the business.

[00:12:29] Erin Mayhood: So we’re called Mentor Collective, but really when I talk about our core offering, I talk about us as a student success solution that fosters sense of belonging and increases retention and the likelihood of success through a mentorship platform. So we do this through the power of relationships, which we’re talking about today.

We, we do the connection through matching technology, encouragement in the form of check ins and nudges and curriculum. But what’s very special about Mentor Collective is that from those powerful connections that we help facilitate come actionable insights. And that ensures that institutions and organizations that are sponsoring the mentorship programs are aware of their role in helping students and learners succeed.

[00:13:19] Debbie Goodman: Okay. I need an example. So say I am a CEO. So I’m a student at one of your, you’ve got like 200 or so higher ed institutions that sign up for this. I’m a student and I want to sign up for this program. And then the higher ed institution is supporting this. They own the platform or they’re sponsoring the platform. How does this whole thing work? Who might my mentors be? And then how is the institution getting these signals that help with student retention? I need more information.

[00:13:50] Erin Mayhood: Yes. Yes. I love it. So first let’s imagine we’re students. And you’re probably on your phone all day long and so we’re recruiting you and encouraging you and telling you about the value of being a mentor or a mentee through SMS and sharing stories and what could happen. And so you, you decide to sign up and you get a matching survey that you quickly fill out and we start connecting you with your perfect match. The connections, it really depends what outcomes you’re looking for. So if you think of a first year student or a transfer student, sense of belonging and getting oriented to that space that experience is everything. And you’re very likely to get connected with a peer, somebody who is a little bit ahead of you, who has a shared life experience, who maybe looks like you, somebody who can really encourage you on that particular point of the journey. Now as you become later in your journey and you start, you’re feeling good, you’re there, you’re rocking and rolling and you’re like, You’re getting ready for that next major transition, which is your launch, your launch out of school. You’re going to succeed. You’re going to hit these goals. You’re looking to talk to a workforce member.

You’re looking to talk to an alumni member who maybe has a shared background of you, but also very importantly has skills or experiences that are going to help you prepare that resume that interview. Yeah. And a lot of cases help you decide what your next steps are, that career decision, confidence that really needs to be instilled in you.

So we connect you, we encourage that relationship. Now, when you join the program, you know, and because there’s training involved that mentors can report if you’re facing their, if their mentees are facing major obstacles. They, they can, they’ll become aware of campus resources and other resources available to the mentees so they can recommend them. And students, the mentees, will receive assessment surveys around sense of belonging, academic self-efficacy, so your confidence in your classes or your confidence in making decisions about your career. And little pulse check ins. That information goes to a dashboard. So the campus or the sponsoring organization can see things like what is disrupting the student’s life? What is taking them off of their learning tasks? What needs do they have today in this moment? So an example of a flag that a mentor would be trained to give is food insecurity.

[00:16:23] Debbie Goodman: Mmm.

[00:16:24] Erin Mayhood: If you think about food insecurity, if you think about severe academic issues, things like this come up and schools and I know that many students have ways of helping the student navigate this, but nine times out of 10, a student is more likely to share with a mentor that this is happening and a mentor say, listen, there’s an emergency fund. I can make this, you know, let me flag this. And so the school administration will know and so open dialogue about it and student success support teams can dive in. Mentors will not only back up the students, the student affairs, student support staff in those recommendations, but on residential campuses might even walk their mentee over to take advantage of, say, mental health services or health services or to the food pantry that makes all the difference in somebody’s life.

[00:17:16] Debbie Goodman: Wow, this sounds like an absolutely essential part of any campus everything. mean, it’s like, sounds as like as, as though it is as critical as high quality educational content to have this kind of extra support is absolutely critical. And I’m wondering what the obstacles might be to every single institution not signing. I mean, why wouldn’t they sign up for this? Cause this sounds like such a great, effective solution for so many of the challenges that students face. So, but you’re not the only mentorship offering out there. So what is your secret sauce and what is the unique differentiator for Mentor Collective?

[00:18:03] Erin Mayhood: Right. So the insights, obviously, is that’s one of the big differentiators. The other that I like to talk about, we have a no fail implementation rate. So every institution who partners with us implements our software within a short period of time. And you can’t say that about every student success offering out there. And that’s because we have end to end services. So the end to end services guarantees the implementation, but we work with each institution to make sure that we fit into your unique strategic plan and meet the specific needs of your population. We also do things like advise on best practices, share trends and benchmarks of student wellness across the country and provide programming to engage your staff. So creating community within student success professionals, I think is really, really important, especially since COVID and you know, there’s been A very remarkable drop in student engagement on campuses, which makes it very challenging for institutions to know what’s going on with the student experience.

There’s been a lot of talk about the need to personalize the student experience, and if you think about it, you really need your team. You need a team like ours to extend your reach, right? We can increase kind of the return on the investments of your support offerings and your staff by having leveraging mentors to encourage help seeking behaviour mentors to make those connections and that support. It really, really is. It increases your reach. And I think that’s such an important thing and a message to get out there and is unique than kind of a point and click mentorship platform where you might have to do all the implementation, follow up.

[00:19:49] Debbie Goodman: Okay. Do your mentors have training? And the reason I ask this is because back in the day when I was starting out, I was actually part of a mentorship program. Program that was for, I think it was for business women in South Africa. And I was super excited. I was going to be paired with somebody who was far more senior and she was, you know, had all this prestige and experience and the, the actual mentorship relationship was kind of a bit disastrous actually. Yeah, it just went pear shaped really quickly. And I kind of would dread the sessions with her and it left me feeling yeah, as a, as an experience I think neither she nor I knew what to expect out of it and not to put all the blame on her. I was probably equally at, you know, at a loss as to how to capitalize on this wonderful potential opportunity. So just curious to know about the mentor side of things.

[00:20:46] Erin Mayhood: Yes, it’s an important question because yes, that can happen now, things that we do differently to prevent that from happening. Training is one of them. So there’s an online training that goes through everything from things like title nine to how to set boundaries, how to start conversations, what happens if your mentee becomes disengaged or ghosts you. Like these types of things that can happen. We train the mentors. We also, when working with the institutions, encourage them to offer supplementary engagement sessions for the mentors. You know, offer them like little awards and thank you’s or have chatting sessions. We can join some of them, but we know I mentioned this because schools love our training, but also say well, can we do some ourselves?

I’m like 100%. The more community you create, the better. We also, this is why it’s so important not to expect a mentorship just to blossom, right? You also have to share information with the mentee. What might be required, and you have to nudge and encourage the relationship. We provide conversation starters, how you might have your first conversation. We collect goals from the mentee and then provide discussion guides on how you might engage with the mentee on these goals. Because no, not everybody hits it off immediately. You need a little structure and encouragement around that. I’ll also say sometimes What we’ve learned over the years. It’s not sometimes shared backgrounds really, really help, even one shared life experience. And so we say yes, we do matches based on what goals you’re after, what you’re looking to achieve. But really, what we’re doing behind the scenes goes much deeper than that, that we’re looking for some something else that you might be able to hold on to connect around. And we also ask you, you. both the mentee and the mentor, what you’re looking for and what frequency of communication makes you comfortable. Just so that we ensure that expectations are set you’re going to respond well to our encouragement and you have the highest chance of succeeding.

[00:23:00] Debbie Goodman: That sounds like a really good matching and training process as well. Okay. So, Erin, I noticed there’ve been some pretty big announcements around appointments recently. Andrew Rosen, a new CFO from the outside, it definitely looks like you are laying a foundation for some big growth. Tell us more about growth aspirations for Mentor Collective.

[00:23:23] Erin Mayhood: Yes. So thank you for sharing that observation. And yes, you are indeed correct. We are laying the foundation for significant growth. There are times and moments in a company’s history where you start to see things align. So for us, what we’re seeing, the pain points that we solve right now are acute and high priority for institutions across the country.

[00:23:47] Debbie Goodman: Mm hmm.

[00:23:48] Erin Mayhood: There’s recognition that our solution works. There’s sharing of how it works. The demand is starting to become inbound, which is very exciting, as you know, for a growing, yes.

[00:23:59] Debbie Goodman: The Holy Grail 

[00:24:01] Erin Mayhood: The Holy Grail. We have inbound and we have found and we continue to refine ways to help us scale. So we’re at a very exciting moment of our journey. And for us, scaling and working with more institutions, it means helping more students achieve their dreams. It means social mobility. It means uplifting our society and fulfilling workforce needs. So, yes, we’re laying the foundation of the growth and for us is driven by the mission. Yeah.

[00:24:30] Debbie Goodman: Okay. So let’s wave the magic wand. If all your hopes and dreams materialize, what does Mentor Collective look like in, let’s say five years time?

[00:24:39] Erin Mayhood: Yes, it’s funny you use the term magic wand, because our leadership team meeting last week, it doesn’t happen by magic. It happens by hard work and strategy. And so I love that you said that. You remind me of this. So really, really great question. I’ll start answering the students and work through different ways we’ll get there. So when I think of how we look in five years, I hope that each of us Every single student, and I mean every learner, regardless of age, background, point in their journey, has a team, and that team is a human team, that is around them, that encourages, uplifts, and helps them achieve their goals. To do this, Mentor Collective is going to continue expanding our innovation around effective combinations of humans and technology. This means we’re going to continue growing our offerings in ways that foster a sense of belonging, identifying student needs, and connecting students to resources that ensure completion and career success. We don’t want to do this in a silo. So really, when we think about ourselves in five years, we are part of the next generation of solutions for higher education that are very scalable and that are very easy to maintain. We involve students, alumni, workforce members, and how we deliver those students, and it creates value. It’s human connection and frankly, builds leadership that we so desperately need across all of these segments. So when you think of us in five years, and I can’t wait to come back and talk to you about it, you’re going to see that we solve multiple pain points, that we’re empowering these incredible teams of faculty, staff administrators, through the power of peers and live in the moment data of what is needed for every student so that they can thrive.

[00:26:29] Debbie Goodman: Wow. That is a powerful five year vision. I also noticed you used the word human at least seven times.

[00:26:36] Erin Mayhood: I had to throw it in there.

[00:26:38] Debbie Goodman: You did and we have managed to get through an entire podcast recording without using the two letters, A and I, so that is amazing too. Erin, this has been absolutely such a pleasure. I hope all of the hard work and the magic actually, cause I think it bit of all of that propels your vision and your mission and your dreams to fruition.

This is an amazing solution for students and higher ed institutions. And I’d love to, I’d love to have the five year reunion, but I’m sure we’ll speak sooner than that. Thank you so much.

[00:27:11] Erin Mayhood: Thank you.