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Everyone, Especially Top Executives Could Use Mentors to Aid Careers

Melissa Dyrdahl regularly seeks guidance from mentors inside and outside Adobe Systems, where she works.

"They provide a mirror for me to reflect back on," presenting perspectives "that I am unable or unwilling to see," she explains.

By JOANN S. LUBLIN

Staff Reporter of THE WALL STREET JOURNAL

Yet, Ms. Dyrdahl is hardly an inexperienced junior manager. The 46-year-old oversees 250 staffers and a $100 million-plus budget as senior vice president of corporate marketing and communications. She reports to Bruce R. Chizen, president and CEO of the San Jose, Calif., software maker.

Everyone needs wise, seasoned mentors to help them grow and excel — even after they reach upper management. Unfortunately, informal advisers are scarce high in the hierarchy. But Ms. Dyrdahl and Mr. Chizen have gotten wide-ranging assistance from multiple mentors. Their experiences offer hope to anyone feeling lonely at the top.

Ms. Dyrdahl’s best mentor? Mr. Chizen. They met 15 years ago while at Claris, another software company. She joined Adobe in 1994 and four years later, he became her boss. "He has played a strong mentoring role throughout my career," she notes.

Because they know each other so well, "I’m brutally honest with her," says Mr. Chizen, 47. "If she wasn’t interested in feedback, [mentoring] would be impossible."

It’s tricky for a superior to simultaneously wear a mentor’s hat. Mr. Chizen finds himself in an awkward situation when Ms. Dyrdahl complains about communications problems with fellow senior executives. In May, she told him about a colleague who inaccurately repeated one of her comments. Speaking as her boss, he said she should devise a solution. Switching to his mentor role, he suggested she confront her peer directly — which she did.

Mr. Chizen himself seeks insights from higher ups: Co-Chairmen John F. Warnock and Charles M. Geschke. They founded Adobe and gave him the helm in late 2000.

Mr. Chizen solicits their views before tackling knotty problems, such as whether to set operating-margin targets that please investors more than staffers. He says the founders continue to teach him how to preserve the company’s unique culture by hiring people smarter than he is and practicing open-door management. The youthful-looking CEO also emulates Mr. Warnock’s technical creativity. It inspired him to "play around a bit and give my ideas to the engineering team," he recollects.

An Adobe board member acts as another mentor for Ms. Dyrdahl. Carol Mills Baldwin ran a private data-integration business until its recent sale. The women became casual acquaintances during the 1980s, when both worked for Hewlett-Packard.

Early last year, Ms. Dyrdahl asked Ms. Baldwin for career advice, complaining she wasn’t growing. She wanted exposure "to new ideas without changing jobs," Ms. Baldwin remembers.

Over breakfast and in subsequent sessions, Ms. Baldwin urged Ms. Dyrdahl to pursue a public-company board seat. She proposed the Adobe executive promote herself to enterprises needing her marketing acumen, such as small and midsize producers of consumer goods.

Ms. Dyrdahl says she used Carol’s words about best possible directorships when an executive recruiter approached her last month. The recruiter "seemed very interested," she says.

Ms. Dyrdahl and Mr. Chizen also have forged relationships with mentors with no Adobe ties. Among them are former supervisors such as Resa Pearson, who hired her at Hewlett-Packard. Now a marketing-agency owner, Ms. Pearson enjoys reminding Ms. Dyrdahl that her Adobe post is important and that she needs a stronger spotlight on her accomplishments. "What have you done lately to advance yourself?" she often asks her protégé.

"I tend to be very reluctant to brag about my successes," Ms. Dyrdahl concedes. Ms. Pearson’s latest peeve: The executive omits her high-level title from her office voicemail message. "We’re not really focused on title and hierarchy," Ms. Dyrdahl replies. But "I should consider it."

Intuit Chairman Bill Campbell plays a similar cheerleader role for Mr. Chizen. The Silicon Valley figure recruited him in 1987 to Claris, which he founded and then ran. Mr. Campbell says his ex-lieutenant knows he "will be honest with him and care about him personally." When the Adobe chief describes a planned strategic shift, his old boss counsels him over a beer to "change it quickly. Don’t let it linger."

Mr. Chizen also turns to a confidential support group of high-tech chief executives. The group’s 22 members, who meet quarterly, lead sizable but noncompetitive businesses. Many are far more experienced than the Adobe chief.

Soon after Mr. Chizen took the No. 1 spot, his support group offered painfully frank feedback that persuaded him to push for an additional outside director — which he got. "When you have 21 other CEOs telling you that’s the way to go, it’s much easier to move full speed ahead," he observes, adding: "I don’t know how CEOs without mentors can succeed."

• E-mail comments to me at [email protected]. To see other recent Managing Your Career columns, please go to CareerJournal.com.

Copyright © 2003 Dow Jones & Company, Inc. All Rights Reserved

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