The Program of international certification was organized by the Mentoring Network of the 3IE Institute at the Technical University Federico Santa María in Spain, and carried out by Mentoring Spain, supported by CORFO (Production Development Corporation) and IncubatecUFRO.

After participating in an unprecedented initiative in the South of Chile, which promotes the development of necessary skills and competencies to lead a mentoring process in an entrepreneurial environment, professionals and teachers of the Macro Faculty of Engineering were internationally certified.

The Program of International Certification in Mentoring was organized by the Mentoring Network of the 3IE Institute at the Technical University Federico Santa María in Spain, and carried out by Mentoring Spain, supported by CORFO and IncubatecUFRO (the Business Incubator of the Universidad de La Frontera).

During two days, professionals and teachers of the Macro Faculty of Engineering of the Universidad de La Frontera, the Universidad Bio Bio (UBB), IncubatecUFRO, and other organizations related to entrepreneurship and innovation in this Region were part of this activity directed by Julio Diaz, director of Mentoring Spain.

In different dynamics, the expert gave details about the methodologies and tools that are necessary to lead a mentoring process in the best way. “With this certification, we are training the participants in eleven basic competencies a good mentor needs and in the processes and steps they have to follow at the moment of mentoring. The training system we use is innovative – with dynamics, exercises and role-plays. We think this is very effective, since they experience what they are doing and have to put it into practice afterwards. This is what we evaluate at the end”, he explained.

“Once the training is over, the participants have to take a test about their knowledge in order to verify if they internalized what they did in class. Afterwards, we evaluate a mentoring practice. We get in contact with the entrepreneur they have been supporting or will support when the training ends, and what we do is to check if they are doing an effective mentoring process”, he added.

PARTICIPANTS

The academic staff member of the UFRO Macro Faculty, Juan Pablo Cárdenas, said that this activity “opens a door for us and our work we do at the academy. Here, we give them structures and concepts that permit us to do correct work and to project it, with methodologies and techniques that help us to optimize the processes and accompany someone who wants to start a business or develop a project in a good way.”

For the project engineer of the Node for Innovation and Technology of the UBB, Fabian Zambrano, the acquired experience in the program will help to do better work accompanying the entrepreneurs the Macro Faculty supports.

“For the students, the support by a mentor will permit them to create a better business model, to define the idea well and to transform it into a product that can be commercialized. We want to be a support for them in this process. Therefore, we think that this certification will position us and permit us to build capacities in this field”, he concluded.