Professional Dissertations DMin

Date of Award

2009

Document Type

Project Report

Degree Name

Doctor of Ministry

College

Seventh-day Adventist Theological Seminary

Program

Doctor of Ministry DMin

First Advisor

Walton A. Williams

Second Advisor

Peter Swanson

Third Advisor

Jeanette Bryson

Abstract

Problem

Customer Service Representatives at the Adventist Information Ministry (AIM), the call center for the North American Division of Seventh-day Adventist Church media ministries on the campus of Andrews University in Michigan, have a passion for ministry but lack mentoring models to make their ministry effective. There is a great need to understand mentoring models operational at AIM and to develop a master plan for mentoring and empowering employees at Adventist Information Ministry.

Method

The purpose of this study was to discover the mentoring styles preferred by employees within the Seventh-day Adventist community of faith working at Adventist Information Ministry (AIM). Using the Mentoring Style Indicator survey instrument developed by William A. Gray and Marilynne Miles Gray (1996), employees at Adventist Information Ministry (AIM) were asked to list in order of their preference what mentoring styles they preferred to use when presented with six situational scenarios. The results were analyzed to determine the preferred mentoring styles employees at AIM like to provide and receive.

Results

The data collected ranked informational mentoring style as the most preferred followed by confirming, guiding and collaborative mentoring styles for employees at AIM. The data collected underscored that younger responders (18-24 year old group) preferred the informational mentoring style while the oldest group (32+ year olds) preferred the collaborative mentoring style. The data collected underscored that males preferred the information mentoring style while females preferred the guiding mentoring style. The data collected revealed that staff prefer to utilize the guiding mentoring style, shift leaders prefer to use the confirming mentoring style, and chaplains prefer to use the guiding mentoring style, and customer service representatives prefer the informational mentoring style. Results The data collected ranked informational mentoring style as the most preferred followed by confirming, guiding and collaborative mentoring styles for employees at AIM. The data collected underscored that younger responders (18-24 year old group) preferred the informational mentoring style while the oldest group (32+ year olds) preferred the collaborative mentoring style. The data collected underscored that males preferred the information mentoring style while females preferred the guiding mentoring style. The data collected revealed that staff prefer to utilize the guiding mentoring style, shift leaders prefer to use the confirming mentoring style, and chaplains prefer to use the guiding mentoring style, and customer service representatives prefer the informational mentoring style.

Conclusions

Mentoring is an evasive term in that it overlaps with coaching. Employees at AIM can be coached to obtain specific competencies but it does not mean that they are prepared to face all the challenges of ministry. Understanding mentor style preferences helps combat barriers to communication. Thus, a more efficient manner of knowledge transfer can happen. All initial mentoring relationships are dependent on information sharing (equipping) until the relationships takes on the dynamics of confirmation (empowering).

Subject Area

Mentoring in church work; Mentoring in the professions; Employees--Coaching of; General Conference of Seventh-day Adventists. North American Division. Adventist Information Ministry

Creative Commons License

Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

DOI

https://dx.doi.org/10.32597/dmin/460

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