Informal Mentoring as an Organisational Resource
Introduction
Mentoring is an important form of support for managers at all stages in their careers, and is considered particularly useful for women managers in male-dominated organisations. In a major US study of senior females and their CEOs, 91 per cent of female executives mentioned having a mentor, and many saw this as the ‘single most critical piece to women advancing career-wise’.1 Previous research has indicated the benefits of mentoring from the protégé’s perspective. Support may be career-focused, with the mentor acting as sponsor, coach, protector, challenge-giver and exposure-provider. It may also be psychosocial in nature, with the mentor taking the role of friend, social supporter, parent, role model, counsellor and acceptance-giver.2 Less has been reported regarding the value of mentoring to the mentor, but this includes the rewarding experience, improved job performance, a loyal base of support, organisational recognition and generativity (a sense of continuity and regeneration for the mentor).3 Much of the previous research into mentoring is US-based, although some researchers have been active in the UK, particularly in the area of best practice in mentoring for top-level positions.4
While many articles have hinted at the benefits of mentoring to the organisation, these have seldom been discussed in detail, although they are said to accrue to the organisation indirectly through the support given to promising young individuals who have been identified by more senior managers. A notable exception is Wilson and Elman, although no empirical results are reported, and no measure of the organisational benefits has been found in the literature.5 The purpose of this paper is to provide empirical evidence of the perceived benefits of mentoring to the organisation itself.
The aim of this study was to examine whether the views of managers would be in agreement with the benefits of informal mentoring suggested by the literature. We undertook a case study of Cambridgeshire County Council, a UK public sector organisation which was considering whether to introduce an assisted informal or more formal mentoring scheme. This followed a decade when the presence of mentoring relationships was not monitored at all.
This paper focuses on the organisational benefits of informal mentoring. We review the literature on organisational benefits, although it is scant. We then report the findings from our survey of male and female managers’ perceptions of the benefits of informal mentoring to the organisation. Of particular interest is the view of mentoring as an organisational mechanism for the production and capture of tacit knowledge.6 Finally, we review implications for further research, and for managerial practice.
Section snippets
Formality in mentoring
There are two contrasting theoretical models underpinning the rationale for mentoring programmes.7 Mentoring may be undertaken as a social exchange, with a rational, cost-benefit approach. The mentor’s performance is formally monitored and recognised by the organisation. In contrast, a communitarian model leads to people enacting helping behaviour through core values as members of a community, which is a more sustainable model as such behaviour becomes the norm. The organisational culture is
Previous research
Mentoring is acknowledged to be of benefit to protégé, mentor and the organisation: ‘The mentor gives, the protégé gets, and the organisation benefits.’8 In this paper, we define mentors as ‘individuals with advanced experience and knowledge who are committed to providing upward support and mobility to their protégés’ careers’. The organisational benefits most often discussed in the literature are those relating to human resource management, particularly recruitment and retention, but in
Methods
The design used is a single organisational case study. While the researchers’ aim was to gain an understanding of managers’ perceptions of the organisational benefits of informal mentoring, access was given by the public sector organisation because it wanted to ascertain the existence of mentoring in the management tier. Hence a survey design was used. At a later stage, the researchers will work with mentors and protégés to gain a deeper understanding of mentoring, which will help the
Findings
Both mentors and protégés gave positive responses to all the benefits listed, although no items were rated above six on a seven-point scale of agreement with the statements. Protégés rated six of the nine variables higher than did the mentors, but mentor/protégé differences were not significant. Figure 1 shows the level of agreement with the mentoring benefits statements by male and female mentors and protégés.
Female protégés rated seven of the nine benefits higher than male protégés, with two
Discussion
The results confirmed our expectations based on the literature from which the questionnaire was derived. The limited number of responses relating to actual mentoring experience means that we can only use these findings as indicators for further research with larger samples. Nonetheless, there are some interesting results, including comments made by non-mentoring managers about expectations of mentoring benefits. The findings provide confirmation that managers do perceive the benefits of
Conclusions
This paper has contributed to the literature on informal mentoring by building on Wilson and Elman’s and Conway’s work, constructing a scale derived from the literature covering a range of benefits to the organisation. We also have provided evidence of mentoring benefits perceived by a UK sample, whereas most previous research in this area has been undertaken in the US. However, despite an initial sample of 642 managers, and a response rate of 35 per cent, there were few informal mentors and
Dr Val Singh is Senior Research Fellow in Organisational Behaviour, working in the Centre for Developing Women Business Leaders at Cranfield School of Management, where she undertook her doctorate. Her current research focuses on women directors on FTSE 100 company boards; diversity management performance measurement; impression management strategies; and mentoring. She has written a number of journal articles and book chapters, as well as occasional practitioner articles. Val also lectures on
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Dr Val Singh is Senior Research Fellow in Organisational Behaviour, working in the Centre for Developing Women Business Leaders at Cranfield School of Management, where she undertook her doctorate. Her current research focuses on women directors on FTSE 100 company boards; diversity management performance measurement; impression management strategies; and mentoring. She has written a number of journal articles and book chapters, as well as occasional practitioner articles. Val also lectures on qualitative research methods. (E-mail: [email protected])
Ms Divindra Bains is a full-time M.Phil student studying the benefits of informal mentoring to the protégé, mentor and organisation. She previously worked in local government housing management. (E-mail: [email protected])
Professor Susan Vinnicombe is Director of the Centre for Developing Women Business Leaders, as well as Professor of Organisational Behaviour and Diversity Management. Susan has designed and run award-winning women’s management development courses in major organisations. She has written five books, including Working in Organizations and The Essence of Women in Management, as well as many journal articles and book chapters. Susan’s research interests are focused on women directors, career development and leadership. (E-mail: [email protected])