Roots and Wings: Mentoring

SUMMARY

What's in a name? Who was this Mentor, and why should we all have one? Isn't a manager, teacher and friend sufficient? This paper suggests some answers to these questions through a look at a segment of the literature on the ways people learn in the workplace and consideration of some practical examples of schemes which their originators describe as mentoring. Finally, since everyone is talking about intellectual capital and learning organizations at the moment, do mentors enable people to grow from sound roots and then take their wings and fly?