From Supervisor to Mentor: Transformations in a Collaborative Partnership

Background and ObjectivesIn this paper we trace the transformation in our roles from doctoral candidate and supervisor, through academic mentee and mentor, to a fully collaborative partnership. While acknowledging the intergenerational nature of academia, the changing demographic profile of universities means it is timely to consider novel approaches to mentoring, such as reciprocal, that captures the contributions and benefits that each generation brings especially in a higher education landscape.MethodsWe have adopted a longitudinal qualitative narrative approach via autoethnography capturing the changes and challenges in our respective roles over a three year period. Data from diary notations, reflective journals and structured dialogues were harnessed. The process of analysis was to independently annotate these data and then to discuss each of the main constructs and common dimensions in a form of inter-rater reliability check of our themes and sub-themes. ContributionsThe analysis highlights the transformations across three phases: Hierarchical Supervisor-Candidate; Exchange Mentor-Mentee; and Reciprocal Peer Partnership. We found support for the overwhelmingly positive benefits of mentoring replete in the literature (both vocationally and emotionally oriented). This paper contributes to our current knowledge about adult mentorships for mentors, mentees and organisations, and more specifically to the higher education environment where a sense of patronage has long been assumed and yet has remained somewhat invisible and informal. KEYWORDSsupervisor, mentoring, higher education, university, reciprocal mentorship model