However, if the mentor is not completely confident in the mentee’s capacity to complete the envisioned agenda, then the obligation to offer honest feedback can suddenly be transformed into a significant source of possible friction. An important guideline, therefore, is to remember that even after forming a skeptical assessment of the mentee’s plans, mentors are not automatically required to immediately transmit their reactions. In these cases, mentors will often need to tread very carefully with regard to openly questioning mentees’ abilities to accomplish their stated career and educational objectives.
Generally, this type of volatile issue would have surfaced (and hopefully been resolved) well before the later phases of mentoring, although some mentees may insist on periodically revisiting prior agendas until the very last stages of the relationship. Also, in the early stages of mentoring, most mentors would have already found that the cautious approach was the practical brake which prevented them from commenting too quickly—and therefore possibly unwisely—regarding their doubts about their mentees’ plans.
Mentors need to be fully attuned to the mistakes awaiting those who proffer instant advice to mentees with whom they are just becoming acquainted, and to fully recognize those interpersonal situations in which they have not yet accumulated enough substantive information.
But as the mentoring relationship evolves, and the mentor develops a reasonably well-defined profile of the mentee, then the mentor may actually be faced with the problem of whether or not to agree with the mentee’s openly expressed hopes for the future.
If the past record, as well as the the present evidence, indicate that mentees have formed highly unrealistic goals which will be extremely difficult to accomplish, then the mentor must make a judgment about what action to take at that point in the relationship. The mentor must determine the most helpful strategy: Would it be beneficial or not to confront the mentee?