Mentoring

Mentoring is often conceptualized as giving advice to junior colleagues and students.  Advice-giving is in fact only one limited way to provide good mentorship.  The strategies below provide alternative, effective strategies broken down by mentorship type.

• Expert
  •  Offer substantive feedback on work.
  • Introduce mentee to invisible requirements of the field: strategy on which journals to submit to, how to respond to referee reports, how to market a paper at conferences, etc.
• Adviser
  • Often an assigned role by a program, like a dissertation adviser.
  • Without compromising on rigor, adapt programs to the career goals of the advisee.  Emphasize the legitimacy of career diversity, and avoid tendencies of self-replication.
• Role model
  • Typically members of the same field who model good research and professional practices.
  • Shared identities, backgrounds, and experiences can promote a sense of inclusion in the field.
• Sponsor
  • An advocate for the mentee, helping them gain visibility and opportunities.
  • This is a highly active role, characterized by letter-writing and other forms of referral.
• Supporter
  • Troubleshoot and support mentees in moments of acute difficulty.
  • Share and normalize stories about failure, and about needing and receiving help.  This is especially important in conversations around mental health.
• Tutors
  • Directly address a skills gap, either through personal tutoring or through referral to a third-party resource.

So that they will be ready for pre-doc work when they graduate, it's key to prepare students early for research careers.  Taking coursework and completing RAships takes time, so reaching out to undergraduates in their fourth year is too late.  Here are some strategies to guide students early in their undergrad career.

• Refer promising students to offices on campus that specialize in undergraduate research.  In addition to these (or instead of them if your institution has no such office), refer them to the AEA Summer and Scholarship Programs or have them sign up for our mailing list.
• Meet with students once or twice to discuss the nature and benefits of a research career.  Point out specifically how they may be qualified for such a career, and the interest it might hold for them.
• Lower informational barriers, being sure to go over information that may seem obvious to you but may be news to anyone not familiar with the academy.  For example,
  • Does the student know that certain coursework (e.g., Real Analysis) is unofficially "required" for PhD admission in your field?
  • Do they know that PhD programs offer stipends and tuition remission?
  • Do they have a realistic sense of what a professor's salary is (they tend to underestimate)?
  • Do they understand the entrepreneurial nature of research, or the balance between research, teaching, and service at different institutions?
• Send the student's CV with a brief description of the student's stand-out qualities to your colleagues who may be looking for RAs.
• Hire a promising student as an RA yourself, or advise a paper or Bachelor's thesis.
• If you are looking for RAs outside your institution to hire, refer to PREDOC's RA repository.

Background Information

By ensuring equal access to information and research opportunities early on in an undergraduate’s career, you ensure a broader pool of qualified applicants when it comes time to hire research staff.  Care needs to be taken when choosing which students to invest in.  Scholar of higher education Julie R. Posselt illustrates the pervasive practice of homophily in graduate admissions, and the barriers this can create toward greater diversity in the academy.  Similar homophilic practices can pervade earlier stages in pipeline development.  One of the most effective ways to help under-represented students combat a lack of inclusive space is to inspire intent to enroll in graduate school.  Intent to enroll in graduate programs has long been demonstrated to be the most predictive factor in graduate school attendance, even more potent than factors like grades and amount of faculty interaction.  A seemingly obvious or reductive finding on its face, this trend in fact underscores the importance of inspiring an interest in research early on in the curriculum—not just teaching how research is done, but why someone would want a research career.  Research opportunities do a great deal to foster students’ self-identification as nascent researchers, especially when a students’ identity is not reflected in the professoriate. The ability to see oneself as a researcher can positively impact intent to go to graduate school, which in turn drives development of the researcher’s toolkit.

• Learn how your mentee's journey through the profession may differ fundamentally from yours.
  • Do not assume that your mentee's goals are identical to yours.  Students and pre-docs in particular may be considering careers outside the academy and need support.
  • Read about and understand the blockages different groups may face.  URM women, for instance, may face different obstacles than non-URM women.
    • Develop your cross-cultural competency by reading about the historical context of race and gender in the U.S., the profession, and your own institution.  While it's vital that you ask your mentee about the specific challenges they face, avoid making them responsible for your education on these issues.
• Advocate rather than advise: a mentor will ideally help to clear the pipeline, rather than help navigate its inequities.
• Share inside information on how to succeed in the field.  Erase informational frictions caused by asymmetric access to the "hidden curriculum."
• Establish trust and signal openness to having difficult conversations.  Priming questions include:
  • What are the biggest barriers to your success, and what role can I play in helping to remove them?
  • What percentage of your time is spent on addressing exclusion against you or others?
  • How can I help amplify your voice?

Background Information

The AEA's climate survey has made it clear that effective mentoring is not spread evenly throughout the profession (indeed, it is not spread evenly through the academy writ large).  In the survey, men are twice as likely as women to agree with the statement, "I am satisfied with the overall climate within the field of economics."  60% of male respondents and 80% of female respondents agree in the survey that economics would be a more vibrant discipline if it were more inclusive.  Currently 17.5% of undergraduate economics degrees are awarded to students who are Black, LatinX, or Native American.  Only 8.62% of doctoral degrees in economics are awarded to this group.  For context, 33.2% of the US population is Black, Hispanic or Latino, or Native American or Alaska Native.

Effective mentoring can lead to student retention and faculty success.  Effective mentorship "across difference"—that is, when the mentor and mentee hold different identities and lived experiences—is especially crucial in light of the current asymmetries in the economics profession.

Because of power differentials, it can be difficult to elicit candid feedback from a mentee on mentoring outcomes and process.  Nevertheless, rubrics for evaluation can reveal important trends.  Consider applying these rubrics as your pre-doc is leaving to go on to their next opportunity.

• Measuring Mentee Outcomes
  • Attitudinal: sense of belonging, satisfaction with the discipline
    •  Does your pre-doc feel they are welcome in the discipline? 
  • Behavioral: declaring or maintaining a major, pursuing RAships, presenting at conference
    • Was your pre-doc active in the intellectual culture of your institution, attending workshops and seminars, taking classes, etc.?
  • Career: PhD admissions, getting a job
    • Is your pre-doc moving on to a research-related career?
  • Health: strain or stress experienced by mentee
    • Does your pre-doc report working especially long hours, or express anxiety coming to you with problems?
• Measuring Mentor Processes
  • Commitment: time spent, actions taken
    • How many times did you meet with your pre-doc to discuss their future, independent of the work they were doing for you?  At what frequency?  
  • Approachability: mentee initiating meetings, asking for help
    • Did you initiate these meetings, or did your pre-doc ask for them?
  • Perception: how committed and effective does the mentee feel the mentor was?
    • Can you draw a line between your work as a mentor and your mentee achieving their stated goals?