The Old Man You Didn't Know You Needed

Mentor characters IRL

Battleship (2012) is hardly cinematic gold. But I love it for one reason. Or should I say one scene.

After alien ships demolish young Lt. Hopper’s ship, and all the other ships in the area, he needs a new one. But all there is left is an old one. Specifically the USS Missouri. The problem is that none of these young sailors know how to operate this floating antique.

Lucky for them, the Missouri is a museum. One staffed by veterans who DO know how to operate it.

Alex Hopper : You men have given so much to your country, and no one has the right to ask any more of you... but I'm asking.

Old Salt : What do you need, son?

The old WW2 and Vietnam vets then proceed to help the youngins whip some alien ass.

They can’t figure out the debit card machine at the grocery store. But they sure as hell remember how to operate the ship they cut their teeth on forty or fifty years ago.

It’s glorious.

I started thinking about this thanks to copywriter extraordinaire Nabeel Azeez. In his newsletter, he pointed to the gender dynamics of women in male-dominated fields. In fiction and in real life, these women excelled because an older man took the woman with promise under his wing:

Midge (Mrs. Maisel) owes her career to Lenny Bruce (one of the pioneers of stand-up comedy as it's performed today.)

In season one, Midge gets blackballed right as she's getting started and can't book gigs anywhere in New York.

During a set, Lenny invites Midge on stage to do a short set before he does his own.

He sees something in her and his endorsement lifts the ban and starts her career for real.

Her innate talent then allows her to rocket past other comedians in success and stardom.

Something similar happens between Peggy Olson and Freddy Rumsen, and then Don Draper in Mad Men.

Freddy “discovers” Peggy has an innate talent for copywriting and mentions it to Don.

Don, as creative director and a copywriter himself, is astute enough to give her a shot and mentors her until she becomes a Copy Chief and manages her own team.

Behind every strong independent wahmen is a man who gave her her shot, or one who pushes her to achieve her potential.

As a former female Marine, it struck a cord. I was lucky enough to have an older man and an older woman team up to act as my second set of parents in my first duty station, kicking my ass in gear and teaching me how to be a professional.

Boomers, both of them. Both from hard-scrabble, working-class backgrounds. Both rose to excellence because they had mentors of their own. They both went on to be high-ranking Pentagon officials after they turned in their uniforms.

They are the ones who looked at my work and said: “Not good enough. Do it again.” They said it over and over again until I did it right the first time.

The Mentorship Gap

As the eldest of Millennials (b. 1981) and seeing the crop of kids coming up behind me, I have to wonder… who will we ask for help when the Boomers are gone?

Are we in a position to guide the next crop of adults?

Millennials take a lot of guff for the fact that our younger members use the verb “adulting” like it’s an accomplishment. But for all our flaws, we are the last generation to have been raised without social media, constant access to the internet, and being filmed everywhere we went.

It is obvious by now that distinction makes a difference in our development, our capability, and, of course, our attention span.

The online learning economy is booming, and many of the courses out there are far more useful than what you find on university campuses these days.

But I’m worried about actual mentorship vs simple skill acquisition.

In order to listen and apply the tough love of a mentor, the criticism that makes you truly excellent at what you do, you have to respect and care about the person giving it to you.

If someone yells at you, “This is crap! You’re better than this; you’re just being lazy!” In order to take that critique to heart, the person has to matter to you.

• You must care about their opinion.

• You must want to live the type of life they live

• You must believe they want the best for you

If those elements are not present, then any sharply-worded statement, no matter how true, will be discarded.

That’s why anonymous commenters on Twitter get told to pound sand. I don’t know you, I don’t like you, and I don’t care what you think. Kindly piss off.

Unfortunately, for young people today, “Twitter friends” might be the deepest level of relationship they ever form, which is bad news for all of us.

True excellence always requires struggle, and taking heat from someone who knows better than you. A coach, a boss, a teacher.

Unfortunately, the overarching mantra for Zoomers seems to be, “It ain’t that deep, bro.”

But it is.

Whether you’re an engineer or a music composer (do those even exist anymore?) we as a society need those truly great talents to come along and change the paradigm every once in a while.

Without the guiding hand of a mentor, a trusted teacher who you obey when he says “Put down the TikTok and get back to work,” we will be left with a world of bland mediocrity, one that will have long-lasting implications.

Fifty years from now, when the Zoomers are old and the next generation calls on them for help from the olden times, will they have any help to give?

I’m not sure. But if they are to have a shot at rising to the potential within them, it must be the Millennials who help them reach it.

The Boomers have done their duty.

I think it’s time we stepped up.

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