Why mentor?: New study has surprising implications for mentor recruitment and retention

Jean Rhodes

Despite strenuous efforts, many mentoring programs  struggle to recruit enough volunteers for all of the youth who need them.  A major barrier is the fact that, unlike other forms of volunteering, mentoring requires a sustained and relatively intensive  commitment. In some mentoring programs, for example, volunteers are expected to meet with their mentees several hours a month over the course of an academic or calendar year. Newer forms of mentoring have reduced such requirements, and many agencies have taken steps to further minimize demands on volunteer time by requiring minimal training, providing online options, and reducing the commitment , etc. Of course, such steps must be balanced against the need to maintain sufficient levels of quality, intensity and duration in relationships.

Different mentoring programs use different strategies to recruit mentors—some emphasizing the enjoyment that the volunteer will have while others highlight the unmet needs of youth. Gil Clary and colleagues would argue that programs should take a “functional” approach to volunteer recruitment. Different people may have very different underlying motivations for deciding to volunteer, and messages that tap into these reasons are more persuasive than more generic messages.

With this in mind, they identified the major functions that volunteerism can serve and developed a questionnaire, the Volunteer Functions Inventory (VFI), which asks potential volunteers to rate the importance of 30 different reasons for volunteering. They found that the VFI tapped into the six major reasons:

• Values—to put their values into action (e.g., I am genuinely concerted about the particular group I am serving).
• Career– to explore career options, increase the likelihood of pursuing particular career paths (e.g., Mentoring allows me to visibly demonstrate my interest in youth, to explore different career options).
• Understanding-to gain a greater understanding of the world, the people in it (including their own children) and themselves (e.g., Mentoring allows me to gain a new perspective on things).
• Enhancement-to feel important, to form new friendships, and to boost their own self-esteem (e.g., Mentoring a child makes me feel needed).
• Protective—to distract themselves from work or person problems (e.g., Mentoring relieves me of some of the guilt over being more fortunate than others.”
• Social—to satisfy expectation of friends, spouse, or other who are close to them. “Others with whom I am close place a high value on mentoring).
• Omoto and Snyder developed a similar questionnaire, which includes an additional function:
• Community Concern (e.g., I volunteer because of my sense of obligation to the community).

Does the VFI apply to volunteer mentors? 

In a recent study, researchers Amanda Teye and Liliokanaio Peaslee (2021) sought to validate the VFI with volunteers in a Big Brothers Big Sisters program (N = 439). The sample included mostly single volunteers–avg. age, 19.7 years, and 38 years for school- and community-based programs respectively). VFI items were adapted to provide a mentor-specific context for volunteer motivations and measured on a 10-point scale (Kim, Zhang, & Connaughton, 2010). For example, the original question “My friends volunteer” was modified as “My friends serve as mentors” and “Volunteering experience will look good on my resume” was changed to “Mentoring experience will look good on my resume”

Consistent with previous research, scores on the Values and Understanding motivations were significantly higher than all other scales

What are volunteer mentors actually saying? Qualitative Study

The researchers also asked mentors to answer open-ended responses to the question, “What attracted you to BBBS as a way of becoming involved in working with youth?”

• Values were the most frequently articulated functional motivation (45%)–Many indicated having an altruistic motivation for helping others, in particular, working with or helping children. Typical responses here included “wanting to be a positive example” and “helping kids in need.”
• Social (41.5%) came in second–Responses ranged from dating someone who was volunteering as a mentor, encouragement from fellow fraternity/sorority members or roommates, or having named a specific friend who was currently volunteering (74 individuals identified another mentor by name as motivation for joining).
• The other four domains were seldom endorsed by respondents. In fact, despite higher quantitative scores on the survey, understanding motivations were expressed by only 2.7% of respondents in the interview, career motivations were expressed by only 5% of respondents and Enhancement/Protective concepts by 8.6%.

• community/civic responsibility (13.8%)–While still motivated by values, these responses seemed distinct from items in the Values measure in that the prosocial sentiment was focused on the community at-large rather than a substantive interest in individuals or children in need, e.g., I volunteer because of my sense of obligation to the community.
• organizational structure and reputation (18.2%)–Comments were focused on the reputation of the agency as being well run, well known, and respected in the community. Respondents also noted the flexibility of the commitment–being allowed to choose and change the day of the week they visit or deciding between meeting in a school or community-based setting.
• self-concept (7.8%)–Some mentors noted that giving back is a fundamental part of their identity. These were individuals who noted that they had “always wanted to volunteer,” “have always volunteered,” or “missed volunteering.”

Conclusions (from Discussion)

• Qualitative findings suggest there may be more domains to consider for  youth mentoring populations than volunteers in general–most notably community/civic responsibility, organizational structure and reputation, and self-concept. The inclusion of these additional indicators may be essential for understanding volunteer functional motivations, which have been directly linked to volunteer engagement and satisfaction, as well as to framing effective volunteer marketing and recruitment efforts.
• The VFI may be capturing domains that are not central among mentoring volunteers. Although, when prompted, mentors rated Understanding items highly, reflecting a more socially desirable tone, they were unlikely to offer responses connected with the domain during the semi-structured interview.
• Mentoring programs should] appeal to a variety of intrinsic motivations (e.g., humanitarian values and understanding others) as well as extrinsic motivations (e.g., career enhancement and enhancing self-esteem) to expand their pool of applicants..

Key Takeaway

“…mentoring organizations can enhance volunteer and youth outcomes by identifying opportunities for mentors to better align with volunteer mentors.  For example, volunteers who have high Social motivation scores may welcome group activities that bring together multiple mentors and mentees. Individuals motivated by personal Enhancement or Protective factors, may strive to improve match quality through a “Mentor of the Month” or similar agency recognition. Those seeking Career enhancement might value workshops on how to translate their volunteer experience into resume skills or opportunities to connect with local youth providers. Finally, volunteers driven by Values and Understanding may be particularly well-suited to be matched with harder to serve youth, such as those impacted by trauma or who are facing other individual or environmental risks.”