Compelled to Lead: From Mentee to Mentor

Compelled to Lead: From Mentee to Mentor – A Narrative Study of Leadership Development Within a Relationship-Focused Mentoring Model

Steven Lamar Jones | 2024

Abstract

Through this study, the researcher aimed to gain greater insight into mentoring’s impact on holistic leadership development. The existing body of literature has revealed mentoring’s ability to develop effectual relationships that reciprocally advance through modeling, knowledge, skills, and the psychosocial development of both the mentor and mentee (Ismail et al., 2015; Johnson et al., 1999; Trice, 2021). Indeed, relationships are integral to developing human socialization skills, which result from connecting with others through structured social groups, intimate groups, community groups, and world groups (Pescaru, 2018; Sterling, 1998). Yet, it is understood that not all mentoring motifs are equal (Clark & Mils, 1993; Lee & Chon, 2021; Ragins & Verbos, 2017). In fact, mentoring grounded in principles that result in success metrics couched in exchange norms produces different outcomes compared to mentoring experiences built on communal motivations (Clark & Mils, 1993; Haidusek-Niazy et al., 2023; Lee & Chon, 2021). The literature suggests that mentoring engagements founded on communal relationships result in close relational bonds (Dutton & Heaphy, 2003; Strydom, 2021). Further, communal mentoring relationships that result in strong bonds foster growth, learning, and personal and professional development (Trice, 2021). To that end, the participants of this study included six individuals who have participated as a mentee in mentoring engagements lasting at least 6 months and whose engagements also demonstrated a strong relational component. These participants narrated their experiences in open-ended interview sessions, answering 13 open-ended questions, resulting in rich phenomenological data. The qualitative analysis of that data indicates that their mentoring experience functioned as a transformative leadership development encounter, producing within them leader identity traits and a desire to lead others. The importance of authentic trust (Wright, 2018) in developing identity, whether it starts as dysfunctional or between friends, cannot be overlooked. Mutually earned trust scored the highest among all themes (60) emerging from the participants’ narratives. Consequently, leadership development resulted when time and the processes required to build trust were allowed preeminence.