Benefits of Companionship and Mentorship Relationships
There are so many reasons to consider becoming a Companion or Mentor* – for both sides of the relationship! We at inCOMMON can testify to the life-transforming reality of these types of mutually-beneficial gains. In fact, it’s highly common for all parties involved in a Companionship or Mentorship relationship to claim their own personal benefit as the primary end result in their relationship. As is the case with most relationships rooted in authenticity, respect, and trust; everyone wins. We hope after reading more about the benefits of Companionship and Mentorship relationships, you too will consider investing your life in this indescribably important (and rewarding!) way.
Benefits for the Companion/Mentor
1. It’s a way to leave a legacy
Sharing in the life of someone provides you the opportunity to leave a legacy and inspire that person to, in turn, share their life with another. By being a Companion or mentor, “a part of you, your experience, and your character will be a part of that person’s journey, which in turn is likely to be a part of someone else’s.”[1] You not only have the potential blessing of seeing someone get beyond a difficulty or a transition, but of seeing them pass on their blessing to others. Mentors really can change the world one person at a time.
2. You’ll learn from your mentee / “reverse mentoring”
“Reverse mentoring,” or when the person normally thought of as the mentor is the receiver of guidance and learning from the person normally thought of as the mentee, is a common phenomenon in Companionship and Mentorship relationships.
Mentors will often attest they learned or gained something personally from their mentoring experience, including:
- Feeling that they were a better person, increased patience, friendship, a feeling of effectiveness, and a chance to acquire skills.[2]
- Insight into one’s own childhood or children[3]
- Enrichment of mentor’s family life (e.g. when companioned/mentee provides support and companionship to the companion’s/mentor’s [family])[4]
3. The gain of “cultural capital”
It has been shown that mentors’ experiences provided them with a form of “cultural capital,” that helped them to:[5]
- Make sense of their own past (sometimes difficult) experiences and current challenges;
- Gain insight into the day-to-day lives of [their mentee]; and
- Develop positive, more reciprocal relationships with [their mentee].
4. Gain of enhanced self-images
Mentors saw themselves as being competent, helpful, visionary and loved. [6] Additionally, mentors indicate a sense of overall improved health and self-esteem.[7]
5. The overall gain of positive feelings
It has been shown that mentors’ experiences have had a “very positive” effect on their lives. They felt that mentoring provided a break from their busy professional lives and a chance to give something back.[8]
Mentors often:
Benefits for the Companioned/Mentee
1. Gaining from Your Wealth of Experience
You have a wealth of life experience no matter what your age. You know how to provide a listening ear, plan a project, make things happen, study and evaluate situations, talk to individuals and groups, influence others to take steps, bargain, write documents, parent, handle aging parents, express your feelings, telecommute and/or hundreds of other abilities.
2. Mentees need your particular slant on your expertise
Mentees don’t just need the general expertise you own; they need your particular version of it. How you do it differently from others. The unwritten rules you’ve learned on how to do it better, faster, more enjoyably, or with more sensitivity. No one but you knows this, and it will end with you if you don’t pass it on.
Benefits for Everyone/Society
1. Creation of a common fabric
Research also shows that mentoring & companionship also has many societal benefits, including the capacity to create a common fabric in communities – a breaking down of the artificial “we-them” distinctions between more and less privileged members of society.
2. Lower costs and increased benefits to society
Individuals who had been mentored in the past anticipated fewer costs and more benefits than those who were never mentored.[11]
3. The experience of being a mentee appears to help pave the way for later mentoring
“There is a pure enjoyment in working with someone who is open to learning and who values what the mentor has to say. Mentoring is positive and infectious, the reasons why many protégés eventually take on the role of mentor.”[12]
*inCOMMON offers/participates in supportive relationships comprised of both adult-youth and adult-adult configurations. We term these adult-youth relationships Mentorships, as the adult is expected to train-up or help mature their younger counterpart. We term these adult-adult relationships Companionships, as the adult experiencing economic need in the relationship may not necessarily require maturing relative to his/her peer counterpart. Those in poverty are not always in poverty because of their lack of maturity (in fact we further contribute to someone’s poverty when we relate to him/her as if this was the case). Financial instability is often completely disconnected from personal deficiency. In order to protect against assumptions such as these, and because those in poverty often need relational support far more than anything else, we prefer to use the term Companionship in our adult-adult relationships. This does not mean that a Companion should avoid opportunities to mentor his/her counterpart where appropriate, only that a Companion should 1) not assume he/she possesses a higher level of understanding or maturity in every realm of life and, likewise, 2) be readily open to take on the posture of learner himself/herself.
Adapted from “Benefits from Mentoring” (http://www.mentoring.org/access_research/benefits_all/) and “Six Reasons to Be a Mentor by Dr. Linda Phillips-Jones” (http://www.mentoringgroup.com/html/mentor_32.htm)
[1] Phillips-Jones, Dr. Linda. Six Reasons to Be a Mentor (http://www.mentoringgroup.com/html/mentor_32.htm)
[2] McLearn, K.T., Colasanto, D., & Schoen, C. Mentoring matters: A national survey of adults mentoring young people. In J. B. Grossman (Ed.). Contemporary issues in mentoring. Philadelphia, PA: Public/Private Ventures. (1998): 67-83.
[3] see Taylor, A. & J. Bressler, J. Mentoring across Generations: Partnerships for Positive Youth Development, New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Press, 1996; R. N. Saito & D. A. Blyth Understanding mentoring relationships (Minneapolis: Search Institute, 1992).
[4] see Taylor, A. & J. Bressler, J. Mentoring across Generations: Partnerships for Positive Youth Development, New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Press, 1996; R. N. Saito & D. A. Blyth Understanding mentoring relationships (Minneapolis: Search Institute, 1992).
[5] Philip, Kate; Hendry, Leo B. Making sense of mentoring or mentoring making sense? Reflections on the mentoring process by adult mentors with young people. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology. 10 (2000), 211-223.
[6] S. D. Murphy The benefits of mentoring from the mentor’s perspective. Dissertation Abstracts International, 5, (Oct, 1996), 1488, US: University Microfilms International.
[7] see Taylor, A. & J. Bressler, J. Mentoring across Generations: Partnerships for Positive Youth Development, New York: Kluwer Academic/Plenum Press, 1996; R. N. Saito & D. A. Blyth Understanding mentoring relationships (Minneapolis: Search Institute, 1992).
[8] McLearn, K.T., Colasanto, D., & Schoen, C. Mentoring matters: A national survey of adults mentoring young people. In J. B. Grossman (Ed.). Contemporary issues in mentoring. Philadelphia, PA: Public/Private Ventures. (1998): 67-83.
[9] S. D. Murphy The benefits of mentoring from the mentor’s perspective. Dissertation Abstracts International, 5, (Oct, 1996), 1488, US: University Microfilms International.
[10] S. D. Murphy The benefits of mentoring from the mentor’s perspective. Dissertation Abstracts International, 5, (Oct, 1996), 1488, US: University Microfilms International.
[11] B. Ragins & T. Scandura. Burden or blessing? Expected costs and benefits of being a mentor. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 20, 1999: 493-509
[12] S. Schulz, “The benefits of mentoring,” in M.W. Galbraith and N.H. Cohen, eds. Mentoring: New strategies and Challenges, New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 66 (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1995).
