Mentoring provided: Relation to mentor's career success, personality, and mentoring received

The relationship of a mentor's perceptions of his/her career success, mentoring he/she received, personality, and the amount of mentoring he/she provided was investigated in a sample of 176 administrators. Results indicated that the amount of mentoring respondents reported they had provided was positively associated with their objective and their subjective career success and with the amount of mentoring they reported they had received. Mentoring provided mediated the relationship between mentoring received and subjective career success. Finally, the personality trait of openness was associated with mentoring provided over and above the contribution of human capital and demographics. The results were in line with suggestions in the literature that providing mentoring has positive consequences for the career of the mentor and that an individual who has been mentored is more likely to provide mentoring. However, the findings suggested a limited role for the personality of the mentor in providing mentoring. The implications for career development practices and tactics and for future research were considered, along with the limitations of the study. (C) 2003 Elsevier Science (USA). All rights reserved.