Mentoring is commonly defined as a process that aims at supporting a mentee (e.g. a novice in an organization) in his career advancement by providing guidance, counseling, coaching/training and empowerment. These four functions are the pillars of a successful mentoring process. They have to be considered as interlocking constituents of mentoring, thus they are depending upon each other. Following Hunt (1986) mentoring can be also understood as a form of learning in the workplace and within an organisation. Mentoring was first identified as a largely informal process, conducted often times by male managers sponsoring their protégés (also usually male mentees). In many communities of practise sophisticated learning takes place without formal learning provision (Lave and Wenger, 1991). Formal mentoring, on the other hand, refers to assigned relationships like for a example a trainee or apprenticeship programme, often associated with organizational mentoring programs designed to promote employee development by combination of individual and collective goals. These programmes combine work place experiences with structured learning opportunities which are facilitated by trained mentors or other more experienced persons in the organisation. Our central argument encountered from these discussions on the advance of formal versus informal learning is, that blended forms of formal and informal learning come much stronger into play in European further training practise. The European Union has therefore developed policies for lifelong learning which focus strongly on the need to identify, assess and certify informal learning, particularly in the workplace (Bjørnavold, 2000). Thus, it is claimed, many things are learned more effectively through informal processes. One clear example of this is language learning. But beside this we have to consider that formal and informal learning are quite distinct from each other - that they have the character of different paradigms, each with its own inherent logic, theoretical foundations and modes of practice. (Hodginson 2006). Departing from our research and development pilot project experiences in German companies (Spöttl, Gerds 2002; Deitmer, Ruth 2006) we like to suggest that it is high time to step outside the frames of this contest between formal and informal learning and to follow new conceptual tracks, which give credit to both forms of learning and re-synthesize it into blended forms of formal and informal learning by designing work and learning tasks (WLT). These tasks take workplace learning for the mentee as a first step. We will show by example that these tasks are activity based and related to the professional background the mentees are acting in. They are extracted from formal structured learning processes. These learning processes get evaluated through the other instrument we bring into play, e.g. the competence assessment sheet, which makes clear what the mentee has learned so far.In our paper we want to emphasize that informal mentoring style can be sustained by more formal mentoring styles. By referring to an example of the tourism sector, we shall describe a holistic concept that covers the essentials of the process including a career advancement map which describes the interaction between competence assessment and career development. The development of an in-house training plan based on work and learning tasks is described by developed modules for the occupational task of a receptionist. This paper arises from assisting the development of an regional pilot project, IMPLEMENT for the support of mentoring processes of companies out of two sectors (ICT and Tourism) in the region of Attica, Greece. The project developed and integrated methods of guided learning for mentoring that can facilitate a specific target group - here women. They were affected by restructuring and were forced to take advantages of it. The know how of 17 partners, chambers, VET Centres, consulting companies and transnational partners on mentoring was shared in this large project. Several tools were developed and implemented by needs analysis of the target group and companies from ICT and tourism sectors, profiles for mentors and mentees and curricula for training of the two groups. Over 300 mentoring schemes in and out the companies were undertaken. As one of the transnational partner the ITB, University of Bremen participated in this project. Our role was to synthesize experiences from German and other European countries heading for the support of the Mentoring activities.Several research and development instruments for the design of learning arrangements at the work place and within work processes have been used in our conceptualisation work (Bremer 2003, 2000; Rauner 2001, Ruth/Deitmer 2001, Ruth et.al. 2001). This includes also a literature review on best practise projects in Germany as well as an evaluation on mentoring qualification programm`s and projectsThe experiences with the Implement project show that opportunities of informal learning, such as the workplace learning, are distributed unequal, to the advantage of those higher up the status and management hierarchy getting more and better opportunities for learning, as compared to those at the "bottom of the hierarchy", who were more likely to be female workers and/or, at least in Western countries, with a different ethnic background. This unequal distribution of learning and career opportunities is reflected in and depending upon the specific industrial cultural situation given in the country the mentee is working in (Hewison et al, 2000). Based on the analyses of various European examples, the ITB developed a mentoring concept with the above sketched key components: competence assessment sheet (CAS), work and learning tasks (WLT), career roadmaps, and an evaluation tool for assessing mentoring programmes The success of the mentoring process depends on the successful integration of the sketched components. Obviously the initial competence assessment (CAS) is the basis for the career roadmap as well as for the training and qualification modules. Therefore, the initial CAS must be conducted very carefully, in order to develop a career plan, which is realistic and achievable during the mentoring process. This means that the career goals are not demanding too much of the mentee - the situation that the defined goals are too easy for the mentee can be adjusted during the career plan reflexion and revision stages by formulating more demanding career goals. As a consequence of the initial CAS, a training and qualification plan with in-house work learning task as well as external training modules have to be provided. Finally, we like to consider that a very important condition for effective learning in the company is to belong to a community of practice (Lave and Wenger 1991). A community of practice is shaped through specific organisational factors, but also through work and vocational aspects as well as through general societal and cultural values. Learning, they argue, is the process of becoming a full member of a community of practice (or peer group), which they label with 'legitimate peripheral participation'. Thus, we cannot learn without belonging to a community and we cannot belong to a community of practice without learning their practices, norms, values and understandings of the community. The process of learning and getting accustomed to the requirements and expectations of the community of practice is not at all easy and free of conflicts. But since participation in a community of practice is also a condition for career advancements within this community, an important mentoring goal must be the mentor's supporting the mentee to better overcome these barriers and help him to express his needs clearly in the organisation. Athens Chamber of Commerce and Industry, ACCI (2006) An Integrated Mentoring Plan for the Local Effective Management of Employment - Good practise Guide, Athens Bjørnavold, J. (2001) Making learning visible: identification, assessment and recognition of non-formal learning, Vocational Training: European Journal (22) 24-32.Bremer, Rainer: A Portrait of GAB; A Pilot Project between Schools, an Enterprise and the ITB; in: Strategies for Reforming Initial Vocational Education and Training in Europe; Stenström, Marja-Leena; Lasonen, Johanna (eds.), Jyväskylä 2000 Bremer, Rainer: Curricula for Work Oriented Vocational Education and Training in the Automobile Industry and its Evaluation; Thessaloniki; Work Process Knowledge and Work-related Learning in Europe; CEDEFOP Boreham, Nick; Brink, Bernd; Fischer, Martin (eds.), 2003 Deitmer, L., Ruth, K. (2006) Corner Stones of the mentoring process; First deliverable to the IMPLEMENT project, ITBDeitmer, L., Ruth, K. 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