In Greek legend, before Ulysses embarked on the Trojan War, he left his young son Telemachus in the charge of a wise old man named Mentor. Under Mentor’s guidance, Telemachus became skilled in archery, wrestling and hunting. The twist to this tale is that Mentor was actually the Greek goddess Athena, in disguise. So the point of this story is to look beyond the stereotype of white haired old man for mentorship. Your mentor may take the form of Greek goddess!

Recently, the Johns Hopkins Postdoctoral Association in Baltimore, USA held a session on “How to have a productive meeting with your Mentor/Mentee” that featured postdoctoral researcher Jenifer Calvo (JC) and professor Rajini Rao (RR). Moderated by postdoctoral researcher Irina Duff, the Q & A session covered best practices and proposals for better mentoring of postdoctoral fellows. Their discussion follows, together with excerpts from Rao’s annual lecture on Mentoring from the Johns Hopkins Responsible Conduct of Research course.

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