For reasons not worth getting into here, I’ve been waxing nostalgic (a phenomenon to which I’m apparently rather vulnerable; I mean, seriously). In particular, I took a brief mental stroll down memory lane to think of key leaders who influenced my career trajectory in a positive way. People who took a chance on giving me more responsibility than I’d had previously.

This is far from an exhaustive list, but thank you to the following folks:

• Greg, who hired me to my first full-time coding gig despite me not even having yet graduated from my undergraduate computer science program.
• Rick, who got me internal funding to implement an idea I had, giving me my first taste of leading a project completely my own.
• Cathy, who brought me to San Diego without having seen me in action, only my reputation with a particular set of skills, which her project desperately needed.
• Lori, who first promoted me to a management position when my prior boss left the company, and trusted me to scale an engineering organization to meet the company’s big goals.
• James, who gave me my first singleton leadership position, and helped me think beyond my team and begin operating at a broad organizational level.
• Taj, who twice helped me step up into broader responsibilities, and who first challenged me to consider business implications of technical decisions.
• Abby, who recruited me into my current role, and has taught me much about how to be a true partner at the executive level.

In all these cases, the individuals didn’t just give me advice. They made opportunities happen and put me in places that caused growth. That’s what makes a mentor a mentor.

If you’re on the other side of a mentoring relationship now, don’t just pontificate. Open doors. Delegate. Trust. Support. Praise. Endeavor to be on someone else’s list.