I came across the PMA Mentorship Program through my involvement as an Ambassador. I was already close to the community, so joining felt like a natural next step rather than a big decision.
My reason for getting involved was simple: I wanted to give back in a way that had some structure to it. My time with PMA has genuinely changed the shape of my career.
Being part of this community gave me the knowledge and confidence to show how product marketing could bring real strategic value to our region, which eventually led to the creation of a dedicated Senior PMM role for Latin America at my company. Once I had that experience, I wanted to help others get there faster and with more clarity than I had.
What I’ve seen work
The most rewarding part of mentoring is watching someone move from uncertainty to action. Not just having good conversations, but seeing someone gain clarity, make a decision, and then follow through on it. That’s when you know something actually happened.
A lot of the work comes down to getting specific. Many of the PMMs I’ve worked with have the right instincts but vague goals. My role is to push them to define what success actually looks like, challenge the assumptions underneath their plans, and turn broad ideas into something they can act on. Once the goal is clear, the execution gets easier. That’s been true across mentees in South America, North America, and Europe.
One concrete example: I worked with a mentee on her personal online brand. She had plenty of directions she could go, but she hadn’t defined what she was trying to achieve. Once we locked that in, every subsequent decision became straightforward.
What I’ve taken from it
My mentee Annie brought real self-awareness and honesty to our sessions. That reminded me how much the environment matters – people need space to think out loud and question themselves before they can move forward. I’ve tried to carry that into how I set up conversations in my own work.
The program has also made me sharper at managing ambiguity. When you help someone else work through uncertainty, you get better at it yourself. Not through a single moment, but gradually, across sessions. It’s the kind of improvement that doesn’t announce itself.
The networking has been different from most professional programs, too. The relationships you build here go deeper than typical conference connections. I’ve built genuine one-on-one relationships with PMMs across three continents, and I’m looking forward to more (time zones permitting!).
What I’d tell anyone thinking about becoming a mentor
Do it. But treat it like a process, not a series of conversations.
Set clear goals at the start. Define what the end looks like. Check in regularly against those goals. Without that structure, mentorship stays at the level of a nice chat. With it, you get real outcomes.
The biggest thing I’ve taken from this program is the confirmation that mentorship works best when it has shape: clear goals, regular check-ins, and a defined endpoint. That’s what turns it from a good experience into a meaningful one.
