Formal Mentoring and Proteges' Leadership Development: The Roles of Proteges' Informal Mentoring Networks, Political Skill, and Gender

We seek to better understand how formal mentoring may impact proteges' leadership development by arguing that proteges' informal mentoring networks help explain the relationship between formal mentoring and two protege leadership development outcomes: motivation to lead and promotability. We also argue that proteges' political skill and gender serve as boundary conditions of these mediated relationships. Using 100 South Korean mentor-protege dyads in four organizations across three points in time, we find that a higher level of formal mentoring is positively associated with the quality of proteges' informal mentoring networks, which, in turn, is positively associated with proteges' motivation to lead, but not proteges' promotability. We also find that the relationship between a higher level of formal mentoring and the quality of proteges' informal mentoring networks is strengthened when proteges have a higher level of political skill. In addition, we find that female proteges obtain more informal mentoring networking benefits from their formal mentors than male proteges. Theoretical and practical implications are discussed.