PROFESSIONALS
Looking to put your skills to good use?
Our global community of mentors volunteer their time to support students and social entrepreneurs. Professionals with relevant skillsets and a passion for making a difference in the world are encouraged to join as BfE mentors.
Interested in getting involved? We actively recruit professionals on a year-round, rolling basis for the following three opportunities.
Empower entrepreneurs as a BfE mentor
Your assistance at BfE can help spur employment, increase business profitability, and enhance the skills of entrepreneurs tackling some of the world’s most pressing social issues — all while mentoring students who will form the next generation of passionate leaders. There are three broad pathways to serve as a BfE mentor:
Incubation: work with a startup and student team on a project basis
In this role, you will provide mentorship directly on BfE’s Incubation Programme engagement with a startup and student team. Engagements will last between 3-4 months and mentors are expected to offer their general expertise, knowledge and resources on an as-needed basis according to specific needs identified by the student project lead and the entrepreneur.
The specific duties required of mentors may include reviewing pitch decks, providing strategic guidance to team directors, reviewing financial documents, and suggesting external resources to consult for improvement of final recommendations provided to the entrepreneur.
- Time commitment: 4-6 hours per month
- Suitable for: Professionals with general consulting, finance, legal or technical experience and a passion for social impact. Knowledge of entrepreneurship or conducting business in underserved markets is a plus, but not required.
- What happens after you sign up: You will be notified when projects relative to your industry and experience come up in BfE. Our team will reach out to you and help pair you up with a social enterprise and the student team that supports it.
Thought Leadership: share your insights with our team and wider community
Support BfE by speaking at future events, writing articles for BfE’s blog, or publishing other insights for organisational growth. This mentorship opportunity is perfect for professionals who wish to lend their knowledge to BfE’s global community and external audiences, rather than volunteering to mentor a specific engagement.
- Time commitment: Flexible
- Suitable for: Professionals with experience in the venture capital or social impact ecosystem, especially those with a strong background in working across emerging economies.
- What happens after you sign up: Our team will reach out to you to understand where you can best contribute. There are endless opportunities for you to share your experience with our global community, both online and offline.
Capacity Building: be our subject matter expert in specific sectors, geographies, or business areas
Offer ad-hoc support to startups or student teams on specific sectoral, geographical, or task-based topics. This mentorship opportunity is perfect for professionals with more specific skill sets or knowledge and can provide on-demand advice in niche areas.
- Time commitment: ~1 hour per month
- Suitable for: Professionals who have extensive experience conducting business in emerging economies or in specific sectors relevant to our clients. This is a good fit for professionals willing to lend their expertise and advice on specific issues that our student teams come across in our incubation engagements.
- What happens after you sign up: You will be listed as a sector/country expert in our internal database. From now on, members of our team may reach out to you with enquiries in your area of expertise. You can generally expect no more than several enquiries a year.
When you apply, you may declare your interest in — and be accepted to — one, two or all three of these mentorship opportunities shown above.
Volunteer at BfE Technology
BfE has a separate unit focused on developing software and algorithms to help scale our impact. If you have experience in software development, cloud infrastructure or algorithm design, we would welcome you to join us as a volunteer on BfE Tech instead. This is different from the mentorship roles described above and operate at an arms-length to our Incubation Programme.
How to join BfE?
Filling out the application is designed to take no more than 10 minutes.
Applications are reviewed by our global management team on a year-round basis. Our team will email you when your application has been approved. To be cognizant of working schedules, we don’t currently conduct interviews. However, we encourage you to email mentor@bridgesforenterprise.com if you have any questions and someone from our team will be in touch with you.
Where Our Mentors Work
BfE mentors have worked at, and continue to work at, some of the world’s most respected companies.
Mentor Testimonials
Join our global network of mentors
Our mentorship community is comprised of passionate individuals working across a variety of industries, committed to using their knowledge and skillset to #bridgethegap through empowering businesses.