ABSTRACT
This chapter focuses on mentorship and developmental networks within the context of careers. The various forms of mentoring are considered, along with the reasons that developmental networks have received attention as a supplement to rather than a replacement of traditional mentoring. The chapter reviews empirical evidence demonstrating that mentoring and developmental networks are linked with career outcomes and discusses the relative contribution of traditional mentoring relationships and the rest of developmental ties on career success. The two candidate mechanisms for the link between mentoring and career success, the performance and the political route, are presented and evidence for each is reviewed. Furthermore, factors that increase the probabilities of individuals’ involvement in mentoring relationships and of participation in developmental networks are discussed. Though the literature has paid nearly exclusive attention to their positive aspects, the chapter also looks at the darker sides of mentorship and developmental networks. These are not limited to negative mentoring experiences, but they extend to evidence in favour of the political route for the link of mentoring with career success along with the possibility that mentoring may serve as a means of transmitting and perpetuating unethical mentalities. The chapter ends with suggestions for future research.
