Finland is a small country. The person you study with today might be your colleague tomorrow or even your child’s teacher. In our experience, Finland also has a long-lasting memory. When you wrong someone or fail to uphold commitments, people remember.
In a tightly connected professional landscape, those memories can shape your career opportunities in ways you may not anticipate. At Think Career, we always emphasize this to our mentees: when you join the mentorship programme, you are committing to a journey.
Life happens, and we completely understand that urgent situations may force you to step away. However, the key is communication. Simply disappearing — ghosting your mentor or the programme without a word for months — does not serve you well.
📣 Mentors are your advocates!
A mentor’s help goes beyond giving advice – they can be your ambassador when you need them most. Whether it’s a job opportunity, a recommendation, or an introduction to the right network, your mentor is there to open doors for you. But if you do not establish contact, disappear without communication or if you fail to keep it respectful, you risk closing those doors permanently.
Just imagine you would be asked to write a recommendation for a person who wasn’t responding to your messages, was always late for your meetings, or, even worse, didn’t show up with no prior communication — would you write it? What would you say?
Sometimes there is power in saying “No” when you know you won’t be able to fulfil your commitments. The important thing is to communicate.
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