Finding a MENTOR / Course - Things to Look Out for

[rsagi 10]

Hi all,

 

Thought I'll say a few words about finding a mentor or course/education:

 

Though I never got "burned" by some Snake Oil based course or Mentor - I have a suggestion based on personal experience which I believe helped me avoid various scams.

 

The MOST IMPORTANT thing is to ask anyone who claims to be a mentor to SHOW YOU THE MONEY ...and what I mean by that is that they open their brokerage account in from of YOUR EYES and show you their account size - if it's got more than a million ...most chances 99.9% they are the real thing.

 

I met a person here in the Boston area that gave a lecture about his style of trading - being the skeptic that I am - he connected to the broker he uses and hold and behold - he had 1.5 MILLION $$$.

 

Now, assuming he didn't inherit this - I would say he must be doing something right or just got lucky once and made this - but I met him a few times and it seems the guy is genuine.

 

Don't settle for a screen capture of performance or a manipulated Photoshoped data sheet - ask the person to connect in REAL time to the broker they use - period.

 

Also, watch out for those who try to LAY SERVICES ON YOU (There are always exceptions to the rule) but if someone is trying to hook you up with a broker most likely he is making money from this introduction (COMISSION - cha -ching)

 

I think a good mentor should be HIGHLY compensated - juts watch out for the Charletons (cant remember how to spell it - thats what you get for being a foreigner) out there.

 

Best,

Steve

[bootstrap 47]

IMHO, a good mentor doesn't charge a dime. A good mentor does not claim to be anything. They just are. Just as the old saying goes " When the student is ready, the teacher will appear."

[rsagi 10]

That may be. However, don't forget that many times you get what you pay for ...

 

If you are sitting with a mentor during market hours and he is mentoring you loosing money - then he should be compensated.

 

The person I was talking about did not ask for anything, another person I know is asking for $600 to teach futures for 4 weeks on the weekends. I asked him why he charges that - he said he is not making his money having 2-6 students - he was actually seeking potential good trader students that can work for him since he manages other peoples money - kinda like a mini hedge fund.

 

My point at the beginning was to help newbies avoid scams.

 

 

Best,

Steve

[skl99 10]

Mentor with 1mln+ at brokerage account? Sounds good. But what can you get from him for the money you offer? Couple of hours?

 

I do believe in word of mouth. Ask other traders...

Regards

[DbPhoenix 42]

To Whom It May Concern, don't assume that any qualified mentor is going to jump at the chance to work with you simply because you're ready to write a check. If he doesn't first determine whether or not you're willing and capable of doing the work, you will likely be dropping your money down a well.

 

A good mentor has better things to do than suckle fledgling traderettes who are incapable of helping themselves. What will you be bringing to the table other than money? If you don't know, or you're thinking "nothing", then you're not ready to interview anybody.

[Trader333 10]

if it's got more than a million ...most chances 99.9% they are the real thing.

 

Why would anyone with an account of that size be interested in mentoring others ?

 

 

Paul

[rsagi 10]

Paul,

 

Not sure what you are asking. Are you saying that a person with a large account isn't wiling to train/mentor? Maybe I miss read your post and you think his account is small ...

 

I am assuming he was willing to share his success with others for free - since he wasn't asking for any money - nor was he trying to sell anything.

 

This person belongs to a group that meets on a regular basis and shares ideas mostly about swing/long term trading. He is one of the only people doing day trading so there was a lot of demand from the group to hear how he day trades.

 

His strategy is all about price action/pressure.

 

Steve

[rsagi 10]

Db,

 

I agree with what you are saying - there is no conflict there. The problem is that so many "so called" mentors take peoples money without assessing their skills/will power to trade successfully.

 

Either way, If someone wants to mentor me and asks for money - they better show me their brokerage account before I accept. Performance statements can easily be manipulated using Photoshop ...

 

Personally, I'm the kind of person that if I found a good mentor - I would do revenue sharing with him for a while so it would be a win-win situation (again, this is only after verifying his account balance ...

 

Steve

[bootstrap 47]

I think my point was missed. So lets do it this way..

 

Which would you rather do:

 

(A: Your Mentor) I show you my brokerage account and teach you to trade my way for $10k. And off you go.

 

or

 

(B: My Mentor) I don't show you my account, teach you to trade your way, once I know you are ready, if you want let you trade for me using my money, pay you 30% of the profit, I take all the losses. At any point from day one that you are ready to leave you are free to go. All that you are out is time.

 

Newbies will jump on your mentor because it appears to be the easiest route. But if you really want to learn this business, you are better off with mine.

 

Chris

[rsagi 10]

Hi Chris,

 

You introduced a new scenario in which I agree with you. If a mentor is willing to teach a newbie + let them use HIS money + provide "revenue sharing" - and let them find their "own" style - then it is a good deal as all you have to loose it TIME.

 

Too many newbies fail to find a genuine mentor - and this is the reason I started this thread - to give them another "tool" to decipher and find higher chances of the truth+ success rate.

 

To every rule - there is also an exception ..

 

Best,

Steve

[OAC 10]

I think an account size of $1 million plus is meaningless. He could have been successful in another line of business or profession which as we all know does not translate into success in trading ! Or he could have simply obtained it through inheritance or illegal means. The best way to find a mentor is through relatives and friend of the family, but most of us are not that lucky.

The next best way is to work as an assistant to a top trader and don't mind getting coffee for everyone in the morning.

I think you ae just throwing your money away if you go for someone that advertise themselves as mentors. That is just my opinion.

[DbPhoenix 42]

I think an account size of $1 million plus is meaningless.

 

Especially if he started off with 5

 

The problem with most beginners is that they don't know what they want. This makes them easy prey. And since they tend to think of themselves as Goldilocks anyway, and the mentor community as The Bears, this leads to a usually foreseeable conclusion.

 

Bootstrap made a good point earlier, whether one wants to learn how to trade as somebody else trades or to receive help in finding his own way. But there is also the issue -- rarely addressed -- as to whether one wants to learn to trade or to make money. Most (all?) beginners think they want the former when they actually want the latter, hence the reluctance to read, to research, to put in the screen time, to create a trading plan, etc, and the dogged insistence on beginning to trade as soon as they've figured out how to place an order.

 

I realized long ago that beginners don't want to make money; they want to trade. If they really wanted to make money, then they'd do whatever was necessary to make that money. But they don't. They'd rather trade. So instead of making money, they lose it. As far as they're concerned, it's all a big casino, only without the all-you-can-eat buffet.

[BlowFish 10]

Mentoring is essentially an altruistic pursuit. I would be wary of anyone that wanted money and question the reason for that (to prove your seriousness perhaps?). The reason someone will mentor you is if they like you and as Db points out, feel that you have potential. If they ask for money then thats a red flag. But.........

 

Having said that what makes a would be trader think that they deserve to be mentored? No financial recompense is likely to match what the mentor can make in the markets. Why do you think someone would want to mentor you (if its clearly not for money).

 

Bootstrap what you are talking about sounds similar to the prop shop model (another way to fleece would be traders). Do you really think a successful trader would teach you to trade (the way you want to learn rather than the way they want to teach) for absolutely nothing, next you' will be saying they should fund your account (oh wait you are saying that!) Do you also expect a wage while you learn? come on do you really expect that to happen?

 

Worth looking for a post by Mark 'Nihabashi' either here or ET that goes in to detail about what a Mentor is likely to expect from you. If they don't chances are they are just after your money.

 

OP good advise most self styled mentors are not.

[DbPhoenix 42]

Mentoring is essentially an altruistic pursuit. I would be wary of anyone that wanted money and question the reason for that (to prove your seriousness perhaps?). The reason someone will mentor you is if they like you and as Db points out, feel that you have potential. If they ask for money then thats a red flag. But.........

 

Well, maybe not.

 

Mentoring can be altruistic, but much depends on the mentee and the time and effort required. Some require no more than an occasional nudge. Others are like adolescent birds who are all over their mothers, flapping their wings and whining, demanding to be fed when they should have been feeding themselves long ago. And if the mentee is paying nothing, that is very likely how he will value what he's getting. If nothing else, he is far more likely to hit the road as soon as the going gets tough.

 

I've had to think about this in a practical way, and it seems to me that the best way of dealing with this situation is to charge by the hour. This has the benefit of encouraging the mentee to make the most of whatever time is being spent -- literally -- with the mentor. It also helps to avoid the "I paid $5000 for this and it was a complete waste of money" complaint. The mentee ought to be able to figure out in an hour whether the mentor knows what he's doing or not. It also gives the mentor an out if he learns fairly quickly that this kid just doesn't have what it takes.

 

Something for all you would-be mentors out there to think about.

[brownsfan019 17]

Interesting thread. I've actually thought about the mentoring thing but as is pointed out in this thread, it's a double-edged sword - for both the mentor and mentee.

 

I think if I did it, it would be local and w/ someone that I knew first. I'd want the face-to-face interaction.

[BlowFish 10]

Db I agree it dosen't have to be completely altruistic. In the past I have 'mentored' people and to do that effectively have employed them. (This was not in the trading business btw it was actually 'knowledge' based). In many endeavours people can be somewhat productive more or less from day one. Trading is rather different.

 

In any commercial arrangement things go wrong when expectations of the parties do not match. Be crystal clear before you start. Of course those that are in the business of selling hopes and dreams may not be exactly candid in laying out what they offer. Fledgling traders are quite likely to have un-realistic expectations too. A recipe for disaster!

[brownsfan019 17]

Db I agree it dosen't have to be completely altruistic. In the past I have 'mentored' people and to do that effectively have employed them. (This was not in the trading business btw it was actually 'knowledge' based). In many endeavours people can be somewhat productive more or less from day one. Trading is rather different.

 

In any commercial arrangement things go wrong when expectations of the parties do not match. Be crystal clear before you start. Of course those that are in the business of selling hopes and dreams may not be exactly candid in laying out what they offer. Fledgling traders are quite likely to have un-realistic expectations too. A recipe for disaster!

 

You said it BF. The 'mentor' in the biz of selling, does just that - sell. Those are the mentors you see through a google search.

 

IMO a real mentor/mentee relationship is like finding a needle in a haystack, but when you do it could be extremely profitable. It's almost more of a who you know type thing. For example, if a good friend was serious and approached me, I would probably do it. Now if I was approached on a random message board, I doubt I would even give it serious consideration.

[Hlm 10]

There is a lot of good discussion going on here.

 

...as the old saying goes "When the student is ready, the teacher will appear."

It's almost more of a who you know type thing.

Both of these are very true. Being at the right place (many times with knowledge) at the right time and having connections are always big items when looking for success. One should constantly strive to put themselves at the right place so they can take advantage when the time comes.

 

I never had an official mentor, but there were some very important pieces of information along the way that would have flown right over my head without a strong grasp of the prerequisites from constantly studying both new information and the market. A non-trading example is one can't expect to understand and use advanced mathematics to the fullest without first knowing simple arithmetic.

 

In my opinion there are three different types of mentors:

 

1. Not actively trading (success unknown) but knowledgeable.
   
2. Actively trading (success minimal if at all) but knowledgeable.
   
3. Actively trading and being consistently profitable.
   

Most authors fall into the first two categories. If you are looking for a mentor, I would fit your potential mentor into one of those categories and then think about their motivation and what they can realistically provide. If you wanted to, you could split the 3rd category into two...those that can and cannot teach. Just because they can do it doesn't mean they can teach you how. By the way, the first two categories do serve a purpose but most times can only take you so far. Also, the potential mentor should only be placed into the 2nd or 3rd spot upon proof.

[cowpip 10]

I still think many of you have still missed the point. BlowFish said it first, and he's absolutely right.

 

YOU can't reliably find a mentor. I don't believe that they actively look for students (at least, the good ones don't). THEY find YOU.

 

When a mentor can see real desire, genuine interest, and an honest dedication to work hard, he/she will determine for themselves whether you are worth their time to step in and assist. Yes, this significantly limits the number of people who have been truly mentored. It requires being in the right place, at the right time, or knowing the right people. But THEY (the mentors) decide who they will teach. And they'll likely be very picky about choosing the right clay to mold.

 

Those who ask for cash aren't mentors; they're tutors. And there is a big difference in the quality of education they provide.

 

"Give a man a fish and he will eat for a day. Teach a man to fish and you have fed him for a lifetime."

 

A real mentor will teach you how to think. He won't tell you how to think.

[jasont 10]

Especially if he started off with 5

 

I realized long ago that beginners don't want to make money; they want to trade. If they really wanted to make money, then they'd do whatever was necessary to make that money. But they don't. They'd rather trade. So instead of making money, they lose it. As far as they're concerned, it's all a big casino, only without the all-you-can-eat buffet.

 

Db this is a very interesting and valuable comment. Can I ask if you are referring to the tendency many of us had in the beginning to think that trading was easy? By that I mean new traders hear about trading and then jump in the pond without taking the proper procedures to learn? Then the true traders are distinguished by the ones that understand and take on a role of hard work and constant learning of trading whilst the others leave the market unwilling to put in the time and effort?

 

If there is something different that I have completely missed from your comment can you please explain it further?

[Eiger 10]

Maybe there are different stages of development in a trader's life. Perhaps a beginning trader has different needs and different questions than someone who has some experience and may be thought of as an itentermediate-level trader. I would think, too, that an intermediate-level trader has different needs and different questions than a trader we might consider to be advanced, who will have different questions and differnt needs than others. If there are different levels of students, might there be different levels of mentors, or at least mentors who understand that there are different levels of information to be taught depending on the level of the student?

 

Try not to disparage beginners. Beginners are at the level of beginning. There is nothing wrong with this; it is simply a level, no better or worse than any other level. One Zen monk said that there is high value in beginner's mind -- something we can all strive for.

 

Eiger

[DbPhoenix 42]

Db this is a very interesting and valuable comment. Can I ask if you are referring to the tendency many of us had in the beginning to think that trading was easy? By that I mean new traders hear about trading and then jump in the pond without taking the proper procedures to learn? Then the true traders are distinguished by the ones that understand and take on a role of hard work and constant learning of trading whilst the others leave the market unwilling to put in the time and effort?

 

In a word, yep

[rsagi 10]

I'll put my 2 cents regarding some of the interesting comments.

 

Being a technical instructor early in my career, I ran into some VERY (few) bright/genius students and asked them why are they attending my class as it seems that they know a lot of the material and/or are able to study on their own . I was given an answer by one specific student that changed the way I think, he said -"I know that I can study on my own, but I need a framework as I am known to defocus and an easy prey for distractions"

 

Being an entrepreneur and a founder of a high-tech startup these days, I truly believe that it's 99% who you know - not what you know - this is in regard to a previous post about being in the right place at the right time. It's also a numbers game - the more you try - the higher the probability you'll succeed.

 

Anyway, deviating a bit from the main subject - but I thought I'll comment on some thoughts from previous threads.

 

Best,

Steve

[james_gsx 16]

You said it BF. The 'mentor' in the biz of selling, does just that - sell. Those are the mentors you see through a google search.

 

IMO a real mentor/mentee relationship is like finding a needle in a haystack, but when you do it could be extremely profitable. It's almost more of a who you know type thing. For example, if a good friend was serious and approached me, I would probably do it. Now if I was approached on a random message board, I doubt I would even give it serious consideration.

 

I agree.

 

The "mentors" I've had didn't exactly teach me new things like one would expect. But they helped me in other ways move to the next level. They held me accountable for the most part, and helped me with some of the smaller things that I wouldn't have seen on my own. When I screw up, they help show me where I screwed up. They don't send me their trades or give me their trading system, they help me figure it out on my own.

[DbPhoenix 42]

Some may, in fact, be looking not for a mentor but a coach:

 

Trader education has become a hot topic in recent years. Everywhere you look there is someone offering some course, seminar, training program, or whatever. Many are very pricey, and we can certainly debate the real value of quite a few. The proliferation of the products and such can’t help but bring up some of the commonly debated topics related to whether traders can be taught or just have some innate talent which allows them to succeed. This article makes its own contribution to that discussion.

 

In the interest of openness, my personal view is that anyone can learn to trade effectively. By that, I mean we are all capable of trading toward a reasonable and rational set of goals and/or objectives determined by our own personal situation and means. Can everyone become George Soros, Paul Tudor Jones, or Warren Buffett? No, of course not. If we could all do that, those names wouldn’t be as big as they are. Most people simply don’t have the kind of resources traders like that have at their disposal. We all do, however, have the means to trade well within the scope of the money, time, risk tolerance, and other elements of our trading focus.

 

The starting point of effective trading, as with anything else in life, is education. There are certain things one needs to know in order to trade effectively. What those are vary a bit based on the market traded and instruments utilized, but there are some fundamentals. For example, all trading is based on the bid-offer mechanism at some level. There are numerous types of orders for entry in to positions and exit from them. There are exchange hours and instrument specifications. Brokerage commissions are a feature in most markets, and in all one needs to understand how profits and losses are determined. I think we can all agree that these are some of the basic building blocks of knowledge and understanding required to even contemplate trading.

 

At the next level we start getting more in to comprehension of the market action, its interpretation, and knowing how that translates in to profit opportunities and risk. On some level, trading requires analysis to make buy/sell decision – fundamental, technical, or quantitative. For the mechanical trader, that analysis is done through research in the development of one’s trading system. For the discretionary trader it is more an on-going process. Likewise, some kind of risk management program is a requirement, regardless of trading style or analytic method.

 

All of this kind of core knowledge and understanding can, in my opinion, be learned from books, lectures, seminars, courses, etc. It is akin to earning a degree. In order to get that diploma, one must prove that certain things have been learned, skills gained. Once that is done, however, one’s development becomes a more personal journey. It is the same thing in trading. There is a basic set of knowledge we must gain, but after that it is up to us to forge our own path in the markets as our own personal situation dictates.

 

Here is where things start getting muddled.

 

We must each determine our own course in trading, ideally based on a good assessment of the resources we have available to us. There are so many ways we can go, though. Everywhere there are people telling us that this path or that path is the one we should take. How are we to decide? Most of us end up stumbling along through a trial and error exploration of various systems, methods, techniques, and whatnot. Some of us find something that works. A great many do not, and quit in frustration, or broke. This is where having a coach or mentor can make a huge difference.

 

We need look no further than the world of athletics to see how important the role of a coach is to one’s development. I happen to coach high level collegiate volleyball, so please permit me the indulgence of using that sport as an example.

 

There are certain physical attributes which can be strong determining factors for one’s success in volleyball – height and jumping ability being two of them. As the saying goes, you can’t teach height, and while a coach can help one jump higher, genetics goes a long way to determining what a given athlete can do in that regard. Being tall and able to jump high, however, does not guarantee success, and one can be quite good at the sport without being a top physical specimen. There is a lot more to volleyball, and that is where coaching comes in.

 

The role of the coach is basically that of facilitator. He or she aids the athlete in the development in their skills and the refinement of the game. For the novice that means a lot of teaching in regards to skill execution. When working with experienced players, it become much more a question of refinement and showing them how to apply what they know to the best effect given the situation at-hand.

 

Coaching or mentoring in trading should be the same thing. The advantages of having someone to oversee your development are many. There is the obvious element of teaching, as it is often assumed that the coach knows more about the markets and has more experience in them than the trainee. Possibly even more important, however, is the coach’s role as external observer.

 

When I coach volleyball, I can see things a player is doing incorrectly that they cannot see because they lack the proper perspective. I can then tell them what they are doing wrong and help them correct it. A trading coach can do the same sort of thing.

 

At the same time, there is the mental and emotional element to coaching which is separate from the teaching one. Especially in the case of experienced athletes, it is often more a question of maintaining a proper level of motivation and a high degree of confidence to ensure peak performance than anything else. The same can be said of trading, where one’s mental state often seriously influence one’s performance just as it does in athletics.

 

The question of where one finds a coach or mentor is a difficult one. Brett Steenbarger (author of The Psychology of Trading and a contributor to this site on the topic of trader development) and I recently discussed this very topic. There are certainly a great many experienced traders out there willing to share what they know in one way or another. But are they really prepared to provide the guidance needed? Some may be good teachers – imparters of knowledge – but lacking in the ability to be a coach in the full sense of the word. Others might be great motivators, but perhaps do not have the breadth of knowledge and/or experience needed for the educational element of coaching.

 

There are two major obstacles to finding a good trading coach. First of all, it is the tendency of many people to look for someone who’s had a great deal of success as a mentor. The problem with that is in a many cases those people are not well equipped to coach. It’s something seen in athletics all the time. Look to the ranks of coaches in your favorite sport. How many of them can you point to and say he or she was a great player? Now consider how many were good players, but not superstars. There are way more of the latter in the coaching ranks than the former because the average players tend to have to work harder and become better students of the game to be competitive.

 

The other difficulty in finding good trader coaches is that there are no real training programs for these people. As a volleyball coach I can go to training seminars and courses, earn national and even international levels of certification, and work under the direction of other coaches more knowledgeable and experienced than myself. As yet, there is no such readily available structure in trading. We cannot look, for example, at someone’s resume and see that he or she is a Level III certified coach, having been so declared by a recognized training and testing organization.

 

So where does that leave us? Well, clearly there is value in having a coach to help us maximize our performance in the markets. As things currently stand, though, finding a good one for our particular situation is going to remain a challenge. It requires the discipline to not just look at someone’s returns and assume that they can teach you how to do that yourself (remember, teaching you a trading system is not the same as coaching you through applying a trading system). It also requires legwork to check out a possible coach. Have they coached others before? Get references. Make sure you find someone who will fulfill your particular requirements and be a good match. If you can do that, you should see your development as an effective trader really take off. (John Forman)