08832323.2012.733739

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Journal of Education for Business

ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20

An Alternative Approach for MBA Mentor

Programs: Empower the Protégé

Andrew B. Artis

To cite this article: Andrew B. Artis (2013) An Alternative Approach for MBA Mentor Programs: Empower the Protégé, Journal of Education for Business, 88:6, 361-365, DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2012.733739

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ISSN: 0883-2323 print / 1940-3356 online DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2012.733739

An Alternative Approach for MBA Mentor

Programs: Empower the Prot´eg´e

Andrew B. Artis

University of South Florida, Tampa, Florida, USA

A new approach is proposed to maximize the benefits of mentor relationships between master of business administration (MBA) students and executives by empowering students to select and recruit their own mentors, and then be responsible for managing those relationships. This mentor program is designed to be short but intensive. First-year MBA students spend 8 weeks developing their career and life goals, and then spend another 8 weeks working with mentors. A pilot study is used to test this approach and provide recommendations to other graduate faculty and staff members interested in implementing a mentor program that empowers the prot´eg´e.

Keywords: coaching, MBA curricula, mentee, mentor, mentoring, prot´eg´e

The use of formal mentor programs has been growing within large organizations to enrich the careers of veteran ees who serve as mentors, and to prepare novice employ-ees who benefit as prot´eg´es (Allen, Eby, Poteet, Lentz, & Lima, 2004; Allen, Poteet, & Burroughs, 1997). The use of formal mentor programs has also grown within master of business administration (MBA) curricula as a way to address Association to Advance Collegiate Schools of Business rec-ommendations that students be more connected to business practitioners, attract potential MBA students, demonstrate the value of an MBA education to students already enrolled, and involve business executives (Butler, Benjamin, & John-son, 2008; D’Abate, 2010; Navarro, 2008).

STATEMENT OF ISSUE

Despite all the well-intended work by those who match protégés with mentors, often the efforts of mentors are squan-dered (Hezlett, 2005). This hurts everyone involved, and re-search suggests that a negative mentor-protégé relationship may be more harmful than not having one at all (Burk & Eby, 2010). This gives MBA faculty and staff cause for concern and a need for a more thoughtful design and implementation of formal mentor programs.

Correspondence should be addressed to Andrew B. Artis, University of South Florida, Department of Marketing, 4202 E. Fowler Avenue, Tampa, FL 33620, USA. E-mail: aartis@usf.edu

What are the primary reasons for failed mentor-protégé relationships? First, there is a poor fit between mentor and protégé (Bozeman & Feeney, 2008); the learning style of the protégé has to work with the teaching style of the mentor. Second, motivation for the protégé to learn has a significant moderating effect on the relationship; a protégé has to be convinced that his/her mentor has advice that is meaningful to the protégé’s goals (Hezlett, 2005; Neubert, 1998). Third, one or both of the dyad members are unprepared for, and inexperienced at, their respective functions (Hezlett, 2005); this includes initiating the relationship, assigning appro-priate tasks, and following through on tasks. Traditionally, these three problems have been addressed by providing training to the mentor who is expected to lead the protégé (Burk & Eby, 2010). My business college has taken a different approach. I argue more positive results will develop more often for the protégé if the protégé has the skills he or she needs to initiate and manage the relationship in a way that guides the mentor to the protégé’s desired ends. One way to achieve this is to teach MBA students how to be successful protégés, and then empower these protégés to secure and manage a relationship with the right mentor.

METHOD

The goals set by the MBA faculty for students in the pilot study were: (a) to assist students in the development of their career goals, (b) to help them learn how to implement a suc-cessful mentor-prot´eg´e relationship, and (c) for them to be

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362 A. B. ARTIS

confident enough to cultivate additional mentors after their training. A graduate leadership course was used to implement the mentor program. Woven into the assigned readings, lec-tures and exams of the course, students spent the initial eight weeks developing their personal and professional goals, and practicing how to be good prot´eg´es. For the final eight weeks students managed their relationships with their mentors.

Instructor’s Time With Students Related to the Mentor Program

Prior to the first class meeting each student meets privately with the instructor to review the long-term objectives of the mentor program. Over the next eight weeks the instructor guides all students through a series of assignments designed to assist them in the development of their career goals.

Prior to contacting their mentor, each student meets again with the instructor. These hour-long meetings are designed to evaluate students’ preparedness, motivation, and confi-dence as prot´eg´es. All the personal development and career planning assignments for that student are reviewed. If it is determined that a student is not ready, then more coaching is provided by the instructor. In addition, students review their options for potential mentors; all mentors must be approved by the instructor and each student must show how the poten-tial mentor’s expertise fits with a desired goal of the student. Last, the instructor works with students to prepare for the first meeting with their mentors, to role-play if necessary, and to review students’ overall strategies for successfully managing their relationship with their mentors.

Upon completion of their meetings with mentors, all stu-dents come together to review their efforts and outcomes, and express how they will repeat the process when they want to recruit another mentor. This is an important part of the reflec-tion process. It provides students with a better understanding of how the larger mentor-prot´eg´e process works.

Mentor’s Time With Student

Each mentor is asked to meet with his or her protégé four times for 1 hr, preferably once per week. Weekly meetings allow the protégé time to digest the advice from a previous meeting, complete any tasks assigned by the mentor, and prepare new questions for the next meeting. It may seem like a lot of effort is invested for just four hours with a mentor, but there is a purpose to this strategy. First, this reflects the amount of preplanning by a protégé that is appropriate for a successful relationship with a mentor. Second, most mentors have had little or no contact with the student prior to being asked to participate. Asking mentors to initially invest just 4 hr over four weeks is not considered to be overly demanding, and increases the likelihood they will agree to serve. Third, for students who are intimidated by the idea of working with mentors, it reduces their anxiety when they realize they only have to manage four 1-hr meetings with their mentors. Fi-nally, protégés need an exit strategy if the relationship doesn’t

go well. A pre-arranged number of meetings with time lim-its give the prot´eg´es more power to close a session—or the entire relationship—without offending the mentors.

Weekly Exercises and Tasks for Students

Personal development exercises are used to help students to first reflect on their strengths and weaknesses, and then de-velop a personal mission statement with ten career goals. Students complete weekly exercises out of class and prac-tice presenting their results to their peers in class (typically in small groups). Giving students a week between exercises allows sufficient time for thought and reflection. Peer mentor-ing also plays an important role. The in-class sharmentor-ing of these exercises allows students to practice talking about themselves in a safe environment before they speak to their mentors. Stu-dents have to learn how to talk about themselves in a way that is honest and shows confidence, but is not perceived by mentors to be exaggerated or arrogant. In addition, stronger students serve as role models on how to handle themselves for the inexperienced and apprehensive students.

1. Week 1: Students assess their professional competen-cies. Prior to the first class meeting, students complete a self-assessment survey that compares their current knowledge, skills, abilities, and experiences to those desired by venture capital investors when recruiting and hiring managers to run newly purchased firms. Using criteria from venture capital investors forces students to consider what the employment market truly values in operations managers (e.g., the com-petencies that financiers will actually pay for). This provides a neutral, third-party assessment that is sep-arate from the MBA faculty and the student. Even the more experienced students are alarmed to learn how far removed they are from their ultimate goal of running a division or an entire firm. In addition, stu-dents soon realize that an MBA degree is helpful but by itself is insufficient. The self-assessment creates in the minds of students the need to fill the gaps in their current skill sets that will not come from MBA coursework.

2. Week 2: Students update their current resumes. This exercise forces students to capture the current state of their skills. Students are encouraged to not be limited by the one-page rule of thumb, but to use as much space as is needed to showcase their skills. They are instructed to consider the criteria of venture capital-ists used in the prior week’s exercise and to identify as many experiences that may better advertise their current talents. In class, students are placed in groups of three and four. Each student reads another student’s resume, makes written comments, and passes it to the next student. That student reads the resume and the edits, adds their written comments,

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and then passes it on. This continues until the edited resume returns to its rightful owner. The group allows each student to read the written comments, to ask questions, and to get feedback from their peers who reviewed his or her resume. One week later, students must hand in their updated resume with the marked-up version attached so that the instructor can see how recommended changes were incorporated. 3. Week 3: Students develop a future resume. This

ex-ercise forces students to project themselves into a specific job five years into the future. This requires the student to begin to tailor his/her own desires into a specific career path, industry, or organization. Stu-dents must find three job postings for their desired position and compare/contrast the qualifications be-tween these jobs (internet employment sites such as Monster.com can often be used). Students can use other sources: job descriptions, interviews with peo-ple who currently hold a similar job, and talking with a headhunter. To create their future resume, students must take their updated resume from the previous week and rewrite it to fit their desired job. When stu-dents do not currently have a required competency for their future job they must write that line in their future resume with a different color (e.g., red). The different color emphasizes visually the gaps between the skills they possess and those they will need to be promoted to their desired job. In class, students form groups of three or four, and each student describes his or her future job and explains what gaps have to be filled and barriers to overcome.

4. Week 4: Students develop a bucket list of the 25 expe-riences they want to accumulate before they die. As grim as this may sound, students welcome this exer-cise and openly express what is ultimately important to them. For maximum benefit as a planning tool, students are required to review their bucket list with their significant other or close family members, and they must report on the feedback given to them. This promotes a balance between career and life goals, and it helps students visualize a tantalizing future beyond graduate school and toil. Students share their bucket lists in class. Often students are pleasantly sur-prised how many of their peers share similar bucket list items (e.g., travel destinations, hobbies). Students then form groups and discuss how to realize their bucket list items based on common interests (e.g., all those interested in scuba diving form a group). 5. Week 5: A critical step in the personal development

exercises occurs when students write their own per-sonal mission statement and 10 career goals. The mis-sion statement portion of this exercise is often more troublesome for students. Examples of previous stu-dents’ career mission statements are provided in ad-vance. Students may also find it helpful to start to draft

goals even before the mission statement is crafted; by listing goals students can more easily see how the mission statement has to be written to encompass their goals. The goals portion of the exercise requires students to identify who will do what by when for each goal; students must be specific about how and when they will know the goal is realized. In class, students share their mission statements and goals in small groups and receive feedback from their peers. The assignment is turned into the instructor one week later to give students time to make revisions. 6. Week 6: Students then use their 10 goals to develop

a comprehensive learning plan. For each goal, stu-dents must identify what they need to learn and from where/whom they can get information, advice, and skills to achieve that goal. From this comes a mentor matrix or network of potential mentors tied to specific goals. By forcing students to move from goal formu-lation to goal attainment they begin to look at their existing network of coworkers, friends and acquain-tances to see who they already know that can act as a mentor, and they begin to see gaps in the their net-work where new mentors need to be cultivated. It also emphasizes that in addition to what students learn in their MBA courses they must supplement this with specific action to achieve their career goals. Using small groups, students help each other develop their comprehensive learning plans, which are collected one week later by the instructor to allow students to make changes.

7. Week 7: Students participate in a workshop on men-toring where the emphasis is placed on the role of the protégé in mentor-protégé relationships. Students are required to read a dozen practitioner-based articles that explain the most recent thinking on the design and implementation of mentor programs. Since most of what is written on mentor programs emphasizes that mentors lead the relationship and protégés pas-sively follow along, it is necessary for students to think outside the box and consider how a protégé can manage the relationship. Groups of three to four stu-dents use the articles to develop a list of the good/bad qualities of mentors and protégés. A debate is then organized by the instructor as to whether the men-tor or protégé has greater influence in promoting a successful outcome. Students will want to take the path of least resistance and argue that both parties are mutually responsible; this position needs to be discouraged because it allows students to not own the process if the relationship sours. The instructor has to maintain the position, and provide evidence, that a well-prepared and motivated protégé can guide the mentor-protégé relationship to a successful end. All revised assignments should be collected by the instructor by the end of week seven.

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8. Week 8: A peer mentoring exercise is used to show students how mentors and prot´eg´es collaborate. In this exercise each student stands to address the entire class, and explains one of his/her most desired goals (e.g., to start a new career, to start a business). All the other students begin to mentor and coach the student by asking questions for clarification and throwing out ideas on how the student may progress and who they might contact. To help the student who is being coached a second student takes notes (records who said what and what recommendations were made) so that when the student sits back down he/she knows which peer to contact to pursue more information and assistance. Time management is important; each student is limited to 5 min. This allows everyone a chance to be mentored and creates a sense of urgency that makes the room come alive with energy and ideas. It is also beneficial to give students a place to meet after the exercise to pursue each other and follow up on ideas given during the peer mentoring exercise. 9. Weeks 9–10: Students fine tune their criterion for

se-lecting a mentor, develop a short-list of potential men-tors, get approval from the instructor for their final choices, and begin to recruit their mentors. Students who have invested sufficient time and thought into their career goals will find this stage of the process relatively easy to complete. However, there are situa-tions when students are motivated by the availability of a potential mentor rather than a “good fit” between the mentor’s expertise and the prot´eg´e’s goal. In these situations, students’ requests for mentors are rejected, or in a rare case a student may be allowed to revise his/her career goals to fit the mentor’s expertise. When an appropriate mentor is found and agrees to partic-ipate, the student sends an email to the instructor to confirm an approved match has been made.

10. Weeks 11–16: Students meet with their mentors, record the meetings (e.g., agendas, requests, out-comes), and then provide a final write-up of their experience to the instructor.

RESULTS

Viewpoint of Instructor

Content analysis was used to evaluate emergent themes, com-mon actions, and best practices by prot´eg´es and mentors as described within students’ written comments (Stemler, 2001). Twenty-two students participated in the pilot program. Students’ average age was 29 years (low of 23 and high of 45 years). Four students were unemployed. The group of stu-dents was comprised of 11 women and 11 men. The group of mentors was comprised of six women and 16 men. Nine of the students chose a member of the opposite sex as a mentor:

seven of the female students chose a male mentor and two of the male students chose a female mentor.

Using the criteria previously established by the graduate faculty, the 22 relationships were placed into four groups by the instructor based on goal attainment by the protégé: highly successful (four), successful (12), moderately suc-cessful (four), and failed (two). Highly sucsuc-cessful relation-ships occurred when mentors took protégé’s beyond their original goal. Successful relationships met the protégés goal. Moderately successful relationships met part, but not all, of protégé’s goal. Failed relationships did not meet the protégé’s stated goal. Even though not all students achieved their pre-determined goal, all 22 students reported seeing the benefit of the mentor relationship and thought they would use their training to further develop their career goals and to pursue other mentors.

The mentors within highly successful relationships shared three similar characteristics. First, mentors had a genuine willingness to understand a protégé’s goal, and to then adapt their response to meet that goal. Second, mentors assigned tasks to protégés related to the protégé’s stated goal. Third, mentors connected the protégé to people in the mentor’s network.

The 16 prot´eg´es within highly successful and successful relationships shared three best practices. First, they invested sufficient effort and thought into developing and clarifying the goals they pursued with their mentors. Second, they were well organized; they developed agendas and lists of questions for meetings, provided mentors with materials about them-selves (e.g., resumes, mission statement, goals, bucket list). Third, they were highly motivated to work with the expert they had chosen. The six students in the moderately success-ful and failed relationships lacked at least one of these three characteristics. In the two failed relationships neither student was able to clarify his/her goal for their mentor, and this led to frustration, anxiety and an inability to connect with the mentor’s advice.

Suggestions for Preparing MBA Students to Be Good Prot ´eg ´es

1. Focus on protégé’s ownership of the process. This requires three things be communicated to protégés. First, protégés have to see themselves as the catalyst: protégés have to initiate and manage the relationship. Second, protégés have to have an action-oriented plan: they need to develop a comprehensive mission state-ment, career goals, and learning plan. Finally, protégés must be honest with themselves, the instructor, and then with their mentors.

2. Realize that all protégés will have uncertainty and anx-iety, and preparation will help protégés manage their negative emotions. For example, one student knew who she wanted to mentor her, but she was so fearful she would be rejected by the executive she wept. To help

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her cope with her anxiety the instructor made the initial telephone call to the potential mentor (left a message) and wrote the executive an e-mail while the student looked on. Instructor and student then worked together to draft the student’s email request to the executive, and then the two role played the telephone conversa-tion she and the executive would have. In the end, the executive was honored, impressed with the student’s preparation, and immediately agreed to serve as her mentor. The student was ecstatic, and no additional intervention was needed by the instructor.

3. Form goal-driven relationships. Emphasize to protégés the importance of being proactive and investing the ef-fort to develop a good fit with a mentor by using their career goals as criterion for selecting mentors. For ex-ample, students were more likely to choose a mentor outside of their organization than within (10 of 18 em-ployed students chose mentors outside their organiza-tion). Since most formal mentor programs are designed to primarily benefit the organization, protégés are typ-ically paired with executives within that organization, but this approach may not address the true calling or ambition of the protégé. MBA programs are often used by students as a means of transitioning from one ca-reer, or organization, to another and a mentor program can facilitate students’ pursuit of their true goals. 4. Protégés should ask for more than just advice from

mentors. For example, 11 of 22 protégés were given tasks by mentors (e.g., conduct specific research, pon-der questions, clarify objectives, etc.). Protégés who were given extensive tasks could more clearly express how they benefited, and provided richer responses with more detailed explanations on how their men-tors helped them. Protégés who were not given tasks, but were given career advice were honored that their mentor would adopt them, but they were often unable to provide clear explanations of how the relationship addressed their specific goal.

5. Provide prot´eg´es with external motivation to get them started. For the pilot study, the mentoring assignment alone was 20% of the students’ course grade and the personal development assignments–exercises were an-other 20%. Placing 40% of the course grade on this endeavor got students’ attention at the very beginning, but the motivation shifted from external to internal when students recognized how the mentor program personally benefited them.

6. Protégés need to build in at the beginning a way out at the end. Provide the protégé with a way to exit out of the mentor-protégé relationship that allows everyone to

save face. It is true that students who had great mentors complained the four 1-hr meetings did not provide enough time, and pledged to continue the relationships on their own. However, students who did not want to maintain the relationship where thankful limits had been prearranged.

CONCLUSION

A well-run mentor program allows MBA students to connect with practitioners and begin to act on their career goals while in school. Teaching students how to be excellent protégés improves the quality of their relationships with mentors. In addition, when students select their own mentors they have a greater sense of ownership in the process and outcomes, and therefore, they are more likely to act on their mentors’ advice. In the end, the protégé cannot control what expertise the mentor provides, but the protégé can control the selection of the mentor and the process to improve the likelihood of a positive outcome for the protégé.

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