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The changing nature of work dynamics demands that managers keep up-to-date in skills, knowledge, and competencies. Besides, nowadays these professionals need to understand the business beyond the frontiers of their own organizations. This phenomenon has led to new forms of alternative mentoring for managers and entrepreneurs, as companies battle for talent in a globalized way. Professional associations, consultancy firms, and other agents are starting to offer mentoring programs in which the mentor and mentee often belong to different organizations or take place within a group.

The purpose of this study is to present a conceptual model for alternative mentoring for managers. This model is a new approach to mentoring, and it will try to clarify some of the bases of a phenomenon that is increasingly present in the managerial field.

The paper also suggests some advantages of alternative mentoring when compared to traditional mentoring.

This paper contributes to a better understanding of new forms of alternative mentoring while providing practitioners in the field with a better understanding of key issues for alternative mentoring.

The purpose of this study is to present a conceptual model that comprises the four phases of an inter-organizational mentoring (IOM) process.

This study used a focus group of 19 expert coordinators on IOM programs who met once at the Basque College of Economists. The session was recorded and notes were taken and distributed to all participants.

Based on the focus group, the authors developed a four-phase model of IOM. The phases this conceptual model proposes for IOM are awakening, transcendence, organizational bond and maturity.

These four phases should help mentors to guide mentees in the completion of an effective IOM process. This model is a re-conceptualization from the traditional mentoring phases, as the nature of the mentoring process is different. However, getting to understand the phases of IOM will enlighten the understanding of this phenomenon that is a growing option for managers in their career development as IOM helps managers to acquire skills and competencies.

This work contributes to the comprehension of this new form of alternative mentoring, clarifying for mentees and mentors, what process they are going to follow. Additionally, it provides clear criteria for inter-organizational program coordinators on how to organize these kinds of programs. In the opinion of the authors, this paper is original because it provides an in-depth understanding of IOM, which is an HRD technique that has barely been studied to date.

This study's main objective is to analyse the role of the consumer's ethnocentrism as a potential segmentation basis and to detect product origin-sensitive groups. The relationship between the consumer's regional ethnocentrism, local and regional identity and corresponding valuation and purchase of food products from a region is also examined.

The responses of 358 consumers residing in two Spanish regions are analysed by means of a mediation analysis and a cluster analysis.

The results suggest the convenience of considering ethnocentric consumer tendencies, also at the regional level, when studying attitudes, valuation, information search and effective purchase of foods of diverse categories and origins.

The main contributions of this work derive from the assessment of consumer ethnocentrism at a subnational level (which is much less present in the literature) and the evidence of its usefulness for segmenting the market and detecting groups of origin-sensitive consumers, which can be useful to companies that produce and market food products in different regions.

This article aims to present the differences in implementation between individual mentoring programs (IMPs) and group mentoring programs (GMPs).

This exploratory study used semi-structured interviews with 16 experts: mentoring program (MP) coordinators, consultants and mentors. During the interviews, the steps in implementing a mentoring program were reviewed and discussed by practitioners.

Based on the interviews and contrasting with the proposed implementation model, the authors compared IMPs and GMPs. The results highlight the role of the GMP coordinators, especially in the selection of mentors, mentees and generating resources that favor the beneficial effects of group dynamics on mentoring processes.

This model for implementing MPs and the differences identified between IMPs and GMPs provide practical help to program coordinators (PCs) and mentors to deploy MPs by highlighting the relevant aspects.

Mentoring is a Human Resource Development (HRD) technique whose implementation at the program level needs further deepening for practitioners. This is the first work that emphasizes the differences to be considered in the design and implementation of MPs by taking the individual or group dimension of mentoring.

The purpose of this paper is to present an analysis of the results of applying executive coaching (EC) as a management competency training and development strategy, setting up a comparison with other known training and development methods.

A dual sample is used. On the one hand, information is collected from a sample of 100 managers who participated as coachees in an EC process. On the other hand, the study provides the opinions of 236 HR managers as prescribers and promoters of company executive training and development actions.

The results suggest that EC is an effective management training and development method (MTDM). Furthermore, it is confirmed to be more effective than the rest of the techniques analysed in relation with sustained and observable management behaviour changes, whilst also providing advantages and drawbacks in its use.

Coaching seems to provide the most effective method for altering a selected number of concrete managerial behaviours, although its cost, length, and specificity limit its capacity to be used exclusively as a tool for continuous and generalised management training.

In addition to incorporating two different samples and points of view within the analysis, this work contributes evidence regarding behaviours addressed in EC processes – a feature that has received little analysis in the academic literature – and breaks new ground by comparing the results of this method with other MTDMs in terms of their degree of effectiveness in attaining observable and lasting behaviour changes.

This paper aims to identify, assess and classify the most significant mentee outcomes of formal mentoring processes aimed at managerial development.

After conducting an extensive literature review to identify the most significant mentee outcomes in the management field, a survey was conducted with a sample of 80 experienced mentees. An exploratory factor analysis (EFA) has been performed to simplify and contribute to operationalizing these results. Finally, focus group and nominal group techniques were conducted with practitioners to better understand the findings.

A total of 27 mentee outcomes have been identified in the literature. EFA analysis has allowed us to downsize the 27 outcomes into four factors encompassing the most relevant mentee outcomes. The authors then provide an interpretation and discussion of the results.

This work compiles, reviews and systematizes existing studies on mentee outcomes in the field of management, classifying the results in a novel manner.

The purpose of this paper is to explore the essential mentor characteristics for effective inter-organizational mentoring. This kind of HR development technique, where mentor and mentee belong to different organizations, is becoming increasingly popular and so far has been scarcely studied.

First, a rigorous literature analysis to identify primary mentor characteristics for managers and professionals has been performed; second, a Delphi analysis has determined their relevance according to the opinion of 125 experienced mentors, mentees and program coordinators that have carried out inter-organizational mentoring processes in Spain; and third, an exploratory factor analysis has reclassified the mentor characteristics into a smaller number of factors.

In total, 29 relevant mentor characteristics have been identified and valued. The foregoing characteristics are related to seven underlying dimensions or factors that serve to characterize an effective mentor for inter-organizational mentoring programs.

The research extends the existing literature regarding mentor characteristics of those mentors who are engaged in inter-organizational mentoring. In addition, this work offers a valuable contribution to inter-organizational mentoring research based in a Delphi method that includes both academic and practitioner perspectives in a cultural context that may have not received previous attention. The findings can be valuable for both academics who investigate this topic of growing interest, and for practitioners who must face the selection and training of mentors.

Although trust is considered a dyadic and bidirectional phenomenon, the majority of trust research has not considered it as such. The purpose of this paper is to contribute to closing this research gap by analyzing the influence of supervisor’s propensity to trust on salesperson trust in supervisor, considering the mediating role of servant leadership (SL). Additionally, the authors delve into the relationship between trust in supervisor and salesperson turnover by examining the moderating effect of perceived ethical climate (EC).

Information was provided by 145 salesperson–supervisor dyads from 145 companies across various industries. SEM and PROCESS procedures were used to test the proposed hypotheses.

The results indicate that a supervisor’s disposition to trust is positively related to employee trust in the leader via its impact on perceived SL behaviors. However and contrary to the expectations, supervisor’s propensity to trust is found to have a direct negative impact on trust in the supervisor, suggesting the presence of additional mediating variables. Finally, the trust dimension of EC moderates the negative influence of trust on salesperson turnover intentions.

The findings highlight the practical benefits of fostering trust in the workplace and confirm the significant role of trust in the identification of servant leaders. In addition, the study shows that a supervisor’s disposition to trust can have a relevant effect on salesperson’s turnover intentions. Moreover, the results demonstrate the beneficial role of an ethical work climate.

This study offers insight into how to improve the retention of efficient employees and the role of trust, analyzed at a dyadic level, in this process. In addition, the findings suggest why servant leaders adopt this leadership style.

The development of Information Systems (IS) and Information and Communication Technologies (ICT) is offering new opportunities for businesses to implement promotion strategies focused on customer attraction and retention. In this sense, mobile coupon usage has increased as a promotion tool, especially in the fast-food sector. However, the use by consumers of these coupons is not homogeneous and it is conditioned by prior experience. Thus, this study aimed to examine variations between Fast Food Restaurant (FFR) customers based on their prior experiences with the use of mobile coupon (expert vs novice users).

A sample of 400 fast-food customers was collected using a structured questionnaire. In order to compare the proposed relationships between expert and novice users, a multigroup approach was applied through new, recently proposed evaluation procedures designed for PLS–SEM.

The results show that the two groups of consumers (expert vs novice users) have notable differences regarding the relationship between perceived ease of use and perceived usefulness. This relationship was the strongest in both groups. However, there are no differences found in other aspects considered as antecedents to mobile coupons usage, for instance, usage intention and attitude.

This work emphasises the importance of considering differences based on experience between mobile coupon users. Ease of use, perceived consumer utility and increased mobile coupons in apps can be the key to driving effective business strategies based on promotional tactics by FFRs. Likewise, this study can help other researchers in their empirical applications of PLS–SEM analysis.

This study is the first to provide an in-depth analysis of differences based on users' experience with mobile coupons at FFRs. It is innovative in its introduction of the consumer's coupon proneness variable.

Inter-organizational mentoring (IOM) is a human resource development tool that is used when the mentor and mentee belong to different organizations. As mentees are the focus of the IOM process, the success of this type of program is highly reliant on their characteristics. Therefore, the purpose of this paper was to derive the most desirable characteristics for mentees in IOM.

An intensive review of the literature on mentoring for managers and business professionals was carried out to identify mentee characteristics. These characteristics were then ranked for their importance to IOM using the Hybrid Delphi method (with 130 informants taking part in a Delphi survey and 19 expert IOM practitioners taking part in Focus Group and Nominal Group Technique sessions). An exploratory factor analysis identified the three main underlying factors behind the listed mentee characteristics.

In total, 17 relevant mentee characteristics were identified and ranked and then synthesized into three essential factors for the mentee. The results were discussed in the light of existing studies.

The mentee characteristics and factors identified in this study will be of great practical value to coordinators of IOM programs. Also, the review of the literature and the obtained results will help other researchers who wish to expand on this topic.