Mentoring Handbook

For centuries, personnel recruiting at universities has been characterised by the informal support that senior academics have provided to those younger colleagues they considered eligible. However, this form of (informal) support/promotion entails drawbacks with regard to the fair distribution of opportunities to enter the system. As the author of this handbook mentions, informal mentoring is „often based on similarities between the participants or earlier positive experiences
with similar people, as these factors make it easier to recognise and assess their potential“. This means that those who are not perceived as a perfect fit will lack the support so crucial for academic careers. Hence, the ways in which the university communicates performance expectations
and the rules of the game to its junior staff has a direct impact on the degree of diversity that the university can allow and thus determines the extent to which it offers equal opportunities
to women and men. Consequently, expanding the group of young researchers that benefit from
mentoring relationships will improve equal opportunities.

Mentors are committed colleagues and academics who share their experiences and support others in achieving their goals and understanding the university’s rules – especially the informal ones. They discover and promote young talent and, in the process, help to develop networks and skills. This guide contains materials that you can use, regardless of whether you are participating in a formal programme or maintain informal mentoring relationships.
The point is to support the actors in mentoring relationships in making them systematic and reflective, thus counteracting "homosocial cooptation" as university research likes to call the university mode of recruitment.

Link to the Mentoring Handbook (part of the Graz University Library, free download)
In German: Mentoring Handbuch, online and print.