Dealing with negative mentoring experiences: the roles of ‘can‐do’ and ‘reason‐to’ factors

Abstract

Academics and practitioners have long worked to reduce negative mentoring experiences. Drawing on social cognitive theory and expectancy–value theory, we examined the link between mentors' perceived organizational support and protégés' negative mentoring experiences, shedding light on the mediating effect of mentoring self‐efficacy and the moderating effect of mentors' self‐enhancement motives. Results based on data from 260 protégés and 214 mentors in Chinese organizations supported our proposed hypotheses. Mentoring self‐efficacy mediated the negative relationship between mentors' perceived organizational support and protégés' negative mentoring experiences. In addition, mentors' self‐enhancement motives intensified both the negative relationship between mentoring self‐efficacy and negative mentoring experiences and the indirect impact of mentors' perceived organizational support on protégés' negative mentoring experiences via mentoring self‐efficacy. A discussion of the theoretical and managerial implications of these findings is included.