EQUALITY GUIdE - KU Leuven

238 Equality Guide
David Clutterbuck 249 defines mentoring as: “Off-line help by one person to another in
making significant transitions in knowledge, work or thinking.”
Julie Hay 250 identifies the range of activities which may be referred to as mentoring:
! showing people the ropes ! and helping them to climb them;
! passing on knowledge and/or skills, either formally or informally;
! looking after people;
! acting as a sounding board;
! helping people to put learning into practice;
! being a role model;
! being a guide;
! talking to people about their careers;
! coaching.
The definitions of mentoring can roughly be divided into what can be called the ‘US
traditional or godfathering’ and the ‘European or developmental approach’. The former
starts from the assumption that the focus of the relationship is the mentor’s extensive
experience and willingness to exercise power and influence on behalf of the
mentee (typically called a protégé). It can be characterized by long-term relationships
that may involve a degree of mutual dependence. Developmental mentoring, on the
other hand, emphasizes the mentee’s role in managing the relationship, and focuses on
the achievement of personal insight, intellectual challenge and increasing self-reliance.
Mentoring is often confused with coaching, as both development tools are very similar.
As Julie Hay has identified, coaching skills come into the mentoring relationship. The
mentor will listen and give advice and guidance when it’s appropriate. But the mentor
is a ‘senior’ and more experienced in the organization; which is not necessarily the case
for a coach.
According to the historical definition, a mentor is a more experienced person who
shows the ways to a younger person. Mentoring is a tested method in so-called role
model learning. The under-representation of women in higher positions is often linked
to the lack of positive role models.
Coaching, networking, training, it’s all about talent development but how to distinguish
between these methods and, even more important, how to choose one method or the
other? A recent international survey by the ACCA (Association of Chartered Certified
Accountants) examined how companies applied various developmental approaches to
talent management 251 . One of the interesting comparisons was between the use of an
approach and how useful it was regarded to be:
! coaching was used by 70% of respondent companies and was felt to be useful by
60%;
249 Clutterbuck, David (1999). Everyone Needs a Mentor. CIPD, ISBN 0852929048.
250 Hay, Julie (1995). Transformational Mentoring: Creating Developmental Alliances for Changing
Organizational Cultures. McGraw-Hill.
251 Clutterbuck Associates, Electronic newsletter, June 2007.