Breaking Silos, Building Trust: Connecting People and Knowledge to Deliver Better Outcomes for Victoria
with Cindy Ho,
Learning and Development Consultant, Department of Transport and Planning (DTP)
with Cindy Ho,
Learning and Development Consultant, Department of Transport and Planning (DTP)
One of Victoria’s largest state departments turned a period of change and reconnection into a flagship mentoring initiative — connecting over 500 employees across engineering, planning, and corporate teams, with a 99% match rate and a story of personal courage that changed how the whole department thinks about inclusion.
Cindy Ho had a story she’d never told at work. As the L&D consultant leading the Department of Transport and Planning’s new mentoring program, she’d built a design centred on psychological safety and inclusion — but she’d never applied that same courage to herself. Watching a colleague openly and bravely share their own disability gave her the push she needed. So she shared hers: a hearing disability she’d been too afraid to disclose in her entire career.
"That was the moment I realised how powerful it can be when someone shares their story"
Afterwards, people reached out to share their own experiences for the first time — telling her that her story had given them courage too. For a department built on structure and process, it was a profoundly human turning point.
Department of Transport and Planning (DTP) — one of Victoria’s largest state departments, spanning engineering, urban planning, major infrastructure and corporate professions — had experienced significant organisational change, bringing together thousands of employees from different professions and ways of working into one department.
At the same time, an ageing and evolving workforce highlighted the importance of retaining and sharing specialist knowledge, raising a pressing question: how do you retain decades of specialist technical expertise while helping a post-COVID workforce strengthen trust and connection?
The answer became a pillar of DTP’s Enterprise Workforce Strategy: knowledge retention through structured mentoring. A 2024 pilot aimed for around 100 participants, with Mentorloop selected for its intuitive interface and the data needed to evaluate the program properly.
More than 200 applications arrived in the first week alone, and DTP expanded the pilot from 100 to 180 participants on the spot. That early signal has held: the current cohort drew applications from every single division, achieved a 99% match rate, and connected people across divisions in every match — 80% of them across different disciplines entirely. (The other 20% were intentional same-discipline matches, prioritised where deep specialist knowledge-sharing mattered most.)
Alumni are returning too, with 17% of participants coming back — with mentees who’ve become mentors. Mentoring quality has held at 4.6, and with the cohort just weeks from finishing, 83% of participants had already progressed into the program’s later stages. On DTP’s annual employee survey, measures like learning and development, cross-team collaboration, and employee engagement all improved by an average of 6% — with mentoring as one of the contributing initiatives. The program has since evolved from a workforce-strategy pilot into a flagship initiative under DTP’s broader culture plan, and was a finalist for an international learning award.
The program has since evolved from a workforce-strategy pilot into a flagship initiative under DTP’s broader culture plan.
Beyond that opening surge of 200+ applications, Cindy points to two other moments. The first was structural: 64% of participants identify with one or more of DTP’s priority diversity cohorts, a direct reflection of the program’s inclusive design. The second was the in-person community event — bringing mentors and mentees together with speakers and workshops. “You could really see, hear and feel the energy in the room,” Cindy says. Participants described it as invaluable, powerful, and seamless, and asked for more of it.
"That was the moment that I realised people were really excited for this, people wanted this, and they really needed this."
For a public-sector team, evidence matters as much as outcomes. Cindy points to a handful of levers:
DTP isn’t chasing scale for its own sake. “Growth isn’t necessarily about expanding beyond our department,” Cindy explains — the gap they set out to fill was internal. Instead, the focus for years three and four is going deeper: growing the alumni community, creating more ways for people to stay involved, and better understanding the long-term impact of mentoring relationships that continue well past the formal program.
Learning and Development Consultant, Department of Transport and Planning (DTP)
Share this Article
Join the loop
"Mentorloop has given us the tools to grow and continually improve the program, while allowing us to design a mentoring experience that feels right for us."
– Cindy Ho, Learning and Development Consultant, Department of Transport and Planning (DTP)
What Role Does Equity and Equality Play in Your Mentoring Program?
The right mentoring program should level the playing field to empower entire cohorts of people: workplaces, member associations, social groups and educational institutions. Equality should be a cherished value so that every individual can thrive—whoever they are, whatever their background, however they worship or whomever they love. But we can’t arrive at equality without it’s often forgotten partner, equity.
What does a Mentoring Program Coordinator do?
Being a Mentoring Program Coordinator is an incredibly rewarding experience that positively impacts the lives of many. And while mentoring programs don’t fully run themselves (even though Mentorloop can do a great deal of the heavy lifting!), they do require a point of contact that can steer the program in the right direction for the organisation that is running one.
Building Quality Feedback Into Mentoring Relationships
This is Part 8 of our 10-part series on the 10 Key Qualities and Habits of a Highly Effective Mentor.
In this post, we’ll look at how mentors can successfully build quality feedback into their mentoring. Quality feedback is priceless because it clarifies expectations, helps people learn from their mistakes, and builds confidence. It also allows mentees to more effectively take what their mentors say and turn it into action.
