014126 Mentoring in the Workplace

Warning: The information on this page is indicative. The subject outline for a particular session, location and mode of offering is the authoritative source of all information about the subject for that offering. Required texts, recommended texts and references in particular are likely to change. Students will be provided with a subject outline once they enrol in the subject.

Subject handbook information prior to 2025 is available in the Archives.

Description

This subject aims to develop student's understandings and capabilities in designing and implementing workplace mentoring, a key workplace learning strategy in organisations. After engaging with contemporary research literature on mentoring in the workplace in a range of contexts, students explore the issues involved in designing effective workplace mentoring programs. Students have opportunities to design a workplace mentoring program relevant to their own professional context and to experience a peer mentoring process through the subject.

Subject learning objectives (SLOs)

Course intended learning outcomes (CILOs)

This subject engages with the following Course Intended Learning Outcomes (CILOs), which are tailored to the Graduate Attributes set for all graduates of the Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences.

• Synthesise advanced knowledge of complex concepts to make research and theory informed judgements about a broad range of professional learning and / or leading practices (1.1)
• Use and critically analyse technologies for leading learning and /or leading practices (1.2)
• Critically and creatively reflect on complex relationships between theory and professional practice using highly developed analytical skills (2.2)
• Apply strong communication and interpersonal skills to engage diverse audiences around complex professional practice issues (6.1)

Teaching and learning strategies

Students are guided through a series of six online modules using a process of practice-based learning. Each module contains rich content that is organised around a series of topics and includes activities that help students actively engage with the content and undertake the practice–based tasks. Students engage interactively through online discussion boards, embedded comments, and concept-based activities and are scaffolded to carry out the design of a mentoring program and to identify factors impacting on its implementation.

This subject employs an authentic learning approach in which students design and develop a mentoring program based on their workplace, using models and practices introduced throughout the subject that students are encouraged to use in their own contexts. Students participate in collaborative activities and share observations and insights with peers from different professional contexts to expand their understanding of the concepts and practices used in this course. Students also engage in a peer mentoring process throughout the subject, in which they experience mentoring in a realistic setting. Synchronous online seminars provide an opportunity to revise key concepts, further develop connections with other students, and to prepare for assessments. Students receive formative feedback on assignment tasks both from their lecturers and peers, including early formative feedback.

To ensure practice-relevant and authentic outcomes, teaching and learning strategies for this subject involve students customising learning to suit their professional practice context. This occurs through the ‘Capability Wrap’ process. Students develop a ‘Subject Learning Plan’ for each subject, as a way of customising assessments and their learning in the subject to their professional context. As a first step in this process, students must complete their ‘Course Learning Plan’ and Portfolio (Part A – (if this is the student’s first subject in the course) and their ‘subject learning plan’ (Part B), which are compulsory (non-graded) tasks and constitute minimum requirements for this subject.

Students also complete a ‘subject wrap-up’ on conclusion of the subject by reflecting on their learning in relation to their course and subject learning plans. This also contributes to the ongoing ‘capability wrap’ process.

Content (topics)

This subject engages students in an exploration of key aspects of mentoring in the workplace, starting with the literature of mentoring models and theories and students’ personal experiences, identifying good practice, differentiating between mentoring and coaching and working towards the design of a workplace mentoring program. Students learn about key issues in designing and implementing mentor relationships through participating in peer mentoring throughout the subject and investigate mentoring practice as an effective learning and development strategy in their own and others’ workplaces.

Assessment

Assessment task 1: Mentoring program in the workplace scenario

Assessment task 2: Mentoring Issues paper

Assessment task 3: Mentoring Program Design

Minimum requirements

The satisfactory completion of the Course Learning Plan (Part A) (if not previously completed) and the Subject Learning Plan (Part B) are minimum requirements for this subject as they are key components of the ‘capability wrap’ process and a defining feature of this course. Failure to meet this requirement will result in the final assessment task not being considered for assessment.

Required texts

A full reading list is available in Canvas

References

Clutterbuck, D. A., Kochan, F. K., Lunsford, L., Domínguez, N., & Haddock-Millar, J. (Eds.). (2017). The SAGE handbook of mentoring. Sage.

Dashper, K. (2019). Challenging the gendered rhetoric of success? The limitations of women? only mentoring for tackling gender inequality in the workplace. Gender, Work & Organization, 26(4), 541-557.

Eby, L. and Robertson, M., (2020) The Psychology of Workplace Mentoring Relationships. Annual Review of Organizational Psychology and Organizational Behavior, Vol. 7, Issue 1, pp. 75-100, http://dx.doi.org/10.1146/annurev-orgpsych-012119-044924

Ensher, E. (2018). Being a good mentee. Lynda.com. Carpenteria, CA.

Garvey, B. (2018). Coaching and mentoring: theory and practice. London: SAGE.

Goerisch, D., Basiliere,J., Rosener, A., McKee, K., Hunt, J., & Parker, T. M. (2019) Mentoring with: reimagining mentoring across the university, Gender, Place & Culture, 26:12, 1740-1758, DOI: 10.1080/0966369X.2019.1668752

Heikkinen, H. L., Wilkinson, J., Aspfors, J., & Bristol, L. (2018). Understanding mentoring of new teachers: Communicative and strategic practices in Australia and Finland. Teaching and Teacher Education, 71.

Mullen, C. A., & Klimaitis, C. C. (2021). Defining mentoring: a literature review of issues, types, and applications. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1483(1), 19–35. https://doi.org/10.1111/nyas.14176

Naidoo, L., & Wagner, S. (2020). Thriving, not just surviving: The impact of teacher mentors on pre-service teachers in disadvantaged school contexts. Teaching and Teacher Education, 96, 103185.

Neely, A. R., Cotton, J., & Neely, A. D. (2017). E-mentoring: A Model and Review of the Literature. AIS Transactions on Human-Computer Interaction, 9(3), 220-242. Retrieved from https://aisel.aisnet.org/thci/vol9/iss3/3

Scerri, M., Presbury, R., & Goh, E. (2020). An application of the mentoring framework to investigate the effectiveness of mentoring programs between industry mentors and student mentees in hospitality. Journal of Hospitality and Tourism Management, 45, 143-151.

Submitter, R. P. S., Schipani, C. A., Dworkin, T. M., & Abney, D. (2020). Overcoming Gender Discrimination in Business: Reconsidering Mentoring in the Post# Me-Too and Covid-19 Eras. Ross School of Business (Paper No. 1400). Forthcoming in 23 University of Pennsylvania Journal of Business Law (2021), Available at SSRN: https://ssrn.com/abstract=3732212