بررسی اثرات تعدیل جنسیت بر روابط بین شروع مشاوره و برداشت شاگردان از توابع مشاوره

Recent research has suggested that the more the mentor is involved in relationship initiation the greater the benefits that the protégé may receive. No research, however, has examined the impact of protégé gender on the relationship between initiation and mentoring received. The results of this study indicate that male protégés perceived more mentoring than female protégés in protégé-initiated mentorships. Female protégés, however, reported receiving more mentoring than male protégés if the relationship was mentor-initiated or where both mentor and protégé initiated the relationship. Protégés in informal mentorships reported receiving more mentoring than those in formal organizational programs. The findings of this study also indicate that protégés may benefit more from same-sex relationships than cross-sex relationships with respect to role modeling.

Studies have shown that mentoring plays a role in successful career development (Kram, 1985; Roche, 1979;Vertz, 1985). Levinson et al. (1978) described the mentor’s function as guide, counselor, and sponsor. Hunt and Michael (1983) suggested that mentoring is an important career training and development tool that may be used to socialize employees into the organization. Mentoring is an important key to success in an individual’s career; however, early studies of mentoring dealt mainly with successful male managers (Levinson et al., 1978). The importance of mentoring has been supported by research that shows mentoring to be associated with positive work outcomes, including lower work stress (Baugh, Lankau, & Scandura, 1996; Kram & Hall, 1991), lower turnover intentions (Lankau, 1996), and higher career expectations (Baugh et al., 1996). Individuals with mentors report more promotions, higher incomes, and higher job satisfaction than nonmentored individuals (Dreher & Ash, 1990). Support and encouragement of the prot´eg´e, training and development opportunities, providing challenging assignments, and sponsorship all occur in a mentoring relationship and thus foster career development. Riley and Wrench (1985) also noted that women reported higher job success and satisfaction when they had a mentor and that they expressed a greater need for mentoring than men. Thus, the literature suggests that gender is a potentially important determinant of the quality and nature of mentoring relationships (Noe, 1988; Ragins, 1989, 1997).Gender may affect the development and outcomes of mentoring relationships (Ragins, 1989, 1997). Clawson and Kram (1984) theorized that cross-sex mentorships might be more difficult to initiate than same-sex ones; however, while some studies report gender differences in the receipt of mentoring (George & Kummerow, 1981), still others do not (Dreher & Ash, 1990; Fagenson, 1989; Hill, Bahiniuk, & Dobos, 1989; Scandura & Ragins, 1993). Mentoring functions provided by mentors may differ based on diversity issues, and prior research on mentoring indicates that cross-sex and cross-race effects influence the benefits to be received from mentoring relationships (Ohlott, Ruderman,&McCauley, 1994). Chao (1997) suggests that to understand the impact of mentoring relationships it may be necessary to understand how they change over time. The initiation phase may be a crucial element in relationship development. Recent research suggests that the greater the role the mentor plays in relationship initiation the greater the benefits from mentoring will be (Scandura & Williams, 1998). However, no research examines howthe relationship between the party responsible for initiation and mentoring functions received might be affected by the prot´eg´e’s gender.The purpose of this article is to investigate the role that gender may play in the relationship between prot´eg´e perceptions of who initiates the mentorship (the first phase of mentorship) and their perceptions of the mentoring received after initiation. The literature comparing different phases of the mentoring relationship is sparse. We therefore explore prot´eg´e reports on different types of mentorship initiation: initiated through a formal organizational program and informally initiated. For informally initiated mentorship, there are three types of initiation: (1) prot´eg´einitiated, (2) mentor-initiated, and (3) both mentor-and-prot´eg´e-initiated (mentor/ prot´eg´e-initiated). The extent to which prot´eg´e sex impacts the relationships of these types of initiation (comparisons of prot´eg´e-initiated vs mentor-initiated, prot´eg´e-initiated vs mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated, mentor-initiated vs mentor/prot´eg´einitiated, and formal organizational program vs informally initiated) with reported mentoring functions are tested. We also examine the extent to which prot´eg´e sex impacts the relationship between mentor’s sex and mentoring functions received

While mentor and prot´eg´e gender do not appear to have direct effects on mentoring functions, gender appears to moderate the relationship between initiation and the amount of mentoring received. When the mentor initiates the relationship, and when both the mentor and prot´eg´e are committed to the mentorship (mentor/ prot´eg´e-initiated), vocational support was higher than that for prot´eg´e-initiated relationships. It appears that the mentor’s initial commitment and interest in the prot´eg´e has implications for career development. Also, it appears that informal initiation might result in higher levels of vocational support and role modeling reported by prot´eg´es. The means on the mentoring functions were not significantly different from each other for male or female prot´eg´es. The means were also not significantly different from each other for prot´eg´es with male or female mentors. For hypothesis 5, however, the results, while marginal, indicate that male prot´eg´es reported receiving more role modeling than female prot´eg´es when the mentor was male. Similarly, female prot´eg´es reported receiving more role modeling than male prot´eg´es when mentor was female. It therefore appears that cross-sex relationships may hold some promise for beneficial mentoring outcomes (with respect to vocational and psychosocial support). However, with respect to role modeling, gender-specific behaviors may be more difficult to demonstrate. This may be true since some behaviors that are acceptable for men (e.g., male aggressiveness may be seen as a strength for men) may be seen in a different light, as socially undesirable, for women (e.g., an aggressive woman may be seen as exhibiting inappropriate sex-role behavior) (Scandura & Ragins, 1993).The proportions of initiation were compared for male and female prot´eg´es with male mentors. For male prot´eg´es with male mentors 21.1% were mentorinitiated, 29.9% prot´eg´e-initiated, and 49% mentor-prot´eg´e initiated; for females prot´eg´es with male mentors 28.8% were mentor-initiated, 17.4% prot´eg´e-initiated, and 53.8% mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated. Thus, it appears that male-mentor initiation was more prevalent for female prot´eg´es while the majority of male and female prot´eg´es were in relationships that were mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated. The ratios of initiation were also compared for male and female prot´eg´es with female mentors. For male prot´eg´es with female mentors 33.3% were mentor-initiated, 33.3% prot´eg´einitiated, and 33.3% mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated; for females prot´eg´es with female mentors 12% were mentor-initiated, 32% prot´eg´e-initiated, 56% mentor/prot´eg´einitiated; male-mentor initiationwas more prevalent for female prot´eg´es. It appears that female-mentor initiation was more prevalent for male prot´eg´es and malementor initiation was more prevalent for female prot´eg´es while the majority of prot´eg´es were in relationships that were mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated. The results for hypothesis 6 reveal that when the mentoring relationship was prot´eg´e-initiated, males reported receiving more vocational support, psychosocial support, and role modeling than females.However, when the mentoring relationship was mentor-initiated, females reported receiving more vocational support, psychosocial support, and role modeling than males. The results for hypothesis 7 revealed that when the relationship was prot´eg´e-initiated males reported higher vocational support and role modeling than females. However, when the relationship was both mentor-and-prot´eg´e-initiated females reported higher vocational support and role modeling than males. It appears that prot´eg´e initiation is most beneficial for male prot´eg´es. For females, having a mentorship initiated based on mentor initiative provides the most benefits (mentor- or mentor/prot´eg´e-initiated). Hypothesis 8 was partially supported, suggesting that when the mentorshipwas mentor-initiated females reported receiving higher psychosocial support than males; the same was reported for mentorships initiated by both mentor and prot´eg´e. Thus, for females, mentor/prot´eg´e initiation and mentor initiation may provide greater benefits than for males.Therefore, for males, assertive behavior may produce the greatest benefits from mentoring. Recent findings indicate that women are just as likely as men to have mentors (Dreher & Ash, 1990; Ragins & Cotton, 1993). Based upon our results, however, it appears that male mentors may be more likely to initiate relationships with male prot´eg´es. In this study, the ratio of male to female prot´eg´es was almost 1 : 1, while the ratio of male mentors to female mentors was greater than 3 : 1. However, the ratio of male to female prot´eg´es with a male mentor was greater than 6 : 1. This might be because male mentors may prefer or have more access to male prot´eg´es. The ratio of male to female prot´eg´es with a female mentor was 1 : 2. Prot´eg´es may perceive a greater willingness of female mentors to mentor women. The three-way interaction of initiation by prot´eg´e sex by mentor sex was tested for each type of initiation comparison and no significant results were found.