Clear Mentoring: Contributing to Mentees’ Professional Self-confidence and Intention to Stay in their Job

Abstract

Researchers have highlighted developmental mentoring as being beneficial and judgmental mentoring as hampering the potential positive outcomes of mentoring. We introduce the construct clear mentoring as a beneficial form of mentoring. The findings suggest that newly qualified teachers who perceive higher levels of mentoring characterized by mentees’ opportunities to reflect upon their own practice, openness to different approaches to being a teacher, and an atmosphere of relational trust are more likely to report lower levels of self-efficacy. In contrast, mentees who perceive higher levels of mentoring characterized by clear communication of feedback and advice are more likely to report higher levels of self-efficacy and lower levels of intention to quit. This study contributes to the field of mentoring by illuminating how mentors’ communication of evaluations, advice, and feedback can positively affect mentees, and how mentoring dominated by mentees’ perspectives can negatively affects mentees.