The following competency-specific and general resources are designed to support faculty mentors in navigating relationships across the six core mentoring competencies.
Fostering Independence
The following resources provide strategies and tools to help mentors empower mentees toward self-reliance and professional autonomy.
- Leadership Lab Book: A Discovery Guide for Developing and Motivating Others (UCSF Center for Health Professions)
- Towards an autonomy-supportive model of wellness in Canadian Medical Education. (Neufeld, Canadian Journal of Medical Education, 2022)
- Supporting Graduate Student Mental Health and Well-Being: Evidence-informed recommendations for the graduate community (Council of Graduate Schools and The Jed Foundation, 2021)
Maintaining Effective Communication
Explore these guides and tools to build open, ongoing dialogues that make mentoring transparent, productive, and collaborative.
- Listen Actively: To Be Heard, Listen First (Baylor College Medicine Ombuds Office)
- Decision Tree for Dealing with Difficult Mentoring Situations (UCSF Faculty and Staff Assistance Program and Mentor Development Program)
- What Research Says About Giving Effective Feedback to Students (Inside Social and Emotional Learning Research Brief, 2020)
- Being Assertive: Reduce stress, communicate better (Mayo Clinic)
Promoting Professional Development
These resources will support you in helping mentees map their strengths and values, set career goals, and pursue opportunities both within academia and beyond.
- Career Development Planning Cycle (Emory School of Medicine)
- Utilising a SWOT Analysis For Your Career Planning (Public Sector People)
- Resources for Developing Professional Skills (UCSF Office for Career and Professional Development)
- Resources for Finding and Applying for Jobs (UCSF Office for Career and Professional Development)
- Mentoring Opportunities for Graduate Students and Postdocs (UCSF Office for Career and Professional Development)
- Balancing Work-Life (UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute)
Building and Maintaining Inclusive Spaces
Use the articles and toolkits below to design mentoring environments where all mentees feel welcomed, respected, and equipped to contribute their best work.
- Mentoring Underrepresented Students in STEMM: A Survey and Discussion (Mcgee, E. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2019)
- Mentoring beyond Hierarchies: Multi-Mentor Systems and Models (Montgomery et al. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, 2019)
- Equity-Minded Mentoring Toolkit (Wofford et al., USC Rossier Pullias Center for Higher Education)
- Mentoring Underrepresented Students in STEMM: Why Do Identities Matter? (The Science of Effective Mentorship in STEMM, Chapter 3. The National Academies Press, 2019)
Aligning Expectations
Consult these resources to clarify roles, responsibilities, and milestones up front, and to better address any misalignments along your mentoring journey.
- Individual Development Plan (IDP) Library (Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research)
- Appropriate Treatment of Research Trainees (American Association of Medical Colleges, Group on Research, Education and Training, 2021)
- Compact Between Biomedical Students and Their Research Advisors (American Association of Medical Colleges, 2017)
- Mentoring Meeting and Individual Development Plans (UCSF Clinical and Translational Science Institute)
- Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine IDP (Northwestern Medicine)
Assessing Understanding
The following resources offer knowledge and techniques for gauging mentee comprehension and adapting your guidance to their evolving needs.
- Assessment and Evaluation: What Can Be Measured in Mentorship, and How? (The Science of Effective Mentorship in STEMM, Chapter 6. The National Academies Press, 2019)
- Measuring Mentor-Mentee Alignment: A Toolkit (Pfund et al., University of Wisconsin – Madison School of Medicine and Public Health, and Wisconsin Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research, 2020)
- What Makes a Good Match? Predictors of Quality Mentorship Among Doctoral Students. (Tuma & Dolan. Journal of Cell Biology Life Sciences Education, 2024)
General Resources
The following general resources provide examples of mentorship programs in academic settings, curricula, and evidence-based frameworks to help faculty mentors cultivate effective and growth-minded relationships.
- Center for the Improvement of Mentored Experiences in Research (CIMER): “Entering Mentoring” Curriculum
- UCSF: OCPD Research Mentoring
- UCSF Office of Faculty and Academic Affairs Mentoring Page
- Columbia, Irving Medical Center: Mentor/Mentee Trainings
- Stanford Medicine: Faculty Mentoring
- University of Pittsburgh: Mentoring Academy