The first six months of a coaching program follow a predictable rhythm. This guide walks through what to expect, what's normal at each stage, and what to plan for as you go.
Once we align on cohort and budget and the contract is signed, here's the math:
Motivated members can be in their first coaching session within three days of a chemistry call. The faster you've identified members at signature, the faster this compresses.
Your program moves through three phases:
You'll have structured touchpoints with our team at each phase: the Implementation Meeting and Post-Implementation Meeting up front, the Mento Kickoff / Information Session at launch, a Coaching Engagement Review in the first few months for programs of 10 or more members, and ongoing Partner Success Meetings anytime you need them.
Here's what to expect, month by month.
Implementation runs between contract signature and your program kickoff. Most partners take about four weeks. Partners who already have their members identified at signature can move faster. Partners still finalizing nominations can take longer.
You'll meet your Partner Success Manager in a 45 to 60 minute Implementation Meeting to walk through the Mento overview, our IT setup checklist, roles and responsibilities, and the partner dashboard.
Before launch, we'll meet again for a 30 minute Post-Implementation Meeting to finalize the list of members (names, emails, roles, engagement duration), review the communications plan, and schedule the kickoff event.
Two small moves at this stage make everything downstream easier. The first is identifying members as early as possible. The more lead time we have, the more time we have to reserve coach capacity, especially for specialized populations (research, AI engineering, international teams). The second is tagging your coaching participants in your HRIS at the start. It's a quiet step at month zero that makes month six measurement much cleaner.