2014 The role of mentoring in faculty job satisfaction, organizational commitment and turnover intent Dr. Rimjhim Banerjee-Batist Santa Fe College October 9, 2014 #GHC

BACKGROUND TO THE PROBLEM  Junior faculty – new environment – adjustment  Low job satisfaction, poor research productivity, ineffective teaching, high stress, burnout and turnover

2014 MENTORING  Definition - A dyadic relationship where psychosocial support and career support are the functions provided by the mentor to the protégé (Kram, 1996).  Promotes job satisfaction  Enhances organizational commitment  Increase possibilities of employee retention and reduce intent to turnover

2014 FACULTY MENTORING  Faculty mentoring −Supportive setting is crucial to long-term success in academia −Key tool for universities to attract and retain faculty – important to human resource development  Faculty mentoring studies: Academic medicine primarily −Bland, Center, Finstad, Risbey, & Staples, 2005; Steiner, Curtis, Lanphear, Vu, & Main, 2004; Lu, Lin, Wu, Hsieh, & Chang, 2002; Stallworth, 2003

2014 PURPOSE OF THE STUDY  Examine relationships among mentoring, job satisfaction, organizational commitment, and intent to turnover in formal faculty mentoring programs.  Whether mentoring can be used as an intervention to augment job satisfaction and organizational commitment of junior faculty and reduce their turnover intent.  How universities can develop faculty mentoring

2014 HYPOTHESES  H 1. Mentoring (i.e., degree of career and psychosocial support received from mentor) is related to protégé job satisfaction.  H 2. Mentoring (i.e., degree of career and psychosocial support received from mentor) is related to protégé organizational commitment.  H 3. Mentoring (i.e., degree of career and psychosocial support received from mentor) is related to protégé turnover intent.

2014 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK  Kram’s model of mentoring −Career support Sponsorship Coaching Protection Providing exposure, visibility Providing challenging assignments −Psychosocial support Role modeling Acceptance and confirmation Counseling Friendship

2014 RESEARCH DESIGN  Correlational, Cross-sectional  Available Population – 125 protégés in a faculty mentoring program at a university in the United States  Access through director of faculty mentoring program −Pilot study −Dillman’s (2007) Tailored Design Method (TDM) survey protocol −Objectives of the research −Web-link to survey 8

2014 RESEARCH DESIGN (survey instrument)  Demographic questions  Mentoring Functions Scale (Noe, 1988a)  Job Satisfaction Scale (Spencer, 1997)  Organizational Commitment Questionnaire (Mowday, Steers, & Porter, 1979)  Michigan Organizational Assessment Questionnaire (Cammann, Fichman, Jenkins, & Klesh, 1979)  Open-ended questions 9

2014 Nature of the Mentoring Program  Matching faculty mentor with faculty protégé −Commonality of background, interest, and prioritized needs  Mentor-protégé meetings self-arranged  Organized meetings (twice a year) −Panel discussion on reappointment, promotion, tenure −Panel discussion on work-life balance  Checking in with protégés to make sure mentoring is going well 10

2014 DATA ANALYSIS 11 Types of Variables Used in the Study General Type of VariableSpecific Variable in This Study IndependentMentoring DependentJob satisfaction DependentOrganizational commitment DependentIntent to turnover

2014 DATA ANALYSIS 12 Types of Analyses HypothesesType of Analysis H1H1 Zero-order correlation H2H2 H3H3 Descriptive statistics used with demographic data Themes found with responses to open-ended questions

2014 DATA ANALYSIS 13 Demographics

2014 DATA ANALYSIS 14 Demographics

2014 RESULTS 15 Demographic Variable Cross Tabulation Variable Combinationχ 2 Valuedfp Gender and Ethnicity Gender and Age Gender and Years employed Age and Ethnicity Age and Years employed Ethnicity and Years employed

2014 Results 16 Protégés (N = 50) IndependentDependent Mentoring (career support) Job satisfaction (r =.57) p <.01 Organizational commitment (r=.60) p <.01 Intent to turnover (r = -.32) p <.05 Mentoring (psychosocial support) Job satisfaction (r =.62) p <.01 Organizational commitment (r=.58) p <.01 Intent to turnover (r = -.29) p <.05 Strong relation between protégé job satisfaction and mentoring, protégé organizational commitment and mentoring, and medium relation between protégé intent to turnover and mentoring (Cohen, 1988).

2014 Results 17 Open-ended questions Protégés (30% response rate) 1.What is your overall feeling about the effectiveness of participating in this mentoring program?” All rated the program well, citing how much valuable guidance they received from their mentors for the tenure process, and navigate their way through the university as brand new junior faculty

2014 Results 18 Open-ended questions Protégés (30% response rate) 2. What are the areas where you benefitted most from your mentor? Trust, friendship, and help they received in navigating through difficult personal situations Advice they received regarding the tenure process as well as maintaining a work-life balance Collaborative professional activities like presenting, writing, and teaching

2014 Results 19 Open-ended questions Protégés (30% response rate) 3. What are some of the biggest challenges you have faced in the mentoring relationship? Lack of time Lack of monetary incentive for mentors Mentors as difficult people Proteges’ “own reluctance to burden others.” Lack rapport and trust with their mentors and were hesitant to discuss personal issues with them in the fear that such things will be “divulged to the department chair.”

2014 RESEARCH IMPLICATIONS  Examine mentor protégé dyads  Longitudinal research – change of mentoring support over time – link to organizational outcomes  Examine objective outcomes −Teaching evaluations −Publications record  Examine contextual variables 20

2014 PRACTICAL IMPLICATIONS  Informs and encourages formal faculty mentoring programs at the university level - mentoring support received by protégés −strong positive relationship with job satisfaction and organizational commitment −strong negative relationship with intent to turnover  Significance of psychosocial support - development of interpersonal and social competencies −Listening skills −Openness to constructive feedback −Self-disclosure  Development of structure and time management skills  Discussion about mentor incentives?? 21

2014 LIMITATIONS  Reliance on respondents to accurately self-report  Study can only ascertain relationships – correlational research  Use of a non-random sample - limited generalizability  Role of external factors such as organizational support and organizational culture not examined 22

2014 Summary  Mentoring as a tool for faculty development  Empirical evidence links key organizational outcomes of faculty protégés to mentoring received by them  Unique contribution to faculty formal mentoring research  Discipline independent 23

2014 Entire study: The Role of Attachment in Faculty Mentoring Articles :  The role of attachment and mentoring in junior faculty’s job satisfaction. American Journal of Management, 14(1-2).  Attachment and mentoring: Relations with junior faculty’s organizational commitment, and intent to turnover. In Review at Human Resource Development Quarterly. 24

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2014 Contact Information 27