“Without good leadership or mentors, it’s really easy to skate through your professional experience and feel underwhelmed. So having someone who can teach you how to be ‘whelmed’, how to be overwhelmed, and how to feel good about things is really important.”
Ben Harrison
Ben Harrison developed his skills as a leader and mentor early on in his 15+ year career. At the age of 18, he secured his first management position at a Verizon call center and worked there throughout his undergraduate studies. After earning his bachelor’s degree in Management Information Systems and Services, Ben went on to obtain his MBA at Utah State University while simultaneously moving up the corporate ladder at Verizon. After 12 years of working in various roles at Verizon, Ben no longer felt challenged in his career. As an extroverted leader, he knew he needed a job that would allow him to work with people on a more interpersonal and sophisticated level. This realization led Ben to make a career change to Peek, a B2B software company that specializes in travel booking. Throughout the past 5 years, Ben has cycled through various HR roles at Peek, including titles such as onboarding manager and director of onboarding and implementation. Today, Ben sits as the senior director of onboarding and implementation at Peek, where he manages a team of employees spanning 7 states in the U.S. and also in Mexico, Santiago, and Columbia.
We sat down with Ben to gather his thoughts on the role of mentorship in the modern workplace. Here are some highlights:
Q: Have you ever been mentored by someone? How did that mentorship impact your career or shape you as a person?
“I think there is a perception that if you don’t get mentorship early in your career, then you’re going to miss out. But that’s not true. Because even three or four years ago, I had already been a leader for 12+ years in a myriad of different positions and my boss at the time was the VP of Ops at Peek and I just looked up to him greatly. He had accomplished so much at a young age and he just seemed like he had a lot of wisdom. And I remember one day going to work and just saying ‘I want you to mentor me.’ That was really useful because I found we could talk about broad scopes of professionalism and business that were outside of the onboarding or operational roles at Peek. And even when he left Peek, we still kept in contact. That door is still open, so when I have work related questions or concerns, I know that I can call him and he will take time out of his life to mentor me. And this all happened because I specifically asked him to mentor me.”
Q: What made you interested in becoming a LevelNext mentor?
“I really enjoy working with people who are new in the workforce and industries they are part of and helping people navigate the politics of work and how to move through issues and how to be radically candid…That’s what I really want to bring to this experience. It doesn’t matter who you are or what you’ve been doing. Having someone to chat with and give advice and bounce questions off that isn’t associated with what you’re doing to get paid, I think is really powerful.”
Q: What qualities do you think make a good mentor?
“I think a good mentor is not necessarily someone who dominates conversations. Someone who soapboxes and says ‘This is what you have to do to be successful’ I think is a little shortsighted because that may have worked for that person, but you’re not getting into what makes someone an individual and what they’re going through and what they’re looking for. So I think the best mentors are ones who really understand who they’re working with and ask their mentees what they expect to get out of a mentorship, because then you can hone that in a little bit.”
If you want to get mentored by Ben, click here to apply and sign up with LevelNext today.