How to Be a Good Mentor

Abstract

In academic medicine, a mentor is traditionally a more-senior physician or scientist involved in a formal, personal, and primarily in-person dyadic and interactive relationship with a less-experienced, more-junior physician or scientist (the mentee). This chapter will focus on the academic mentor's role in the two-sided mentoring relationship, while the complementary mentee's role is discussed in another chapter Although ideally both the mentor and the mentee may benefit from this relationship, the mentor must be aware that it is an asymmetrical one, primarily focused on the educational, professional, and personal development and benefit of the mentee. Being a mentor is different than the many other functions that faculty members perform for their trainees or early career faculty colleagues. Although a mentor is not primarily his or her mentee's teacher, supervisor, consultant, friend, or psychotherapist, some elements of each of these important roles may become part of, or result from, a particular mentoring relationship. A number of responsibilities are critical to the mentor role. A mentor must listen to the mentee's professional experiences, issues, and problems; encourage and help the mentee to explore his or her possibilities and opportunities; educate and guide the mentee about how the institution, department, lab, and/or care system operates and how to be successful within these environments; connect the mentee to others who may help further the mentee's career development, including other mentors, important people in the field, and relevant organizations; on interference and, when possible, eliminate barriers facing the mentee within the institution and externally; set the boundaries, expectations, and responsibilities of the mentoring relationship; provide nonevaluative feedback that will help the mentee become more effective professionally; maintain the confidentiality of mentor-mentee conversations; and always stay primarily focused on the mentee's development, not the mentor's advancement, in this asymmetrical relationship. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2021 APA, all rights reserved)