Mentoring is valuable for the Mentor for the following reasons:

A mentee can:

• Help the mentor establish a legacy
• Provide the mentor a role in the molding of successors
• Provide an extension of the mentor's power base
• Reinforce a mentor's professional identity
• Pass on personal knowledge that will help the mentor stay up-to-date in the field
• Provide assistance with the mentor's projects
• Bring to the mentor a sense of achievement or accomplishment
• Help the mentor acquire new technical knowledge

A mentor

• Provides a fund of knowledge that can expand a mentee's current information base and point them toward new resources
• Can "target" the skills needed by the mentee for successful career development by identifying the specific areas of improvement that will need to be addressed
• Provide individual recognition and encouragement that is particularly important in competitive fields
• Gives honest criticism and informal feedback and keeps the mentee's work "on track" and directed toward career goals and minimizes unnecessary career digressions
• Can demonstrate an increased awareness of the formal and informal rules of the organization and keep a mentee abreast of these sometimes conflicting sets of rules
• Can advocate for the mentee (for promotion, salary, resources), keep the mentee's name before the people who make organizational decisions, and recommend a mentee for tasks useful to their career
• Can protect a mentee, particularly important during times of downsizing, management restructuring, or changes within the profession
• May, if willing and competent, give advice on balancing multiple career and or personal tasks

(Hoffman, B. Mentoring: On Having One and Being One. Academic Life, AACP Council of Faculties.)