How Faculty Can Better Develop Their Mentoring Network

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Clara Lapiner

Clara L. Lapiner, MPH, joins us on the Faculty Factory Podcast this week to discuss unique and vibrant models that are useful to faculty to help drive and improve their mentoring relationships.

Ms. Lapiner is Executive Director of Faculty Professional Development, Diversity and Inclusion with Columbia University Irving Medical Center in New York.

She is a colleague of mine with the Association of American Medical Colleges (AAMC) Group on Faculty Affairs (GFA) Research and Scholarship Committee. This is the second time she has joined me on the Faculty Factory, her first appearance can be accessed via the link below:

“Mentoring is often contributed as being a factor in which faculty can rise through the ranks,” she said.

As we discuss on today’s episode, mentoring can be a strong tool for mitigating challenges facing faculty of color and gender disparities in academia. The topic of this discussion is timely and very important as evidence shows the COVID-19 pandemic is putting us at risk for seeing these disparities grow even further and deeper.

Mentoring roles can be grouped into two broad categories:

  1. Technical (or instrumental) career development.
  2. Psychosocial support.

The literature has shown that high-quality mentoring should include both of the functions above. Ms. Lapiner discusses mentoring models that help serve both of these functions on today’s podcast. Needless to say, it’s a highly impactful discussion.

Make sure to listen to the episode via the embedded podcast player above or by visiting our podcast homepage.