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Updated: May 27, 2024 Viewpoint

Viewpoint: Why women mentors should pick male mentees

I often read about why men should be gender-blind in picking mentees and how it’s important for women to find male mentors to help them climb the corporate ladder.

A woman with shoulder length blonde hair wears glasses, a black suit jacket, and light blue silk button down.
Connie Askin

Frankly, there should be more focus on female mentors with male mentees.

Workplace mentoring is sometimes posed as a very direct and simple value proposition: Increase your visibility with leadership, expand your professional network, or receive situational coaching.

One level deeper, a more profound set of benefits exist:

• Increase your self-awareness and self-confidence;

• Reduce anxiety;

• Practice your communication skills with people who have different perspectives;

• Develop the art of seeking and receiving feedback.

A female mentor may both wield these skills differently than men and may be more likely to invest in their mentee’s development.

A study of 500 subjects – aptly named, “The Relationship between Mentee-Mentor Gender Combination and the Provision of Distinct Mentoring Functions” – published In Women in Management Review found: “Female mentors provided personal and emotional guidance to a greater extent than male mentors; female mentors provided career development facilitation to a greater extent than male mentors.”

Interestingly, the mentor experience was neutral: “As far as mentors were concerned, there were no significant differences in the functions provided to female and male mentees.”

A female mentor’s lived experience can provide an important viewpoint on how to decode the politics and culture of a workplace.

She can offer insights to your effectiveness as a listener, test your level of inclusiveness in a marketing plan, or spark an a-ha moment about how your customer base behaves.

Of course, male mentors are important, too. The point is in our post-COVID world, where everything is in a state of flux, seeking out diverse perspectives leads to better decision-making and more resilience.

So men, if you are seeking personal as well as professional growth, ask a woman to be your mentor.

Connie Askin is CEO of Big Brothers Big Sisters of Central Mass & MetroWest.

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