A lifespan perspective on mentoring
Considering the aging workforce, organizations are increasingly seeking human resources practices that leverage older workers’ skills and knowledge while keeping them engaged at work. Mentoring, defined as a developmental relationship in which a more experienced person supports the professional and personal development of a less experienced person, is widely regarded as a promising HR practice in this context. However, age-based assumptions about mentoring have remained largely unexamined, and both theoretical and empirical research have rarely explored how age-related changes influence mentoring processes and outcomes.This dissertation introduces a lifespan model of workplace mentoring, proposing that older workers may be particularly effective mentors due to well-developed emotional competencies and higher levels of generativity (the motive and behavior to support and guide the next generation). It further suggests that providing mentoring may be especially engaging for older workers because of age-related shifts toward prioritizing emotionally meaningful goals, such as generativity. Paths of the proposed model were tested using different research designs, including a systematic literature review, a meta-analysis, and a dyadic study of supervisors and employees.Overall, the findings provided only limited support for the model. A systematic review indicated that older workers may have well-developed emotional competencies, although effect sizes were generally small. The meta-analysis showed a small positive association between age and generativity. Finally, a study with 154 supervisor–employee dyads revealed no age differences in the associations between mentoring and work engagement, suggesting that both mentors and protégés may benefit from mentoring, independent of age.