Cara Nelson, CREW Boston

During the course of my career, I have been lucky to have the support and guidance of both mentors and sponsors. Both are incredibly important in order to progress professionally, but they serve very different purposes. Mentors are often not present in your office, but provide invaluable advice and guidance, assisting with navigating tough decisions and uncertain situations that may arise over the course of one’s career. Sponsors, meanwhile, have influence in your place of business; they advocate on your behalf in your workplace and act as your champion as you move up the corporate ladder. Both are crucial, especially for women working their way up towards management or partnership or other advanced positions in their company.

One of the hallmarks of CREW Boston is the organization’s mentor program. Participation in this popular program is limited to members of CREW Boston, one of the largest and most active chapters of CREW Network, a 10,000 member organization dedicated to the promotion and advancement of women in the commercial real estate industry.

CREW Boston’s mentor committee matches mentees with mentors based on profile information provided by mentees. The committee facilitates face-to-face group meetings and provides tips to both mentors and mentees, helping everyone set expectations and ensuring a successful mentoring relationship.

The goal of the CREW Boston mentor program is to help CREW Boston members gain insights and connections to expand their horizons and skillfully navigate their career path. The program can help members build their network and gain new perspectives on possibilities in the real estate industry and in the CREW Boston organization. Since the program launched in 2007, there have been approximately 30 pairings of mentees and mentors every year, as well as peer-to-peer mentoring.

Our participants in the peer-to-peer program focus less on helping someone early in their career and more on finding someone at roughly the same spot in their career path, to bounce around and develop ideas. We have had extremely successful pairings – for mentors, mentees and peers – and often the relationships continue after the official program comes to a close.

Teresa Betit, managing director and credit risk manager in the commercial real estate banking office of Bank of America, N.A., is a CREW Boston member who has participated as a mentor in the program. She expresses great enthusiasm for the mentor program.

“It’s a great program, very well run,” she said. “I enjoy this opportunity to be a mentor to the younger generation of people just starting out their careers. It’s a way to give back.”

Betit said that, in an industry traditionally dominated by men, women often hesitate to ask for what they want. “We tell them it’s OK to have a voice and to stretch for leadership,” she said.

She has guided two younger women in the program. “They were very smart and really engaged,” she said. “They want guidance and career advice.”

During the course of the six-month formal program, Betit would typically have lunch once a month with her mentee, and in the meantime she would communicate by email, often sending relevant articles to her mentees. “It’s not a huge time commitment, and it’s really valuable,” she said.

Betit said she will participate again. “I talked with one of my mentees about how to ask for a raise,” she said. “And she got it.”

Cara Nelson, partner at DLA Piper, is the 2016-2017 president of CREW Boston.