Late last year, we invited multiple friends of the Macy Foundation to contribute to the January Macy Notes blog post in anticipation of National Mentoring Month, taking place throughout this month. Our authors share their thoughtful reflections to the question “What is one of the traits displayed by your most important and impactful mentor that you strive to emulate as a mentor yourself?” We hope the following comments will inspire you in your own mentoring activities as we work together to create a better future for all health professions learners and, in turn, for the patients under their care.
Conrad Safranek, BS
Third-Year Medical Student
Yale School of Medicine
2024 Macy Conference Participant
One of my most memorable mentorship moments happened during my final meeting with my undergraduate thesis advisor before I headed to medical school. Over our last round of coffee and pastries, I asked him for any big-picture advice. He shared something unexpected: “I hope you see the value in our mentorship relationship. I want you to pay it forward.” That comment made me pause and reflect on what mentorship really is and how my role in it would evolve. Mentorship is wonderfully asymmetric: The twenty minutes a mentor sets aside can save a mentee hours of online searching or second-guessing. When we face pivotal career decisions, often with limited information, it’s striking how much reality can differ from expectations. A mentor’s viewpoint in those moments is invaluable.
Since then, “pay it forward” has stuck with me, especially as I’ve become a mentor myself. For me, it comes down to one key quality: making yourself available. It may sound obvious, but simply making time for someone can form the foundation of a supportive mentoring relationship. Just as my advisor did for me, I want to remind my own mentees to pay it forward so that these enriching relationships—ones that effectively cut down indecision and broaden perspectives—will continue to benefit the next generation. This National Mentoring Month, I invite everyone to take time to express gratitude to their support system and to look for ways they might “pass it on.”
Mandy Kirkpatrick, PhD, RN, RAAN, FNAP
Associate Dean for Research & Innovation
Criss/Beirne Endowed Professor of Nursing
Creighton University College of Nursing
2019 Macy Faculty Scholar
As a Macy Faculty Scholar and throughout my career at Creighton University, I have been blessed with multiple incredible mentors. I have so much gratitude for these mentors who have challenged me, believed in me, and encouraged me throughout my career. In reflecting on the most salient attributes of an effective mentor, CONNECTION stands out the most impactful characteristic I have witnessed and hope to emulate.
When mentors establish a genuine connection with their mentees, they create a safe and supportive environment that fosters growth, trust, and open communication. My mentors did this through actively listening, demonstrating empathy, understanding, and tailoring guidance to meet my individualized needs. My mentors provided constructive feedback in a way that was both respectful and empowering, and challenged me to learn from the experience. Established trust and mutual respect in our mentor/mentee relationship enabled me to accept even the most difficult feedback willingly and with the knowledge of its positive intent.
The power of connection extends beyond the individual mentor/mentee relationship when mentors foster external bonds that can have a lasting impact on a mentee’s career trajectory. My mentors brought incredible value to our relationship by leveraging their professional networks to support my growth. My mentors introduced me to new contacts, within and beyond the Macy Foundation, facilitating opportunities that might otherwise have been inaccessible or impossible to achieve on my own.
On this year’s “Thank Your Mentor Day,” I will not only say thank you, but also aim to express my gratitude through my mentorship of others. I am dedicated to paying forward these blessings by embracing each opportunity to CONNECT with mentees and create a ripple effect of positive change.
Justin Bullock, MD
Clinical Researcher and Fellow
University of Washington, Division of Nephrology
2022 Macy Conference Participant
When I was a second-year medical student beginning my first medical education research project, I came in with lots of excitement and very little experience. I still remember my shock when after a month, my mentor, Dr. Karen Hauer, asked me for feedback on her mentoring. It was remarkable to me that she still wanted feedback despite being a very experienced researcher, prized mentor, and dean at my medical school. This moment was the first of countless opportunities I have had to observe Karen’s commitment to developing learners.
From our first days working together, Karen treated me like a colleague. As we designed that first project, she guided me in the moments where I needed support while also championing my ideas for our study. For almost a decade, Karen has demonstrated her commitment to equity and changing the status quo by championing learners (many of whom are from minoritized backgrounds), equipping us with research skills and sponsoring us when we are not in the room. Over the years, Karen and I have, of course, bonded over our mutual love of medical education research. But more importantly, Karen has become a friend. After a time in training where I struggled with my mental health, Karen let me know that she had noticed and asked me how she could best support me in the future. Her kindness, respect, and commitment to me has exceeded by far the greatest hopes that second-year medical student Justin could imagine. I’m a lucky mentee to have Dr. Karen Hauer in my life.
Holly J. Humphrey, MD, MACP
President
Josiah Macy Jr. Foundation
Over the course of a dozen years at the very beginning of my career as a student, resident, chief resident, and program director, I personally experienced one of life’s greatest gifts—a transformative mentoring experience. While I have written about this much more extensively in my 2010 book Mentoring in Academic Medicine and my introduction to Dr. Kathlyn Fletcher’s book Leading Through Crisis, in honor of mentoring month, I am sharing some lessons that I learned from my most notable mentor, Dr. Arthur Rubenstein.
While many of the lessons were directly imparted, many more came from watching Dr. Rubenstein, then a department chair, engage on a deep, personal level with students, residents, and faculty. During times of crisis, he shared his own emotions freely and openly. The only wrong thing, according to him, was to say nothing at all. This practice imbued in colleagues and learners a feeling of being listened to and cared for, hearkening to the oft-quoted words of Dr. Francis Peabody: “The secret of the care of the patient [or resident, or learner, or colleague] is caring for the patient.”
While the charge for this blog post was to reflect on one of the traits displayed by an important mentor, I hope you will indulge me; as I suspect is true of all our contributors, to distill our mentor’s admirable traits to just one is a tall order! In keeping with the theme of compassionate, thoughtful leadership as modeled by Dr. Rubenstein, here are some of the lessons that I learned from him that have served as guiding principles to me and my leadership team over the course of my career:
- Act in the patient’s best interest and you will not go wrong
- Take the high road
- Express gratitude
- Don’t take credit for other people’s work
- Show respect and kindness—for all
- Act on behalf of the most vulnerable
- Remember the primacy of family
My hope is that these lessons will not only prove valuable in and of themselves, but also convey the way in which personal interactions and guiding principles can indelibly shape an individual’s day-to-day experience.