Mentoring as a Catalyst for Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion

By Marianne Bremner.

Imagine being a senior leader making critical decisions about strategy, culture, and people, without ever having experienced what it feels like to be marginalised in your own workplace. This is the reality for many executives, leading with the best of intentions but often without lived insight into the barriers faced by underrepresented groups. 

Mentoring provides a bridge. By pairing senior leaders with colleagues from different backgrounds, across gender, ethnicity, age, ability, or sexual orientation, organisations can create meaningful dialogue that fosters empathy, inclusion, and systemic change. 

Why This Matters Now 

Organisations are under increasing pressure to demonstrate genuine progress on diversity, equity, and inclusion (EDI). Traditional training has its limits: while it raises awareness, research shows it rarely changes deep-rooted attitudes or behaviours. Mentoring offers something different. By building authentic relationships, leaders gain a first-hand perspective on the challenges faced by colleagues from diverse groups, while mentees gain visibility, voice, and empowerment. 

For Business Psychologists, this approach resonates with our understanding of contact theory, the principle that sustained, meaningful interaction between groups can reduce bias and increase empathy.  

The Psychology Behind It 

Several psychological theories underpin the success of mentoring in advancing EDI: 

• Contact Hypothesis (Allport, 1954) – Prejudice decreases when people from different groups engage in equal-status, cooperative relationships. Mentoring provides exactly this type of interaction.
• Perspective-Taking (Galinsky & Moskowitz, 2000) – Stepping into another’s shoes enhances empathy and reduces stereotyping. Mentoring conversations are structured opportunities for perspective-taking.
• Immunity to Change (Kegan & Lahey, 2009) – People often resist inclusive behaviours unconsciously. Mentoring relationships provide a safe space to surface and challenge these hidden barriers. 
• Psychological Safety (Edmondson, 1999) – For honest dialogue about difference to happen, mentees must feel safe. Mentoring can build trust and model safe spaces across levels of hierarchy.

These theories combine to explain why mentoring doesn’t just “raise awareness”, it changes behaviour and culture. 

Business Psychology in Action 

In the NHS, reverse mentoring has been piloted to improve leadership diversity. Senior leaders were paired with junior staff from underrepresented ethnic groups. Feedback showed leaders developed greater understanding of structural inequalities, while mentees reported feeling valued and empowered to shape organisational change. 

Barclays Bank has also implemented reverse mentoring to address gender inclusion, with younger women mentoring senior male executives. Leaders reported increased awareness of gendered barriers, and the organisation reported progress on gender representation at leadership levels. 

These examples highlight mentoring as a practical, evidence-based EDI intervention that creates measurable cultural impact. 

Looking Ahead & Call to Action 

EDI progress requires more than policies and training; it requires relationships, trust, and shared understanding. Mentoring delivers this by creating authentic dialogue between leaders and those whose voices most need to be heard. 

At the Association for Business Psychology, our self-driven mentorship programme, ABP ConneXt, is designed with this in mind. Members are able to create mentoring partnerships that cut across hierarchy, experience, and identity, thereby embedding inclusion into the very fabric of professional growth. 

References 

Allport, G. W. (1954). The nature of prejudice. Addison-Wesley. 

Dobbin, F., & Kalev, A. (2018). Why doesn’t diversity training work? The challenge for industry and academia. Anthropology Now, 10(2), 48–55. https://doi.org/10.1080/19428200.2018.1493182 

Edmondson, A. (1999). Psychological safety and learning behavior in work teams. Administrative Science Quarterly, 44(2), 350–383. https://doi.org/10.2307/2666999 

Galinsky, A. D., & Moskowitz, G. B. (2000). Perspective-taking: Decreasing stereotype expression, stereotype accessibility, and in-group favoritism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 78(4), 708–724. https://doi.org/10.1037/0022-3514.78.4.708 

Kegan, R., & Lahey, L. L. (2009). Immunity to change: How to overcome it and unlock the potential in yourself and your organization. Harvard Business Press. 

Murphy, W. M. (2012). Reverse mentoring at work: Fostering cross‐generational learning and developing millennial leaders. Human Resource Management, 51(4), 549–573. https://doi.org/10.1002/hrm.21489 

Raza, A., & Onyesoh, M. (2020). Reverse mentoring for senior NHS leaders: a new type of relationship. Future Healthc J. Feb;7(1):94-96. doi: 10.7861/fhj.2019-0028.