Mentoring in public accounting: an empirical investigation

The purpose of this study was to examine the role of the informal mentoring process within large public accounting firms. Specifically, the study was designed to address four issues; (1) the activities performed by mentors within public accounting firms; (2) the observable benefits related to mentoring, such as greater job satisfaction, greater perceived job success, or faster rate of advancement; (3) the impact of gender on the activities performed or the benefits received; and (4) the impact of career stage on the activities performed or the benefits received. Prior research on mentoring in the management literature has linked mentoring to various benefits, including job satisfaction, job success, and rate of advancement. In a study of mentoring in the legal environment, Riley and Wrench (1985) developed a set of 32 activities to determine if an individual had been "truly" mentored. Their measure of a "true" mentor resulted in a statistically stronger measure than the individual's self-identification of a mentor related to job satisfaction and perceived job success. Questionnaires were distributed to employees located within eleven offices of two large international public accounting firms. Of the 758 questionnaires distributed, 375 (49.5%) were returned. Of the respondents, 82% were able to identify the influence of a mentor during their public accounting career. Using the Riley and Wrench method of identification of a true "mentor" only 29% were considered mentored. These percentages were comparable for both males and females in the sample. Analysis of variance (ANOVA) procedures found statistically significant (.01 level) results linking the self-identification of a mentor with three hypothesized benefits of mentoring: job satisfaction, perceived job success, and rate of advancement. Unlike the Riley and Wrench study, results of the ANOVA procedures performed using "tme" mentoring as the independent variable were weaker, with statistically significant (.1 level) results found only for the job satisfaction and perceived job success variables. Attempts to confirm functions or categories of mentoring activities based on prior research using factor analysis were unsuccessful. Both confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis procedures failed to establish an underlying structure of the items. Separate analysis based on gender revealed that females did not receive the same benefits, with only the job satisfaction variable being statistically significant. Analysis based on gender also revealed that the activities of a mentor, when females were involved, emphasized items related to emotional support. By contrast, the involvement of males in the mentoring relationship resulted in significantly higher mean scores for activities related to career advancement. Gender differences were also found based on the ANOVA. procedures linking mentoring with the hypothesized benefits. For males, results were statistically significant for job satisfaction, perceived job success, and rate of advancement. For females, only the job satisfaction variable was statistically significant. Career stage differences were noted based on the importance of activities related to career advancement by those in the later stages of their careers. This finding suggests that those in the later stages realize the impact of mentors on career advancement. Also, in the highly structured large accounting environment, perhaps only during the later stages can mentors provide certain activities related to career advancement. An analysis of differences in the benefits received from mentoring based on career stage of the protege revealed no significant differences.