The protégé: Paul Tanaka, engineering specialist

“It’s really an interactive relationship, not just him being the mentor and me the mentee,” says Tanaka of his mentor Edward Grave. “It’s not just him teaching us, but him bouncing ideas off us and vice versa.”

Tanaka has been in Grave’s technical mentoring group since he joined the company three and a half years ago. “He’s very open, honest and I think he has a big heart for all of his group members; he understands business needs very well and is able to weigh those with personal needs and family,” Tanaka says.

In a busy industry prioritisation is crucial and Tanaka has learnt from Grave “how much needs to be done to get to a viable solution and when you really have to pay attention to the details”.

There has been a lot of one-to-one time, with Grave looking over Tanaka’s designs of distillation towers then taking him into the field. Tanaka explains: “That entails climbing through these towers, pointing out what he looks for and teaching us the ropes all along the way.

“After that initial period of a couple of weeks when we’re out in the field with him, he pretty much lets us loose on our own,” Tanaka says. “But he’s always available.”

He adds: “I think he really looks for opportunities to stretch us. For example, getting us out in the field so early in our careers is very rare.”

The mentor: Edward Grave, fractionation and separation group leader

“When I get e-mail notes from my counterparts or from their supervisors telling me the wonderful work that Paul has done, it just tickles me. It’s extremely rewarding.”

So says Grave, who mentors a group of five people, the most senior being Tanaka and Tanaka’s fellow protégé, Norman Yeh. “What really counts is the one-to-one in the group,” he says.

“There’s a personal side,” he adds. “Each individual has certain buttons that I can push and I know the limits of each one.”

Despite being Tanaka’s boss, Grave sees his role as more of a college adviser, someone to come back to for advice on how to do things. “I tell them, ‘Go ahead and work this out first. I don’t care if you make mistakes – that’s how you learn. Come back to me if you have questions and we'll look at it together.’ ” Grave says that Tanaka “has a good attitude; he works hard and he’s a self-starter – that’s a big thing. Paul has no qualms about coming into my office and asking questions; at the same time he will go ahead and do things for me to unburden me.”

Grave believes in sharing the tricks of the trade with his protégés, rather than being insecure that they will poach his job. “I’m not keeping anything in my drawer so I have a leg up on anybody else,” he says. “My job is to have them take my job so I can move on.”

Times Recommends

• Inspirational leadership
• How to get a new job
• The reluctant CEO