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In practice, mentoring is merely an aggrandizement of the term coaching and counseling is best left to the professionals. The tragedy of mentoring is that it has been hijacked and mugged by the so‐called coaching profession who are in it only for financial gain.

The “Germanwings” air crash in 2015 in which 150 people were killed highlighted the challenges pilots working in the aviation industry face. Pilots regularly work for extensive periods in inhospitable and high-pressure operational conditions, exposing them to considerable work-related stress. This has raised calls for a more systemic cultural change across the aviation industry, championing a more holistic perspective of pilot health and well-being. The study aims to explore how peer coaching (PC) can promote an inclusive psychosocial safety climate enhancing pilot well-being and can mitigate hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours.

Adopting an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA), semi-structured interviews and questionnaires were conducted with military and civilian peer coach/coachee pilots and key industry stakeholders, totalling 39 participants. The research provided significant insights into the perceived value of PC in promoting both pilot health and mental well-being (MW) and flight safety across the aviation industry.

The study highlights four key PC superordinate themes, namely, coaching skills, significance of well-being, building of peer relationships and importance of confidentiality and autonomy. Such combined themes build reciprocal trust within peer conversations that can inspire engagement and effectively promote personal well-being. The contagious effect of such local interventions can help stimulate systemic cultural change and promote a positive psychosocial safety climate throughout an organisation and, in this case, across the aviation industry. This study provides a PC conceptual framework “Mutuality Equality Goals Autonomy Non-evaluative feedback, Skill Confidentiality Voluntary Supervisory (MEGANS CVS),” highlighting the salient features of PC in promoting MW.

The study highlights the salient features of PC and its role in promoting peer conversations that enable personal transition, openness and acceptance. This study also highlights how PC and well-being can be used to encourage inclusivity and engagement, thereby strengthening institutional resilience.

This study highlights how PC that can assist HRM/HRD professionals to embed a more inclusive and salutogenic approach to MW that can reshape organisational cultures. This study highlights the significance and link of workplace stress to hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours. It further notes that whilst the MEGANS CVS peer coaching framework has been applied to pilots, it can also be applied across all sectors and levels.

This study highlights the value of PC as an inexpensive means to engage at the grassroots level, which not only improves personal performance, safety and well-being but by building peer relationships can also act as a catalyst for positive and deep organisational cultural change.

This study offers the MEGANS CVS framework that exposes insights into PC practice that can assist HRM/HRD professionals embed a more inclusive and salutogenic approach to health and well-being that can reshape organisational cultures. This study highlights the significance and link of workplace stress to hazardous attitudes and dysfunctional behaviours, and whilst this framework has been applied to pilots, it can also have relevance across all sectors and levels. This study calls for a “salutogenic turn,” employing MW and PC to transform organisational capabilities to be more forward-thinking and solution-focused, promoting an inclusive “just culture” where leaders positively lead their people.

Explores certain problems associated with formal mentoring within five organizations. Also offers solutions to some of these problems. However, a number of the solutions offered here may be difficult to implement as they represent for some a major shift in thinking.

The article is in three parts. The first, based on survey data, looks at the extent of and the provision for development for mentors and those interested in mentoring. The second part is a discussion about ideas on learning and their relationship to mentoring. It draws on some issues raised by the survey material and highlights the need for a mentor development based on specific contexts and a learner‐centred approach. The third element of the article offers a development programme for mentors devised and used by the authors.

This paper offers a description of mentoring within the context of a large organisation. Mentoring is increasingly employed in many occupational settings in relation to induction, career development and change. It is becoming recognised on both sides of the Atlantic as a highly effective human resource development process. Examples of mentoring activity can be found in many diverse organisations – the voluntary sector, schools, the private and public sector, large and small businesses. The Halifax plc is one such organisation and we aim to offer a description of the beginnings of mentoring within the Halifax. We present a detailed account of how the mentoring arrangements were started, matched and developed, and attempt to draw some early conclusions from this ongoing process.

Aimed at those who are interested in mentoring, offers a perspective on the mentoring experience from the potential mentor’s view‐point and attempts to write from the “inside” of the relationship. Addresses the mentor’s concerns about the role by drawing on the authors’ personal experiences and debates mentoring within the context of modern organizational life. Criticizes a heavily “skills focused” approach to mentoring and argues that it is a holistic and significant personal relationship that flourishes despite management’s attempts to control and measure it.

Learning in conversation occurs in a variety of ways. This paper explores one particular way which, it is argued, is central in a knowledge economy. Non‐linear learning occurs through revisiting and re‐examining recurring issues in working life to arrive at new perspectives and new commitments to act in new ways. Such learning contrasts with learning that is linear and incremental, and where there is a pre‐specified endpoint. Non‐linear learning can be facilitated by conversation that is open, respectful, supportive and challenging. The learning that emerges is a result of collaborative effort. The metaphor of a dance is used to characterise a learning conversation of this kind. An example is presented showing its dance‐like qualities and the broad implications for encouraging learning conversations in organisations are identified.

The final part in a series of three articles, discusses an evaluation of the Northern and Yorkshire region of the health services mentor scheme, linked to Durham MBA. Reports on the results of a survey of 42 health‐service mentees who have just finished a two‐year MBA course and their 42 mentors. Highlights issues raised by mentees and mentors, and discusses the implications of these for development and improvement of the scheme.

This is the second piece in a series of three. Analyses two specific mentoring partnerships. The mentor relationships are part of an MBA linked mentor scheme that is running within the Northern Region of the NHS. Explores the dimensions of the mentoring relationship and attempts to suggest a “best fit” set of dimensions for mentoring to be effective. Touches on the gender issue and Learning Style match. Goes on to debate the effectiveness of mentor development within the scheme and suggests ways in which this might be improved.