Mentoring and Adult Career Development

Abstract

Mentoring has become a buzz word among educational, professional, and corporate consultants charged with the task of socializing students into their professional identities (Bogat & Redner, 1985; Collins, Barrett, & Citrin, 1985; Obleton, 1984; O'Neil & Wrightsman, 1988) or securing the loyalties and optimizing the resources of talented young corporate employees (Hennecke, 1983; Klauss, 1981; Vernon-Gerstenfeld & Burke, 1985; Zey, 1984). Popular as well as academic audiences have been deluged with articles, books, presentations, and workshops touting the benefits and cautioning against the hazards of mentoring as a means to personal enhancement and/or career advancement. Counseling psychologists, in their roles as career counselors and educators, organizational consultants, and researchers need to understand the implications of this growing movement for the institutions and individuals they serve. This integrative review of theoretical and empirical literature on mentoring seeks to promote such an understanding.