Supporting Career Development by Establishing a Mentoring Program for a National Statistical Organisation

Statisticians commonly find themselves working in isolation, with some managed exclusively by nonstatisticians. Mentoring is critical to help statisticians build their careers and network. We created a national mentoring program to support statisticians across Australia through the national professional statistical organisation: the Statistical Society of Australia. This national mentoring program is now in its sixth year, including the pilot, and is well established in the Society. In this article, we describe why and how this program was created, outlining some of our challenges and how the program has evolved. We provide advice for others interested in creating a mentoring program for statisticians.