ASTA Kicks Off Mentorship Program

The American Society of Travel Advisors (ASTA) has officially kicked off the pilot program for its first-ever mentorship program.

The program matches ten mentees with ten mentors for what ASTA is calling “a guided career development experience.” The idea is to allow mentors to share their industry knowledge, while also giving their mentees feedback and opening doors for their future careers.

The pilot will run for six months.

“When I think back on my career, the people who took the time to mentor me made an enormous difference in my career trajectory, in my personal knowledge, and in my ability as a leader. I’m thrilled this is happening under ASTA’s banner with our new mentorship program and I can’t think of anything more important for a trade association to do than to help people who are just starting out in the business,” ASTA’s Zane Kerby said.

ASTA has partnered with the TRAVEL A.L.L.I.E.S. Society to run the program and has built two different committees to help vet the applicants and match mentors and mentees, and then also to build the content for the program.

“There’s a dramatic need for mentorship in our industry. We are the beneficiaries of the human desire to go and see. Customer expectations are not getting any lower. We survive because the knowledge that a travel advisor has is deemed valuable by the traveling customers,” Kerby added.

ASTA has long stressed the need for mentorship in the industry, along with the need for more travel advisors. The association just recently, as part of a partnership with Norwegian Cruise Line, embarked on a campaign to attract new advisors into the industry. The campaign market the profession with simple messages—unlimited potential for income, work from anywhere, and more.

Several thousand people have already downloaded the program overview on ASTA’s website.