Successful Mentorship = Talent x Accessibility with Dr. Hugo Rosen

Hugo Rosen, MD is the Chair of Medicine and a Professor of Medicine, Immunology, and Molecular Microbiology at Keck School of Medicine of USC. Dr. Rosen completed his medical school from the University of Miami—Miller School of Medicine, his residency in internal medicine at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center at Harvard Medical School, followed by a fellowship in gastroenterology and transplant hepatology at UCLA. As a highly accomplished physician scientist, Dr. Rosen has more than 180 original peer reviewed manuscripts investigating the cellular and molecular underpinnings of a wide spectrum of innate and adaptive immune responses and developing novel paradigms in liver diseases. Dr. Rosen is an elected member of the American Society of Clinical Investigation and the American Association of Physicians, and currently serves as the deputy editor of the journal Hepatology. There is a formula for finding a great mentor: Talent x Accessibility. Today, Dr. Hugo Rosen explains that we should look for mentors who are not only talented in their field, but who are also accessible—and invested in you as the trainee. When one of these factors is diluted, it weakens the overall product. Dr. Rosen also reminds us that the lack of mentorship leads to missed opportunities. And it is up to us, as mentees, to not only seek out these relationships, but to prove that we are ones to invest in. “Think of it as an audition,” says Dr. Rosen. He explains that every interaction we have is a chance to display our work ethic, our willingness to learn, our humility—and the fire in our belly that drives us each day. Pearls of Wisdom: 1. Mentorship is not just about career development, it’s about personal development. If a mentor is truly invested, the relationship becomes personal by default. 2. Finding a great mentor is about talent times accessibility. If the mentor is extremely talented but not accessible, the product will be zero. 3. Mentorship has to be driven by us, as the mentee. Show your mentor that you have vision and a fire in your belly, and use that to drive the interaction. 4. Every interaction is an audition.