“It doesn’t matter what you know if you can’t teach it.”—Mike Holmgren
SHAWN “JAY Z” CARTER
Shawn Carter, popularly known as Jay Z, burst into the limelight with his 1996 debut album Reasonable Doubt. Since then, he has released twenty-three studio albums, including collaborative albums with other artists such as Kanye West, Beyoncé, and more. What’s even more impressive is that Jay Z built an empire of his brands spread across several industries. He founded Rocawear, a fashion retailer, Tidal, a music streaming service, Roc Nation, an entertainment agency, and Monogram, a line of cannabis products, to name a few. In 2019, Jay Z’s business acumen solidified him in music history as the first hip-hop billionaire.
A critical part of his success, in his own words, was mentorship. Jay Z’s first mentor was Jaz-O, also known as The Originator. He showed him the inner workings of the music industry and gave him his first big break. At each major milestone of his meteoric rise to power, Jay Z learned from mentors. His mentors’ impact instilled his value of the mentor-mentee relationship.
He touched on the importance of mentorship in an interview, saying, “Most people that were successful growing up from where I was from never came back. So there was never a dialogue on, ‘How’d you do it? What happened?’. There was no mentoring program. There was no going back and grabbing a person and teaching them a trade or, you know, what it is that you do. And then that person goes back and grabs two people, and then, you know, it grows from there.” For Jay Z, mentorship became a personal responsibility. It was an avenue for personal growth in his community.
Jay Z approached mentoring the same way others mentored him. He hand-selected mentees he saw potential in. His mentorship aided the success of J. Cole, Rihanna, Kanye, and many more superstars. When Jay Z took Kanye under his wing, he showed him how to turn his ego into a superpower. He also helped Rihanna make her first album, Music of the Sun. He taught both of them that their craft is more than music. It’s a business. Now, like their mentor, Kanye and Rihanna are self-made billionaires from building businesses out of their brands. Jay Z solidified his title as a creative genius by identifying and nurturing creative geniuses. He taught them while simultaneously learning from them. These strategic relationships grew his influence, power, and creative potential.
THE RESPONSIBILITY
There’s a major risk you take on by being a mentor. Take note of this: the mentor-mentee relationship is one of the most vulnerable human relationships. It’s even more vulnerable than a therapist-patient relationship. When a mentee comes to a mentor for big life decisions, they will aimlessly follow anything a mentor advises them to do. A mentor can influence their mentee’s ideas about the world. It can completely shift the trajectory of their entire life. A mentor’s advice has the ability to change their mentee at their core. Be extremely careful and intentional in this relationship. If you don’t have advice that’s based on a proven track record, admit your ignorance instead of sharing an opinion.
REFLECTION
What if whenever you saw one of your friends, they recommended a new movie? If you watch five of them and they all had boring plots, dense characters, and uninspiring visuals, you’re going to stop listening to your friend’s recommendations. Even if those were the only five movies they ever said were horrible, you would never watch any more of their recommendations. Those five movies become a reflection of their entire taste in film.