NOVIDARO Commitments

Mentoring is an asymmetric relationship. You bring what isn't clear yet; I bring experience and a way of reading it. That calls for rules written in advance, not worked out after the fact. These are NOVIDARO's.

Every item below has a practical consequence. None is a vague statement of intent, and where one isn't in effect yet, the item itself says so. If any of them isn't being met in your mentoring, talk to me first. If my answer doesn't resolve it, you can take the matter to the professional association I belong to; the route is in the first commitment. A complaint about deadlines, billing, or service quality, which is a different matter from ethical conduct, has its own channel and deadlines, both in the contract: confirmation of receipt within one business day and a conclusive answer within five.

Before we start, no surprises

Before any payment, you receive in writing the format of the cycle, its length, its cadence, the fee, and what is and isn't included. You also receive the code of ethics I follow and a description of how I run each session, so you can decide knowing what to expect.

If you ever want to file a complaint about me, there's a route, and it's public. Whenever possible, the place to start is talking to me directly: it's the fastest, and most of what turns into a formal complaint could be settled by an honest conversation first. If that doesn't resolve it, or if talking to me isn't a viable option for you, the complaint goes to the professional association. For EMCC, it starts with the regional affiliate, EMCC LATAM, and can go up to EMCC Global, which has a published formal procedure and a dedicated address, [email protected]. The current addresses are in your contract.

If anything isn't clear to you, it needs to be cleared up before we sign, not after.

What's said in the session stays in the session

Strict confidentiality over everything you bring. Confidentiality is absolute. The only exceptions fit on one short line: a legal requirement, illegal activity, or a concrete risk to your safety or someone else's. You agree to those limits before the first session. They're not fine print you discover along the way.

The session needs the right conditions to happen

A session is a conversation that asks you to say out loud things you haven't said yet to anyone in your organization. That doesn't survive an open-plan office, a moving car, or someone within earshot.

On my side, I guarantee a closed room, no one else present, no interruptions, and the full time reserved for you. On your side, I ask for the same: a private setting, headphones, and camera on. If those conditions aren't there in any meeting, we tell each other and reschedule, at no cost and without using up the session. A session held in poor conditions wastes your time and mine.

How the sessions are recorded

I keep a record of every session, for three reasons: to maintain continuity from one meeting to the next, to produce your one-page report, and to document my own practice for the accreditation I'm pursuing.

The record starts with an audio recording of the session. I use transcription and artificial intelligence tools on that audio to organize the notes and prepare your report. Nothing goes out without my reading, correcting, and signing it: the tool works for me, and I'm responsible for what reaches you, including when an error started in the tool.

Three limits always apply. Nothing is recorded without your written consent, and you can ask that a specific session not be recorded, without giving a reason and with no loss of service. None of the tools I use is set up to use your content for model training, and I check this in each supplier's current terms and each account's settings, before signing up and whenever anything changes; where a supplier's terms are silent on the point, as one of them is today, I don't treat silence as a guarantee: I make up for it with a deadline, deleting the audio from the tool within 30 days of delivering your report, with the deletion logged and dated. And the same confidentiality as in the previous commitment applies to all of that material, from the audio to the report.

Your data and your words stay yours

What I record from each session, where it's kept, for how long, and what happens to that material when the cycle closes are all in your contract, which sets the retention period for recordings and transcripts and includes the specific consent for them. In my professional records, you're identified by your initials. How this site handles the data it collects is described in the Privacy Policy.

The messaging channel between sessions is WhatsApp Business, with end-to-end encryption, a backup protected by a key only I hold, and no use of any of the platform's artificial intelligence features in our conversations. Even so, it isn't my record of the cycle: anything relevant that comes through it goes into my notes, which follow the safekeeping and retention period described above, and when the cycle closes I delete the conversation on my side. The copy on your device is yours, and I have no control over it at all.

A testimonial is requested in writing after the cycle closes, with the text submitted for your approval and the right to withdraw it at any time: no contract clause authorizes me to use your image, your voice, or your words unless you say yes at that moment.

If your company sponsors the cycle, what it receives is defined in advance

What the sponsor receives is agreed in writing with you and with them before the first session, and it doesn't change afterward. The standard is confirmation that the cycle took place, how often we met, and whether it was completed. Topics, session content, and any assessment of you are never part of that scope. If they ask for more than what was agreed, I refuse and let you know the request was made.

Whoever pays has a legitimate right to know whether the investment had an effect, and that right is met at the program level: whether the cycle happened, whether the goals agreed at the start were worked on, and what the design delivered. What isn't shared is you. Assessing the process and assessing the person are different things, and that distinction is written into the contract, not left to good judgment in the moment.

When the cycle is sponsored, I work within your company's rules. I ask for the supplier code of conduct, the information security policies, and the data handling rules before we start, and I comply. With one exception, stated before anything is signed: no internal policy can require me to hand over what these commitments protect. If a company rule demands session content, the topics covered, or an assessment of you, it doesn't prevail. I refuse, I tell you, and if the demand is a condition of the contract, there's no contract. Better that you know this now than find out when you need it.

One relationship at a time

If I already work with someone in your reporting line, your department, or your organization in a position that could conflict with yours, I tell you before taking you on. If a conflict comes up mid-cycle and can't be resolved without harming anyone, I step away.

The same rule applies when the prior relationship is with me. If we knew each other before, as friends, family, or colleagues, that doesn't rule out mentoring, but the separation has to be explicit: what's said in the session doesn't travel into the other relationship, and the other relationship doesn't come into the session as a shortcut, as an assumption about you, or as a reason to hold back what needs to be said. We agree on that in writing before the first session. If at any point the separation stops working, we close the cycle, and choosing the earlier relationship in that case isn't a loss.

One case doesn't fit that arrangement: anyone who currently has power over your career or mine. A current manager, a current evaluator, someone who decides your promotion. No separation is possible there, and I don't accept it.

During the cycle, mentoring doesn't become a door to something else. I don't use sessions to pitch other services, I don't accept referral fees or commissions for referring you to anyone, and I won't accept a job offer, partnership, or business deal from you while the cycle is open. If something like that comes up, I say so right away, and the choice is explicit: either the mentoring continues, or the other relationship begins after the cycle closes. Not both at once.

If someone referred you, what they get from me is a thank-you and nothing more. No referral is paid, and no referral gives me access to information about you.

The boundary that isn't negotiable

There is no romantic or sexual relationship with anyone I work with, or with anyone who sponsors the cycle, under any circumstances, for as long as the professional relationship lasts.

Boundaries also cover what happens outside the session. Any in-person meeting takes place in a professional space, never in a home or a social setting, and never with alcohol. I don't accept valuable gifts, professional favors, or business reciprocity from anyone I work with.

The working channel is the one agreed in the contract. Between sessions, it's for logistics and what we've already agreed on: noting a commitment you kept, reporting how a situation we prepared for went, clearing up a specific question about something already settled. A new topic, a new decision, or a conversation that needs context doesn't fit in a message, and I'll tell you so and bring it to the next session. Not out of rigidity, but because a subject like that, handled in writing and in pieces, is a subject handled badly.

I reply on business days, and response times vary. They depend on the time of day, my schedule, and the kind of question: an answer I need to think about takes longer than a logistics confirmation. And just as I don't see anyone else during your session, I don't answer messages while I'm with someone else. The commitment isn't to answer fast; it's to answer when I have the best answer to give. Silence within that isn't neglect; it's the same principle.

These rules don't exist because I distrust you. They exist because mentoring is an asymmetric relationship with real emotional weight, and in a relationship like that, the boundary needs to be written down before anyone needs it.

Mentoring has limits that can't be crossed

Mentoring isn't psychotherapy or clinical treatment, and it doesn't replace either. When the subject crosses that line, I say so clearly and refer you, even if that interrupts the cycle. The same goes for requests outside my expertise: I'd rather decline than improvise.

I work only with adults in a professional context. I don't work with anyone under 18; mentoring adolescents requires safeguards, parental consent, and specific training that aren't part of this practice.

If during a cycle your situation comes to need protection that mentoring doesn't offer, the above applies: I say so clearly, refer you, and, if needed, stop the cycle. Stopping at that point is the right thing to do, not a failure of service.

Here, difference isn't noise

You arrive with a path, a background, a way of speaking, and a set of references that aren't mine. That's not an obstacle to fix along the way: it's part of what we work with, and much of what there is to read in your organizational environment is right there.

Origin, color, gender, age, religion, orientation, and disability are not criteria in anything I do, neither in whom I agree to work with nor in how I read your situation. I assume I carry biases, including ones I don't see, and I treat that as part of reviewing my practice, not as something already solved. If at any point my reading reduces you to a stereotype, call it out right then. I'd rather hear it during the cycle than find out afterward.

Continuing professional development in inclusion, diversity, and bias is a specific item in my annual hours, not something that resolves itself through good intentions.

What happens in the session doesn't stop at the door

Mentoring deals with your career, and your career has effects beyond you. When a plan of yours depends on shifting costs to the team, a supplier, the end customer, or the environment, that comes into the conversation as part of the reading, not as a moral judgment. It's the same work as always: seeing the whole system before deciding, because that's where the decision will be held to account.

When sustainability, social impact, or the climate transition come up on your professional agenda, and they come up more and more often, I treat them as a legitimate mentoring topic, not as another department's business. EMCC Global, whose code I follow, runs its own program in that area, and its material is part of my continuing development.

In my own operation, what's under my control: remote sessions by default, with no travel and no printed material, and in-person travel only when you ask for it and it makes a difference.

Every idea has an owner, and the owner is named

The NOVIDARO Method is my own arrangement. The body of work it draws on isn't, and the authors are cited by name wherever they appear, here and in the material you receive. When I use a model, a tool, or a question that comes from someone else, I say whose it is. I don't turn other people's work into brand property, and the only thing I sign as mine is the synthesis.

For what you receive, the rule is simple: the content about your own situation is yours to use as you wish within your organization; third-party models and materials follow the terms set by whoever created them, and that's noted in the document itself.

My practice is reviewed by someone outside it

No mentor should be the only one assessing their own work. I'm setting up formal professional supervision with a qualified supervisor, which the accreditation I'm pursuing requires and which is standard practice in the profession. Until it starts, this commitment is still in the future, and I'd rather say so than write in the present tense about something that isn't happening yet.

Once it starts, here's how it works: I bring situations from my practice to that supervisor anonymously, with no name, company, or any data that identifies you, and the supervision relationship is itself confidential. You'll be informed when this takes effect.

After each session, I review how I ran it

Every session produces two records. The first is your report. The second is mine: a written reflection on how I ran it, what worked, what I let slide, and which of my own assumptions were at work without my noticing. That second record doesn't go to you, and it's what keeps the practice from turning into repetition.

At the end of each cycle, I ask for your assessment on a structured form. It feeds into that same review. That's why I ask, not as a closing courtesy.

Beyond that, I keep up continuing professional development with a logged annual number of hours, at least what the accreditation I'm pursuing requires, and I follow new work in the field. You're hiring an up-to-date practice, not experience frozen in the year I trained.

If I'm not in a condition to run a session

Running a session takes full attention. If at any point I can't offer that, whether because of physical or mental health, exhaustion, or personal circumstances, I reschedule and tell you that's why. I don't run sessions at half strength, and I don't charge for a session I knew wouldn't deliver.

If the condition isn't temporary, I seek professional support before working with anyone again and, if necessary, activate the plan in the next commitment. You don't have to manage my state, and you shouldn't have to figure out on your own that it affected your cycle.

If I can't continue

There's a written plan in case I can't complete a cycle because of illness, incapacity, or death. It defines who notifies you, what happens to the material in my safekeeping, how the cycle is closed, and the proportional refund of whatever wasn't used. A summary of that plan comes with the contract: a continuity plan the client doesn't know about is useless.

If I ever close the practice in a planned way, you'll be notified in advance, and none of your records will be transferred to another professional without your express authorization.

Professional liability insurance for this work isn't in place yet. Until it is, this site doesn't claim otherwise, and the start date will be posted here.

The cycle ends by design

Closing is a planned step in the process, not either of us giving up. At the close, we compare where you started with where you ended up, including what didn't move forward, and we decide together whether there's a next cycle. You can end it whenever you want, under the terms of the contract, and I'll encourage ending it if another kind of help would serve you better.

There's a first-session guarantee, with a full refund of the amount paid. The complete commercial terms, including price, payment methods, the deadline to claim the guarantee, the right of withdrawal, and how long the package is valid, are in the Terms and Conditions.

What ends is the cycle, not my duties. Confidentiality about everything you brought, care of your records, and the prohibition on my taking advantage of the relationship we had continue after the last meeting, with no time limit.

What happens if I don't comply

A complaint that is upheld has real consequences. If a procedure finds that I violated the code I say I follow, I accept whatever sanction results, including loss of membership and of any accreditation I may earn. A code without an accepted sanction is just decoration.

The obligation runs both ways. If I have reasonable grounds to believe another professional is acting unethically, I talk to them directly, and if that doesn't resolve it, I take the matter to the association they belong to. I don't do this behind their back or as industry gossip: it's a written duty, not a personal initiative.

And if discriminatory conduct comes up in a session, whether yours or someone else's in your environment, I don't treat it as a neutral fact of the case. I name it, respectfully and without turning the session into a trial, because that's what the code asks of me and because ignoring it would be taking a side.

What I don't promise

I don't promise a promotion, a raise, or recognition. Those outcomes depend on decisions that are neither mine nor yours. What I commit to delivering is the process: a read on your environment, judgment for your decisions, experience you can apply, and a plan you can sustain on your own.

The credentials this site declares

What this site says about me reflects what's active on the date you read it. I'm a member of the International Mentoring Association and of EMCC Global, the latter through its affiliate EMCC LATAM. Individual EMCC accreditation is in progress, not complete: being a member of an association isn't the same as being accredited by it, and treating the two as equivalent is common in the mentoring and development market. Not here. Where something is in progress, the site says so.

These commitments come from the Global Code of Ethics for Coaches, Mentors and Supervisors, created in 2016 by the Association for Coaching and EMCC Global and now adopted by twelve signatory professional bodies, including EMCC Global and the International Mentoring Association, both of which I belong to. Where the code sets the minimum, this practice goes further. Where I don't comply yet, it says so in writing.

None of this is a judgment of colleagues. Mentoring and coaching are fields with legitimate and very different schools, methods, and tools, including in how they use AI, and that variety is healthy. What I describe here is the standard for this practice, and what I refuse in any practice is just one thing: telling clients something that doesn't match reality.

Read the code in full (V4, December 2025)

This page is reviewed at least once a year, whenever a new version of the code is issued, and whenever my accreditation status or the tools I use change. Earlier versions are available on request.