Dissolving The Relationship

In Kram's model, after two to five years the mentoring relationship begins to draw apart. The mentor and the mentee are affected by organisational changes. The mentee has advanced sufficiently to be experiencing new independence and autonomy. The mentor relationship becomes less essential as the mentee's challenges change.

Mentees may respond differently when the relationship declines, according to how prepared they are for the separation. If a change in career position occurs before the mentee feels ready to operate independently of the mentor, he or she will experience a time of uncertainty and anxiety. The mentee will miss the psychological support of the mentor and be aware that he or she no longer has a ‘safety net' to fall upon if he or she makes a wrong decision. The unprepared mentee can also feel abandoned and betrayed and lose confidence.

One young British mentee found her first year apart from her mentor a very difficult time emotionally. A period of redefinition was necessary as she had to demonstrate to the rest of the organisation that she was able to operate independently without her mentor:

I had to prove to myself and the rest of the company that it was my ability which got me my new job and not my mentor's influence. I had to show I could stand alone. I think the whole process helped me to mature. Now if I have any difficulties I rely on myself.

If the mentee is fully prepared for separation from the mentor, he or she enjoys this new-found freedom and independence. It is a little like driving the car home after having passed the driving test. Most mentors accept that their mentees must move away from them and become psychologically more self-sufficient.

Even after the separation has taken place, the mentor continues to encourage the mentee to move forward in his or her career. In sponsorship mentoring, the mentor will often promote the mentee at a distance and be kept informed of the mentee's progress. However, some mentors are unwilling to allow their mentees to go beyond their influence and control. This is most common in senior executives who are insecure in their own positions. The mentor tends to project his or her own negative career expectations on to the mentee. If the mentor feels he or she can go no higher in the company, he or she is likely to feel that a subordinate will not either.

Some managers whose own careers have stagnated and offer little hope for future advancement resent a mentee who has more career opportunities. This kind of mentor does not want the mentee to outstrip him or her, and as a result attempts to delay the mentee's movement by insisting that the mentee stay in the same position.

Where the mentee feels ready to break the mentoring relationship but is unable to move beyond the mentor's sphere of influence, he or she may feel frustrated, restless and ultimately hostile. This is another argument against the use of the immediate boss as a mentor. Although such feelings can be absorbed across departmental boundaries, they may be explosive within the department. Some companies use the personnel department, the mentoring co-ordinator or an arbitrator in senior management to ensure that the mentee has someone to appeal to if conflict of this kind arises. (The mentor, too, can use this formal route to express disquiet if he or she believes a mentee is being pushed too fast for his or her own good. ) Such arbitration is rare, however, not least because the numbers of people involved in most companies are sufficiently small for the issues to be resolved by informal means.

For both the mentor and the mentee the period of divorce and separation is important for their reputation and career in the organisation. The mentee demonstrates his or her skills and independence while the mentor shows to colleagues and other potential mentees that he or she develops young people successfully. The progress of the mentee proves the accuracy of the mentor's insight into potential. By now, the mentee's career objectives may have changed several times as the mentor has made him or her aware of new opportunities and expected changes in the organisation. The mentee will have gradually assumed more and more of the responsibility for his or her own career objectives and will increasingly be taking the initiative in seeking out training opportunities and experience that will help him or her achieve his or her goals. In effect, the mentor has taught what he or she knows and there is little more to pass on.

In developmental mentoring the dynamic is subtly different, not least because it is extremely rare for this kind of dependency to develop in the first place. In a relationship where the primary purpose is achieving rapid self-reliance and where the mentor is not expected to use his or her power on behalf of the mentee, winding down is a relatively straightforward affair. In many cases where a formal time limit has been built into the scheme from the start, both parties begin to prepare for dissolution long before it begins. (In a mentoring scheme run by Shell, it was noticeable that in the relationships with the least time to run - because the mentor would be repatriated in 12-18 months - the intensity of the relationship and the learning was higher than in those where the time-frame was more relaxed. The mentees knew they had to get every drop of learning they could while they could. )

At least one meeting before the expected formal end of the relationship, mentor and mentee should begin to review:

• what the relationship has delivered in terms of expected and unexpected outcomes (changes in knowledge, behaviour, role, etc) for both parties

• what it has not delivered

• what they expect for the new (informal) phase of the relationship, if there is to be one

• what future mentoring needs the mentee may have that may best be met by other people.

In a recent study of relationship endings, David Megginson and I (2003) compared the experiences of numerous mentors and mentees. They fell into two clear categories:

• those whose formal relationship had a clear ending, in which they reviewed (and in some cases celebrated) what they had achieved together - these were almost all perceived as positive by both mentor and mentee

• those whose relationship had just drifted away over time, and which were almost always seen as negative.

Mentors and mentees whose relationship had wound down - rather than wound up - tended to feel unsure about their contribution, and sometimes betrayed. By contrast, recognising the value of the relationship enabled both parties to move on with confidence.