Fostering the Protégé Career Success through Traditional and Relational Mentoring Functions: A Complementary Fit Perspective

Abstract

In today's dynamic and continuously changing environment, achieving a successful career can be challenging for a protégé. A range of stakeholders, including mentors, influence the protégé's career success in their professional network. Mentors play a crucial role in a protégé's professional network. They are strong predictors of the resources that a protégé can acquire, such as career self-efficacy, which is essential for making informed career decisions and achieving success in professional life. Following this, the current study explores the connection between traditional and relational mentoring functions and career success via the intervening construct of career self-efficacy. Data were gathered from 384 staff employed in Pakistan's private, public, and Islamic banks. PLS-SEM was utilized to analyze the data. The findings show that mentoring functions are significantly related to the career success of protégés, with relational mentoring emerging as a more potent predictor of career success and career self-efficacy than traditional mentoring. Additionally, the findings suggest that protégé career self-efficacy mediates the direct association between mentoring and career success. This study adds to the literature by studying traditional and relational mentoring roles as predictors of protégé career self-efficacy and success. By highlighting the importance of relational mentoring, this study emphasizes the need for employers to develop effective mentoring programs that prioritize establishing supportive and collaborative mentor-protégé relationships.