On the shortlist: MentorHER

MentorHER is NatWest Group’s flagship reciprocal mentoring initiative, designed to accelerate gender equity by pairing senior male leaders with aspiring female colleagues. The programme challenges unconscious bias, fosters allyship, and supports women’s career progression through structured, two-way mentoring relationships. Since its inception, MentorHER has grown into a transformative cultural movement, engaging over 800 participants across grades and business areas.

They have been shortlsited for the 2025 DEI Innovation Award.

We asked the team to tell us more…

MentorHER is described as more than a mentoring scheme – a catalyst for cultural change. What inspired its creation, and why was it important to design it as a reciprocal programme?

Lauren Fuller: The programme idea came from two initial sparks. One was my mentoring relationship with my managing director at the time who made the relationship more reciprocal in nature than your traditional programme. I really saw the impact not just on my career having that opportunity but how he really listened to me when I offered my thoughts on DEI within the business. It was super empowering and I wanted other women to get that opportunity.

The other was reading the Lean In MentorHER report run in conjunction with survemonkey following the #MeToo movement. The research within the report states that: 60% of managers who are men in the US and 40% of managers who are men in the UK are uncomfortable participating in a common work activity with a woman, such as mentoring, working alone, or socializing together. Senior-level men are now far more hesitant to spend time with junior women than junior men across a range of basic work activities such as 1-on-1 meetings, travel, and work dinners. This report helped me to see how important it is to create a safe space for these conversations and so MentorHER was born!

Over 800 colleagues have taken part so far, with measurable shifts in confidence, promotions, and allyship. What feedback have you heard from participants – both mentors and mentees – that best captures its impact?

Megan Pollick: Some quotes from the feedback for our 2024 cohort who also took part in our international Men’s Day Mystery mentoring event included:

• I left feeling inspired and more confident about myself.
• I gave some gender adapted advice on career progression and then learned of a specific gender-based challenge that she highlighted about myself. This is turn will allow me to stop a particular behaviour if I ever see it – a behaviour that I was simply not aware was common.
• Knowing the person mentoring you is looking to motivate and push women like you up through their career provided a safe space for me to speak as well. I did not feel judged or overlooked

These are super powerful and really show the impact the programme is having for both women and men in our organisation. I’m super proud to be involved in delivering this initiative.

The programme is data-driven, with dashboards and continuous feedback loops. How do you measure success, and which results are you most proud of to date?

Peter Beringer: We measure success in multiple ways including through our monthly check ins and touch points calls available to everyone on the programme. The results I’m most proud of to date include the number of colleagues who have taken part in the programme which is over 800 so far, the number of colleagues especially men who repeat the programme not just for their own benefit but to offer sponsorship and mentorship to more women. Which comes on to my final stat which I am most proud of which is the number of women who have reported promotions or career growth as part of the initiative which is now 88% of all women who have been through the programme so far.

Every innovation faces challenges. What hurdles did you encounter when rolling out MentorHER, and how did you adapt the approach to keep people engaged and aligned?

Bhu Srinivasan: The launch of MentorHER was ambitious—it aimed to be more than a mentoring scheme, positioning itself as a catalyst for cultural change within NatWest. However, several challenges emerged for us including on occasion some Engagement Drop-Offs where some matches just didn’t work,  Matching Complexity including on occasion getting more male participants or more female making it logistically demanding to get enough of each gender for the programme to work and of course getting feedback from hundreds of participants to help us understand the true impact of our programme.

To help us adapt to these challenges we had to create a robust marketing & comms campaign including themed events like #TagYourMentor for National Mentoring Day or Mystery Meet Ups for International Men’s Day where we can promote the programme to large audiences across the bank not just our Gender Network members. To support with data collection we have regular touch points through the programme from start to finish in a variety of structures including surveys, drop in clinics and roundtables. These help us to collect as much feedback as possible from participants.

MentorHER is embedded in NatWest’s wider DEI strategy and aligns with the goal of a gender-balanced workforce by 2030. How is it influencing leadership behaviours, career development, and wider organisational policies?

Bhu Srinivasan: MentorHER is designed as a reciprocal mentoring initiative, where junior women colleagues’ mentor senior male leaders. This structure is intentional—it fosters allyship, challenges unconscious biases, and encourages leaders to reflect on their own behaviours and assumptions.

As per the end point survey data ,male leaders participating in MentorHER have reported:

• Greater awareness of gender-specific challenges.
• A shift from passive support to active advocacy.
• Adoption of more inclusive leadership styles, especially in decision-making and team dynamics.

The programme is described as a catalyst for cultural change, not just a mentoring scheme. It encourages leaders to “own their impact” and engage in coach-like conversations that empower colleagues to thrive and raise their bar.

MentorHER has directly contributed to measurable outcomes in career development:

• Over 800 colleagues have participated, with reported increases in confidence, promotions, and visibility.
• Female colleagues gain access to senior leadership, helping them navigate development opportunities and set clear career goals
• As per the end point survey data completed by female colleagues, we can see that 85% colleagues have got a promotion/secondment/career progression/additional responsibilities since being mentored. Many have explored alternate opportunities for career progression and have also switched between functions and franchises

MentorHER aligns with NatWest’s goal of a gender-balanced workforce by 2030, and its influence is visible in organisational policy. Female colleagues who work part time/flexible working arrangements have signed up for this and their feedback has been positive as most of them felt positive in their career progression path and did not feel that it’s impacting their growth

Looking ahead, what’s next for MentorHER – whether expanding to other employee networks, scaling further across the Group, or exploring new ways of driving cultural change?

Lauren Fuller: Our next challenge for MentorHER is to continue to expand and grow – ensuring we stay relevant, in line with DEI policies and bank strategy. Next year our big goals are:

• Embedding MentorHER into our new Male Allyship programme which will look at a wider curriculum of content including some of our other workshops and content like 50 Ways to Fight Bias, Allyship at Work and HeForShe.
• Finding creative and fun ways to celebrate International Women’s & Men’s Day as well as International Mentoring Month & National Mentoring Day including collaborations with our other traditional mentoring programme Further Together.

And of course we are always working with our other employee led networks, sharing best practices and learnings where they have also got similar programmes to support their members too and looking for ways to make our initiatives intersectional for all our female colleagues.