Mentoring in Organizations: A Social Judgment Perspective for Developing Tomorrow’s Leaders


 


“Mentoring has been identified as an effective means of leadership development ( 2001;  2000).  Since ancient times, mentors have been described as socially capable and knowledgeable individuals who develop protégés by sharing their wisdom.  The importance of the relationship component of the ancient Greek conceptualization of mentoring has not been lost on scholars.  Several theories have been proposed to describe how mentoring relationships produce positive organizational outcomes – including theories of mentoring functions (1985), human development (1978), personal networks ( 1993), shared identity (1983), information processing (1994), power (1997), social support or helping ( 1997) and transformational leadership ( 2000).  These theories focus on behavioral, perceptual, power and /or demographic patterns in mentoring relationships and the implications of these patterns for mentors and protégés.  In contrast, however, mentoring can be framed instead in terms of social judgment skills that make effective mentoring possible.


 


Mentoring is a form of social support in which individuals with more advanced experience and knowledge (mentors) are matched with a lesser experienced and knowledgeable individual (protégé) for the purpose of advancing the protégé’s development and career.  Mentoring relationships evolve through phases of initiation, cultivation, separation and redefinition (1985).  Mentors provide two broad functions to protégés over the phases of mentoring relationships: career development and psychosocial support.  Career development functions include sponsorship, exposure and visibility, coaching, protection, and providing challenging assignments.   Psychosocial support functions include counseling, friendship, acceptance and confirmation, and role modeling (1985).


 


The education literature has framed mentoring relationships in terms of social problem solving and cognition (1994; 1999; 1999;  1999).  This work has focused on the cognitive development of mentors and protégés including reflection on their own thinking (metacognition).  Wisdom is a cognitive and motivational pragmatic that organizes and orchestrates knowledge toward human excellence in mind, virtue and social interaction ( 2000).  Thus, wisdom may benefit a mentor’s thinking regarding how to assist the protégé in solving career-related problems.


 


What kind of problems do mentors routinely help protégés to solve?  First, to be effective mentors need to find answers to questions: What are the antecedents of the protégés current behavior?  What behavioral interventions must be introduced to attain the desired behavior change?  What metric should be used to evaluate protégé performance?  Should the protégé be measured against the mentor’s personal example?   What knowledge, skills and abilities must be developed to promote protégé and organizational effectiveness?  Thus the mentor faces behavioral assessment, skill development and performance evaluation problems.


 


Second, mentors face problems involving finding how, when and where to share relevant experience and knowledge with protégés, and how to build and sustain commitment to the mentoring relationship ( 1991).  Third, engaging in conversations that deal with race, religion or other Equal Employment Opportunity factors may pose other potential problems.  Fourth, mentors face the problem of maintaining an image of a wise and ethical role model to be emulated by the protégé.  Fifth, mentors face problems involving communicating values, providing support and information, and these problems must be solved within a distinctly social context.


 


Problem solutions generated by mentors must be implemented and applied in a social context.  Consequently, these solutions need to be revised and adapted to the characteristics of the protégé ( interpersonal skills, attitudes) and the organization (e.g. reward system, culture) to ensure workability.  (2000) consolidated these skills under the rubric social judgment capability, a higher-order construct that is a function of one’s wisdom, social perceptiveness and moral and social reasoning ability. 


 


Social perceptiveness is a complex skill involving attributes that provide insight into the needs, goals, demands and problems of different organizational constituents (2000).  These include self-awareness, self-monitoring and social self-confidence. Moral and social reasoning abilities include the capability to move beyond a narrow-minded or self-centered perspective to one that considers multiple constituent viewpoints and integrates multiple perspectives into one coherent solution (1981). 


 


Wisdom includes self-reflection, systems perception, systems commitment, judgment under uncertain conditions and awareness of solution fit ( 1995).  For example, individuals who are self-reflective display in-group loyalty (1989), provide more assistance to others (1986) and learn from their experiences (1998).  Individuals who possess systems perception clarify complex situations (1995), assign tasks that challenge and foster skills (2000), reward others’ strengths and accomplishments ( 1998), connect information and events that reveal key issues or opportunities ( 1999), accurately read key power relationships (1990), and detect crucial social networks (1990).  Individuals who possess systems commitment sacrifice to meet organization goals (1990), actively seek opportunities to fulfill the organization’s mission (1994), share information and resources (1998), and involve key people in appropriate projects ( 1999).  Individuals who can judge under uncertainty handle multiple tasks (1990), use a variety of strategies to fit fluid circumstances (1990) and think complex problems through logically (1999).  Individuals who are aware of solution fit define problems clearly (1990), generate many possible solutions (1990), define criteria  for evaluating solutions (1994), understand organizational constraints (2000) and synthesize date to make appropriate decisions (1999).   Proposition 1:  Mentor wisdom will be associated with the provision of career development and psychosocial functions, but is limited in the provision of role modeling functions.


 


Social perceptiveness includes self-awareness, self-monitoring, and social self-confidence.  A mentor’s self-awareness of his or her own behavior can influence the amount and type of mentoring functions perceived by protégés.  Mentors who are high self-monitors may be more likely to provide appropriate mentoring functions that those who are low self-monitors.  Social self-confidence is likely to facilitate the provision of career development and role modeling functions.  Proposition 2:  mentor social perceptiveness will be associated with the provision of career development and role modeling functions, but is limited in the provision of psychosocial functions.


 


Mentoring functions may be influenced by three types of mentor reasoning capabilities essential for solving complex social problems: integrative complexity, moral reasoning, and perspective taking capacity.  Individuals who possess a high level of integrative complexity are open to new information and integrate a variety perspectives into solutions (1981), show more involvement and accountability in relationships (1999), are effective and committed leaders (1998) and show creativity in problem solving (1993).  Individuals who are at higher stages f moral development display pro-social (1999), altruistic (1992), friendship ( 1999), helping (1987) and teaching ( 1986) behavior.  Individuals who possess high levels of perspective taking capacity display more helping behavior (1991) and self regulation (2000).  Proposition 3: mentor reasoning ability will be associated with the provision of career development, psychosocial and role modeling functions.


 


 (1997) indicated ‘the more functions the mentor provides, the greater the career and organizational benefits received by the protégé.’ The possession of higher levels of mentor wisdom, social perceptiveness and reasoning ability are expected to provide greater amounts of mentoring functions.  Proposition 4:  Mentors who possess high levels of social judgment capabilities (i.e., wisdom, social perceptiveness, reasoning ability) will provide greater protégé career and developmental outcomes that mentors who possess low levels of social judgment capabilities.


A number of variables may moderate the relationship between mentor social judgment and mentor functions, and the relationship between mentor functions and protégé outcomes.  One important moderator in the relationship between mentor social judgment and mentor functions is cognitive ability.  The mentor’s rank and position in the organization have been identified as potential moderating variables (1997).  Other potential moderators include individual differences, career experiences and demographics.  Differences in attitudes, personality, goals, values, motivation and activity patterns act as barriers to joint participation, which is a necessary condition of mentoring (1999).  Characteristics of the mentoring relationship also may influence mentor functions and protégé outcomes (1985, 1997).  Another characteristic of the mentoring relationship is that needs to be controlled for is the phase of the mentoring relationship.  Whereas all these variables may potentially serve as moderators, it is important to remember that mentoring is a social process bounded by environmental influences (1985).  We expect that organizations that value and reward learning and human development would provide a context favorable for mentor social judgment to positively influence mentor functions and protégé outcomes.


 


Organizations such as Proctor and Gamble, General Electric and the Vanguard Group are increasingly using mentoring programs to identify and develop their organization’s intellectual capital to remain competitive in an increasingly global and technologically advanced society (2000).  For these programs to succeed within this progressively changing context, managers will have to pay close attention to several issues regarding mentor development.  First, individual differences in wisdom, social perceptiveness and reasoning abilities within and between mentors exist in organizations ( 1990).  Second, the wisdom, social perceptiveness and reasoning abilities mentors possess at one point in their career may differ from that which they possess at other points in their careers.


 


Studying social judgment in mentoring relationships requires at least three considerations.  First, more attention needs to be paid to how mentors perceive themselves and others and how these perceptions related to how the process information to solve social problems (1994).  Second, longitudinal examination of the social judgment construct as it relates to mentorship is required.  Finally, mentoring relationships are generally dyadic in nature (1997).  The model presented in the present paper needs to be expanded to account for how the protégé’s social judgment skills directly influence or interact with the mentor’s social judgment skills to influence mentor functions and protégé outcomes (2002).”


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