Mentorship programs in the last year have seen steady growth for Fair360’s Top 50 companies, even as they have declined for all companies that participated in the survey. In 2023, 98% of Top 50 companies utilized a formal mentorship program. This is an increase of 2% from 2022. By contrast, formal mentorship has decreased for all surveyed companies from 74% in 2022 to 70% in 2023.
Expanding formal and informal mentorship can provide greater access to professional resources that aid employees’ career trajectories. When implemented with workplace fairness in mind, these programs can benefit women and minorities. Both groups have historically lacked equal access to mentorship and stand to benefit the most from greater accessibility.
In reality, the effect of mentorship programs on opportunities for underrepresented groups is more complicated. This is due in part to the nature of representation in mentorship programs.
How Mentorship is Changing
In 2022, vertical mobility was a key metric in evaluating the success of mentorship programs for Top 10 companies. That year, 70% of Fair360’s Top 10 companies used promotions as a KPI of their mentorship programs. However, overprioritizing promotions fails to leverage all the benefits that mentorship brings employees.
Mentorship’s primary function is to build relationships between experienced employees or managers and their less experienced colleagues. Mentors share knowledge and insights with mentees to help them navigate the workplace. These insights can aid a mentee’s career, but a mentor-mentee relationship can thrive without resulting in a promotion.
KPMG (No. 6 on the 2023 Top 50 list and No. 7 on the Top Companies for Mentoring) expresses as much in their explanation of mentorship. According to KPMG, “A mentoring relationship helps professional growth and fulfillment of career aspirations through a safe environment of asking questions, receiving personalized feedback, obtaining guidance, observing and interacting with other individuals and the opportunity to enhance knowledge, skills, and perspectives.”
In 2023, Fair360 Top 50 companies began shifting their approach to mentorship to reflect its relational focus. Employee participation and engagement are the most used KPIs in evaluating mentorship programs. In 2022, Top 50 companies measured three different KPIs in fairly equal measure: Engagement (58%), retention (60%), and promotions (52%). Now, 94% of Top 50 companies measure overall participation and 98% measure employee engagement.
Retention is still measured by 60% of Top 50 companies. Promotions is now a mentorship KPI for just 42% of Top 50 companies.
That said, the promotion rate for mentees at Top 50 companies has improved since these prioritization shifts. Top 50 companies promoted 4% more mentees in 2023 compared to 2022, while Top 10 Companies promoted 7% more mentees.
READ MORE: Meaningful Mentorship: How Intentional Programs Drive Retention and Development
Making Mentorship Accessible
Companies have introduced mentorship opportunities earlier in the employment life cycle to meet participation and engagement metrics. Over the last year, the number of Top 10 companies introducing mentorship programs to employees during onboarding grew by at least 10% across all levels of management.
This growth was especially significant at the lowest management tiers. In 2022, 70% of Top 10 companies introduced mentorship programs when onboarding Level 4 managers. In 2023, that grew to 90%.
Check out the companies that made Fair360’s 2023 list of the Top 50 Companies for Mentoring. Find out where your company ranks by completing the 2024 Top 50 Survey.
Mentorship Representation Disparities
Women and minorities may not always be able to benefit from mentorship programs despite the programs’ advantages.
People of color comprise 47% of the workforce at Top 50 companies but 41% of mentees. This leaves many people of color without the same access to resources and professional connections their white colleagues have. Top 50 companies have an overrepresentation of women as mentees. But that doesn’t mean women are equally represented in mentorship programs. Women are 55% of mentees in Top 10 companies but only 45% of mentors.
For mentorship relationships to be effective, mentors must be able to guide mentees through specific challenges. The underrepresentation of women and minorities as mentors makes it more difficult for members of these groups to be paired with a mentor who understands their unique experiences in the workplace.
In 2023, most Top 50 companies worked to rectify the state of mentor representation. Eighty percent of Fair360 Top 10 and 66% of Top 50 companies now have systems to monitor mentorship representation. These same companies also strive to test for mentor and mentee selection bias. Both of these numbers represent an increase from the previous year. It remains to be seen what effect this will have on mentor and mentee representation in 2024.
READ MORE: Sponsorship Programs: Advancing Underrepresented Talent in Leadership
Targeted Mentorship
For women and minorities to benefit from mentorship programs, the mere existence of mentorship is insufficient. These programs are prone to bias and exclusion unless steps are taken to correct them.
EY (a Fair 360 Hall of Fame company and No. 1 on the Top Companies for Mentoring) utilizes targeted mentorship programs to pair women and minority mentees and mentors together intentionally. EY’s Women in Consulting pairs women with established female managers and consultants. They provide professional coaching and access to networking events and educational resources. The program creates pathways for women to become managers and consultants and provides a safe place to discuss workplace difficulties.
For recently hired Black and Latinx employees, EY also offers a voluntary onboarding program called EY Unplugged. EY Unplugged allows U.S.-based Black and Latinx leaders to share their career insights with young professionals. It also provides peer networking to help minority employees pair up with colleagues. The program connects employees with resources from organizations like the Association of Latino Professionals for America (ALPFA) and the National Association of Black Accountants, Inc. (NABA).
According to EY, “This support enables our people to engage in crucial relationship-building with other professionals who understand their perspectives and lived experiences.”
