Exploring the benefits of mentoring activities for the mentor

Abstract

Purpose

Mentoring is more and more studied by researchers on account of its professional and personal impact on mentees. This contribution has two main objectives. First, to empirically validate the benefits for the mentor and to test links between mentoring activities and benefits through a multidimensional analysis. Second, to incorporate two variables structuring the relationship into the analysis: the formal vs informal nature of the mentoring relationship and the gender composition of the dyad. The paper aims to discuss these issues.

Design/methodology/approach

In total, 161 French managers have been surveyed.

Findings

The results show that mentors value the personal dimension of the relationship more than the professional dimension. Moreover, informal mentoring favours the perception of a rewarding experience by the mentor, whereas formal mentoring is synonymous with improved professional performance. This research calls into question the advantage of same-sex dyads, suggesting that heterogeneity favours improved performance.

Originality/value

The originality of the paper was to focus on the homogeneity of the mentor-protégé dyad in terms of gender.

Citation

Grima, F., Paillé, P., H. Mejia, J. and Prud'homme, L. (2014), "Exploring the benefits of mentoring activities for the mentor", Career Development International, Vol. 19 No. 4, pp. 469-490. https://doi.org/10.1108/CDI-05-2012-0056