Photo by dave forbes

By Debbie Gin (originally written for ATS Colloquy Online)

For most of us, mentoring is a mixed bag. While we may have had rewarding and life-giving mentoring experiences, we also lament those mentoring experiences where expectations were not met and there was nothing new to be learned. Ineffective experiences can be avoided by tapping the expertise of a range of mentors, including reverse mentors, coaches, role models, and sponsors. Completing our crews can lead to important professional development, but we must be intentional.

As a good researcher, I must first locate myself in a context. Prior to coming to The Association of Theological Schools, the last position I held was Fellow in the Center for Teaching, Learning, and Assessment at Azusa Pacific University. I worked in faculty development and faculty evaluation (APU’s version of a tenure support), offices of university scope. I also held a faculty appointment as associate professor in ministry with Azusa Pacific Seminary.

In nearly 20 years at one institution, I had a slow but steady journey toward my last position. Mentors helped me navigate the challenges along the way. I have wondered, however, whether greater intentionality in completing my crew of mentors earlier on might have contributed to the same amount of progress in half the time.

I tend not to think of mentoring in traditional ways: typically, a single, formal, unidirectional relationship where protégée sits at the feet of, and uncritically absorbs life lessons from, the master. I prefer to think of mentoring as a network of relationships, a crew of experts, where not one mentor-mentee combination does, nor should be expected to, provide all learning and where there is great potential for mutual exchange, even when real power differentials exist.

Mentoring can be volunteer and intentional, where you seek out an individual and invite her/him to mentor you; it can materialize when someone seeks you out. Mentoring can be among colleagues, at a professional level, where there is an exchange of ideas, a kind of mutual mentoring; a close cousin is reverse mentorship, where there is mutual mentoring with someone who is much younger than you. Mentoring can occur as a result of working closely together on a common project; in such cases there might be an exchange of skills. We should think of mentoring as incorporating a variety of resources: not just persons but also communities of mentoring or services/skill-building centers. And, while most mentoring relationships bring mentor and mentee together weekly or monthly, mentoring can even take place when those involved see each other only once a year.

Among the many mentors I have been privileged to have, I list a few here as representative of a strategic approach to completing a crew. Each has performed a different role in the crew, and each has taught me a different set of valuable lessons.

Mentor #1—Navigating the system

My first mentor is the executive director of a national organization. She opened my eyes to the reality of structural obstacles, introducing me to all the “-isms” I am likely to face. One such challenge is age-ism. As a petite Asian American woman with few wrinkles, I often wondered whether I was seen as too young to lead. I remember one setting, when my mentor revealed her age, that she is two years older than a well-respected white male colleague in our context. I couldn’t believe my own internal reaction: my view of her and her potential to lead grew in that instant! (I, of course, subsequently had to repent of my sin of perpetuating the -isms I now work hard to dismantle.) She helped me see the wisdom in telling people my age. She also helped me, an introvert, see the value in nurturing key relationships; I can hear her voice ringing, “Make sure you go to tea regularly with so-and-so.”

Mentor #2—Recognizing my worth

My next mentor, at the time of our relationship, was a high-ranking administrator of an institution of higher education. Stressing the meaning of professional significance and intrinsic human worth, she taught me never to devalue myself and helped me see I am worth the promotions and the raises I have pursued.

Mentor #3—Maintaining integrity

My third mentor was the dean’s administrative assistant at the time we interacted. She exemplified integrity, grace, and nonjudgmental, Christ-like character. I watched her from a distance, realized I wanted the same, and asked her to mentor me. In her position, she became a confidante to many, and she considered it a privileged role, treating information others shared with her in confidence as if they were her own secrets. Richard Rohr refers to integrity as having “to do with purifying our intentions” (Falling Upward, xv). This woman did not have an opportunistic bone in her body; every action she committed benefited the community. That’s what I wanted to learn from her.

Mentor #4—Recognizing that knowledge is power

We all know that knowledge is power, but what I didn’t realize is that knowledge can be a form of capital — until I learned this from my fourth mentor. A faculty colleague, he clued me into the value of intellectual capital and the realization that having knowledge and expertise helps you advance professionally. When I made the transition to faculty, he asked me two questions: (1) What do you plan to read? and (2) How do you plan to excel in your field?

Mentor #5—Nurturing networks

Similar to recognizing expertise as capital, my fifth mentor helped me see the value in nurturing my networks as social capital. To me, an introvert, going to an organization’s social events ranks just above grading papers. But this faculty colleague from another institution coached me in the art of expanding my professional circle. I first met her at an ATS Women in Leadership event. We were standing in the lunch line when we introduced ourselves to each other. I proceeded to complain about how the Asians were only sitting with one another and boasted about how I, doing the multicultural thing, was sitting with African American women. It was then that she leaned in, gently chastising me: “Don’t burn those bridges with Asian American sisters; they will one day be your support network.”

These dear individuals comprise an important part of my mentoring crew, and I have expanded my view of leadership and personal agency because of them. I am grateful beyond measure for these and my other mentors, as they have played a critical role in my professional journey, whether they knew it or not.  For Part 2–>

Dr. Debbie Gin is Director of Faculty Development and Research of The Association of Theological Schools.  She and her husband currently live in Pennsylvania.