Bridg­ing the gap be­tween the class­room and ca­reer is a mis­sion that res­onates deeply with every ed­u­ca­tion­al in­sti­tu­tion and pro­fes­sion­al body com­mit­ted to the fu­ture of our na­tion’s work­force. It is with im­mense pride and a warm, invit­ing spir­it that I share the sto­ry of the Arthur Lok Jack Glob­al School of Busi­ness (ALJGSB) Alum­ni As­so­ci­a­tion’s in­au­gur­al Men­tor­ship Pro­gramme—a new ini­tia­tive de­signed to for­malise and strength­en the pow­er­ful con­nec­tions with­in our com­mu­ni­ty.

The launch of our pro­gramme was filled with pos­i­tive en­er­gy, bring­ing to­geth­er over 100 men­tors and mentees for the first cy­cle of Co­hort One. This land­mark event, held on Oc­to­ber 11, 2025—just one week af­ter HRMATT launched its own sim­i­lar ini­tia­tive—high­lights a strong, shared com­mit­ment to pro­fes­sion­al de­vel­op­ment in our twin-is­land re­pub­lic.

This syn­chronic­i­ty is no co­in­ci­dence. It re­flects the deep, in­ter­twined roots be­tween our two or­gan­i­sa­tions. Many of our most ac­com­plished ALJGSB alum­ni are al­so ded­i­cat­ed mem­bers of HRMATT, and our shared lead­er­ship em­bod­ies this con­nec­tion. Our Alum­ni As­so­ci­a­tion Pres­i­dent, Ms Cavelle Joseph-St Omer, al­so serves as Pres­i­dent of HRMATT.

Her vi­sion for men­tor­ship, as ex­pressed in her launch re­marks, per­fect­ly en­cap­su­lates the syn­er­gy we aim to fos­ter: “Men­tor­ship is a two-way street, of­fer­ing a deeply re­ward­ing ex­pe­ri­ence for both the men­tor and the mentee. It is a pow­er­ful way to give back, share your suc­cess­es and chal­lenges, and help shape the fu­ture lead­ers of our com­mu­ni­ty. Your par­tic­i­pa­tion not on­ly pro­vides cru­cial guid­ance but al­so helps to main­tain and strength­en the bond we all share with our al­ma mater.”

This speaks di­rect­ly to the core of HRMATT’s mis­sion—the de­vel­op­ment of hu­man cap­i­tal—and un­der­scores the val­ue of the ALJGSB Alum­ni net­work as a vi­tal re­source for the na­tion­al HR com­mu­ni­ty. The fact that the same vi­sion­ary leader guides both the ALJGSB AA and HRMATT is a pow­er­ful sym­bol of our shared ded­i­ca­tion to nur­tur­ing tal­ent. By for­mal­is­ing our men­tor­ship ef­forts, we are not on­ly serv­ing our alum­ni; we are ac­tive­ly con­tribut­ing to the tal­ent pipeline that HRMATT cham­pi­ons, en­sur­ing that the next gen­er­a­tion of lead­ers is equipped with both aca­d­e­m­ic knowl­edge and prac­ti­cal, re­al-world in­sight.

The trans­for­ma­tive pow­er of guid­ance

The launch was fur­ther el­e­vat­ed by our fea­tured speak­er, Mr Ma­hadeo Se­barath, Coun­try Man­ag­er of CIBC. He gen­er­ous­ly shared his per­son­al jour­ney—a com­pelling nar­ra­tive of em­brac­ing cal­cu­lat­ed risks and trust­ing men­tor guid­ance to pro­pel his ca­reer from lo­cal suc­cess to the in­ter­na­tion­al stage. His sto­ry serves as a pow­er­ful mas­ter­class in how a men­tor’s in­sight can act as the cat­a­lyst for a tru­ly glob­al ca­reer.

The val­ue of men­tor­ship is not sup­port­ed by anec­dote alone; it is strong­ly re­in­forced by glob­al re­search. Stud­ies con­sis­tent­ly demon­strate the pro­found im­pact of men­tor­ship on ca­reer tra­jec­to­ry and or­gan­i­sa­tion­al health. This is not mere­ly a feel-good ex­er­cise; it is a strate­gic in­vest­ment in hu­man cap­i­tal, yield­ing mea­sur­able re­turns for in­di­vid­u­als and or­gan­i­sa­tions alike. Re­search con­firms that mentees are sig­nif­i­cant­ly more like­ly to ex­pe­ri­ence salary growth and ben­e­fit from clear­ly de­fined ca­reer path­ways. Fur­ther­more, men­tor­ship is a pow­er­ful dri­ver of en­gage­ment, with em­ploy­ees who have men­tors re­port­ing sub­stan­tial­ly high­er lev­els of work­place sat­is­fac­tion—con­tribut­ing to more pos­i­tive and pro­duc­tive or­gan­i­sa­tion­al cul­tures.

These find­ings un­der­score the re­al­i­ty that men­tor­ship is a pow­er­ful en­gine for pro­fes­sion­al growth, lead­ing to high­er re­ten­tion rates, greater job sat­is­fac­tion, and ac­cel­er­at­ed skill de­vel­op­ment. The fresh per­spec­tives and di­verse view­points ex­changed be­tween men­tors and mentees al­so in­ject re­newed en­er­gy and in­no­va­tion in­to the pro­fes­sion­al land­scape.

A part­ner­ship of hu­mil­i­ty and will­ing­ness

The suc­cess of this co­hort rests on a beau­ti­ful ex­change where the gen­eros­i­ty of wis­dom meets the hu­mil­i­ty to learn. We are ho­n­oured to have ex­pe­ri­enced alum­ni and dis­tin­guished pro­fes­sion­als ded­i­cat­ing their time to guide and in­spire—a true tes­ta­ment to our com­mu­ni­ty’s spir­it. Equal­ly, we com­mend our cur­rent stu­dents and re­cent grad­u­ate mentees, whose courage and open­ness are es­sen­tial to their own trans­for­ma­tion.

This is a sym­bi­ot­ic part­ner­ship where both men­tor and mentee thrive. For the men­tor, it is an op­por­tu­ni­ty to hone lead­er­ship abil­i­ties and leave a mean­ing­ful lega­cy. For the mentee, it is a gate­way to ac­cel­er­at­ed growth and hard-won wis­dom. To­geth­er, they em­bark on a jour­ney of mu­tu­al ad­vance­ment.

From mo­ment to move­ment

As the launch event con­clud­ed, our fel­low com­mit­tee mem­ber, Mr Akaash Mo­han, of­fered a pro­found clos­ing thought that has since be­come our ral­ly­ing cry: “Men­tor­ship is not a mo­ment; it’s a move­ment.”

This is more than a catchy phrase—it is a phi­los­o­phy. A mo­ment is fleet­ing, but a move­ment is sus­tained, grow­ing, and trans­for­ma­tive. By for­mal­is­ing this pro­gramme, the ALJGSB AA—work­ing in par­al­lel with HRMATT—is con­tribut­ing to a na­tion­al move­ment ded­i­cat­ed to pro­fes­sion­al ex­cel­lence and lead­er­ship de­vel­op­ment. We are build­ing a lega­cy of learn­ing that will em­pow­er our com­mu­ni­ties for years to come.

We in­vite all mem­bers of the HRMATT com­mu­ni­ty, par­tic­u­lar­ly those who are al­so ALJGSB alum­ni, to recog­nise the pro­found im­pact of this ini­tia­tive. Whether you are a sea­soned pro­fes­sion­al ready to share your jour­ney or an emerg­ing leader ea­ger to learn, the call to men­tor­ship is a call to ac­tion for the bet­ter­ment of our en­tire pro­fes­sion­al land­scape. We look for­ward to wit­ness­ing the in­cred­i­ble suc­cess sto­ries that will emerge from this pow­er­ful new tra­di­tion.

The Hu­man Re­source Man­age­ment As­so­ci­a­tion of Trinidad & To­ba­go (HRMATT) is the lead­ing voice of the Hu­man Re­source pro­fes­sion lo­cal­ly. HRMATT Says is a col­umn fo­cused on ad­dress­ing is­sues and con­cerns of pro­fes­sion­als and the gen­er­al pub­lic in the area of Hu­man Cap­i­tal De­vel­op­ment. To­day’s ar­ti­cle is writ­ten by Janelle Lowe, Chair, Men­tor­ship Com­mit­tee and Sec­re­tary, Arthur Lok Jack Glob­al School of Busi­ness Alum­ni As­so­ci­a­tion.

Learn more about HRMATT by vis­it­ing our web­site: www.hrmatt.com. Fol­low us on Face­book, LinkedIn, In­sta­gram, and Twit­ter. Con­tact us at 687-5523 or via email at sec­re­tari­at@hrmatt.com.