The only time you can really provide mentoring is if the person wants it and asks for it. It is not yet enough because the person may say they want it but have

The only time you can really provide mentoring is if the person wants it and asks for it. It is not yet enough because the person may say they want it but have wrong impression of what it entails (like having expectation of some kind of magical step change in their life), but it is prerequisite IMO. So, obviously, this answer is wrong beacuse that would mean that there cannot be any mentoring. Another observation of mine is what is mentoring for. A person that isn't interested in learning something will not learn it no matter if the do or don't have a mentor. A person that wants to learn something will also learn it regardless of whether they have mentor. The role of mentor is to expedite the process, help avoid dead ends or bad habits and generally make the end result better and faster than without mentor. I can learn to be Enterprise Architect or play flute on my own, but having a mentor makes it easier for me. I pay for a flautist to teach me but really I don't want him to teach me. I teach flute myself and the flautist is to point out errors, tips that help me learn it faster, his experience of how he learned it, all to let me reach goals that I set with less effort. The problem people have is the moment they get a "teacher" they assume some kind of shared responsibility or even expectation that the student will somehow offload part of the effort onto the "teacher". That is simply wrong.