Over four decades, I have encountered thousands of mentoring programmes in dozens of countries. Many of them deliver superb results for all their stakeholders. Other fizzle out and leave no lasting legacy. The mentoring programme standards from the EMCC were introduced nearly 20 years ago and have been periodically updated. They provided the basis for the Programme Manager Quality Award, the professional recognition of anyone responsible for designing and implementing mentoring or coaching programmes in organisations. One of the requirements for the PMQA is to produce a case study of a programme, in which the participant has an active managerial role.

We’ve learned a lot about what good practice looks like and how it can vary from context to context. We’ve also learned about errors that undermine the effectiveness of programmes. Here are some of the most common:

Under-investment in training mentors and mentees for their roles.
People come with different expectations of what mentoring is about. For example, mentors may assume it’s all about giving advice; mentees may assume their role is passive. When both partners in a mentoring relationship understand how to create and sustain the learning dialogue, most relationships last the full term and both achieve considerable learning.

Conflating sponsorship and mentoring.
Although early US studies linked the two roles, we now know that they are largely incompatible in the same person, not least because the power dynamics overshadow open, reflective learning. These problems are compounded when mentor and mentee are direct report and line manager. The success rate in the latter case is poor and the impact on team dynamics (of what is perceived as favouritism) usually negative.

Failure to plan for good endings.
Research conducted into how coaching and mentoring relationships end show conclusively that those, where both parties planned the formal ending and celebrated what had been achieved, were almost always seen as positive in retrospect, while those that didn’t were much mor likely to be recollected negatively.

Lack of continued support.
Many programmes die when their funding is cut. In the context of corporate programmes one of the core causes is failure to link the purpose of mentoring clearly to strategic business priorities. Long-running mentoring programmes tend to have a broad caucus of support, because the costs of discontinuation are widely recognised.

Inadequate programme management.
Is it better to have large numbers of relatively poor-quality mentoring relationships or smaller numbers of high-quality ones? Mentoring platforms that match participants according to algorithms don’t necessarily provide good pairings. Experience from programme managers is very clear – human intervention leads to more successful relationships that delve deeper.

Failure to involve stakeholder groups.
When a programme is focussed on a specific group (for example, female middle managers) it works much better when they have a say in the design and management.

Undervaluing mentors.
Mentors are typically busy people, who have to create time in a packed diary to meet with their mentees. Retention of mentors seems to be linked to two factors: how top management recognises and thanks them for their efforts and how clearly the mentoring programme purpose is linked to benefits for the organisation and the mentees. Nobody likes to be taken for granted!

Well-trained mentoring programmes managers are aware of all these – and many more – potential pitfalls. They also link with peers in other organisations, absorbing good new ideas and guiding each other as needed.

Finally – did you know that we offer the worlds only accredited english speaking course for Programme Managers of Coaching & Mentoring schemes? For a low investment, individuals can become dual accredited – IPMA accreditation & EIA Accreditation with the European Mentoring and Coaching Council (EMCC Global) and you can save your organisation a huge amount of money, time and resources by ensuring that your programme efforts are optimised rather than just well intended.

© David Clutterbuck, 2026