Five mentorship best practices from a Certified Master Anaplanner
Author: Mikhil Agarwal, Certified Master Anaplanner and Senior Solutions Consultant at VISEO.
“With great power, comes great responsibility."
Have you come across this popular adage? Being a Certified Master Anaplanner, I have always appreciated this saying. Why? Well, we are all aware of the countless benefits of being a Certified Master Anaplanner, but one of them that stands out is the power that it gives to not just promoting best practices within our (or our clients) companies, but also the ability to have broader influence within the Anaplan space.
Today I share five best practices that can be adopted as part of mentoring at your (or your clients) organization and that can augment the Anaplan ecosystem. I’ll cover:
- Anaplan weekly challenges
- Creating an ‘Anaplan cheat sheet’
- Conducting workshops
- Inviting speakers from Anaplan
- Organizing an Anaplan Day
Five mentorship best practices from a Certified Master Anaplanner
- Host Anaplan weekly challenges
Who doesn’t love challenges? In my experience, I have found that one of the best practices to mentor your team is to identify the level of Anaplan skillset they currently hold and encourage growth based on opportunities specific to that level. One way to do this is in the form of a weekly challenge. This could be around a realistic use case or a tough nut to crack that you might have encountered during your project implementation. You can share it with your team as a challenge by giving them a week’s time to comeback with the solution. Doing so will help them exchange multiple ways of achieving something together. Highlight the winning solution for everyone to see and make sure to encourage collaboration! - Create an ‘Anaplan Cheat sheet’
One of the most practical ways of making sure that your team becomes self-sufficient is to collate the Anaplan best practices into a ‘cheat sheet’ of sorts. Although we have a vibrant community of Anaplan experts available for help, creating a simpler/personal version could be extremely beneficial for newbies and junior Anaplan consultants who have just begun their Anaplan journey. It can also act as a one-stop-shop for standardized practices that are often overlooked during project implementations. - Conduct workshops
Another way of keeping your Anaplan practice engaged is by organizing monthly workshops that revolve around a specific functionality or topic. There are often exclusive topics or ideas that Master Anaplanners get earlier access to before being released to others. For example, you could focus on an upcoming feature in Anaplan, or an integration workshop, or a best practices workshop. Having these workshops will certainly make your organization self-sufficient. You can host this in-person or virtually! - Invite speakers from Anaplan
Another best practice that you could incorporate is to invite the sharpest, most innovative Anaplanners in to speak on practical, real-world planning and decision-making topics. Or consider business leaders from top companies to present on areas ranging from supply chain to HR and finance to marketing — content for every interest and skill level. Or, invite the people who create and run the platform. Their talks will inspire you, and might just change the way you think about your work life and specific projects. - Organize an Anaplan Day
We all love a festive occation — so why celebrate Anaplan at your organization? Consider organizing a one-day Anaplan event based around both learning and a celebration of accomplishments or milestones. This could include all the above-mentioned practices in a day, but be creative! Maybe it’s a hackathon where you form teams and build something — like a game — in Anaplan, or something unique that couldn't have been otherwise implemented in a project. The idea of this hackathon (and day in general) is to get your team to think outside the box, have time for creative thinking and celebration, or learn something new.
Conclusion
Mentoring — at its core — is the opportunity for people to learn from one another. If you can mentor someone, take that opportunity to help them and you’ll surely gain from the experience also! And if you are being mentored by someone — make sure that you take the full opportunity to learn and grow.
What are your perspectives on this topic or what best practices would you add? Leave a comment!
If you have reached until here, thank you for taking time to read my blog! I hope you implement some of the above in your practice as well. Until we meet next, happy Anaplanning!
Comments
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Mentoring has great potential. Thanks for ideas.
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