Mentoring Relationships

This chapter will describe issues related to the development of the mentor-mentee relationship in an academic setting. It begins with the choosing and formation of this relationship and continues with the dynamics of effective mentorship, including the characterization of a vertical team structure, which allows graduate students to participate as both mentees and mentors. From the perspective of mentor and mentee, the authors describe what are, in their eyes, the most important aspects of mentoring, such as the constructive and compassionate delivery of feedback, effective communication, the providing of opportunities, the building of frustration tolerance in graduate learning, appropriate power differentials, and modeling the balance of academic and nonacademic activities.