Mentoring

Techniques that encourage faculty participation in research mentoring professional development: B. B. Goldberg, Dec 2024. 

Audience: Department chairs, center and program directors, training program directors and administrators - people in positions of leadership who seek to encourage faculty to participate in professional development in mentoring. 

Background: Research on STEM faculty professional development has highlighted the various reasons faculty are reticent to participate in research mentor training: They (1) believe they are already good mentors (many are) by successfully advancing the research careers of their mentees; (2) see ‘training’ as compliance, a requirement by the institution or federal agency; (3) sometimes view ‘training’ as condescending and disrespectful of their often deserved expertise; (4) are mostly unaware of the  research evidence identifying mentoring as a learned skill that can be developed and enhanced through training, and even when aware are sometimes skeptical of such research; (5) view participation as time consuming and a lower priority than other urgent (research oriented) activities; and (6) are generally not rewarded for their participation in research mentor training.

Purpose: This document summarizes approaches developed by two national, NSF-funded projects around STEM faculty professional development. Recognizing the importance of context, these approaches may resonate differently across settings and departmental cultures. The approaches are loosely based on two motivational frameworks: (1) external motivation that encourages faculty to view mentoring and mentor training as supporting the collective department or program mission and is incentivized through acknowledgement and rewards; (2) internal motivation, which focuses on the value of advancing mentoring skills that enhances a faculty’s own research success and relationships with their own mentees. Depending on context, the first set of approaches (a-f) focus on acknowledgement and public sharing which supports mentors who already participate and encourage those on the sidelines, but doesn’t often work for the hard-to-convince. The second set (g-h) is broadly successful since they are associated more closely with rewards.  

Acknowledge and amplify, incentivize and reward participation. 

Departments or Programs can: 

1. Publish on the Department or Program website (create a mentoring page) and post on announcement boards a list and pictures of faculty who have participated in mentoring professional development; 
2. Annually show a slide at the first faculty meeting each fall or program meeting of the faculty who have participated in mentoring professional development; ensure a process that captures everyone
3. Ask recognized faculty who have participated to report on their experience; discussing the value of training and what they have implemented; share choice quotes on mentoring website
4. Create a research mentoring philosophy for the department, encourage faculty to provide input, and adopt parts for themselves and create their own; 
5. Share faculty mentoring philosophy statements that appear on their research websites
6. Change the language and style of the activity, removing the ‘training’ and traditional titles like ‘setting expectations’ that faculty sometimes view as redundant. Instead, offer sessions that address particular challenges, e.g. ‘mentoring in the new age of unionization’ or ‘mentor networks for non-academic career advice’ as facilitated discussions 
7. Chairs (or Deans) announce a particular focus during annual merit review of mentoring activities, including mentoring professional development
8. Program or center directors can create incentives for value, like a set of participation expectations (seminars, committees, mentor professional development, etc) that are rewarded with greater access to trainee slots or program funding. 
9. Departments/Centers host an annual colloquium that describes the latest research on mentoring demonstrating to faculty its value to research productivity and mentee outcomes.

Please contact us, Bennett (bennett.goldberg@northwestern.edu) or Denise (d-drane@northwestern.edu) if you’d like to discuss mentoring measures, surveys and focus groups. We thank Rick McGee and Kenzie Cameron for their advice.