ABSTRACT
Over the last decade, concern about the availability and effectiveness of mentoring relationships for racial minorities has increased (see Ragins, 1997, for a review of the literature). Research on mentoring, as well as that examining boss-subordinate dyads (Tsui & O’Reilly, 1989) and social networks (Ibarra, 1995), has shown that the individual’s racial identity and the racial composition of the dyad influence whether or not developmental relationships form and what types of support they provide when they do form. Despite the well-documented tendency of individuals to form relationships with people from the same identity groups (see Tsui, Egan, & O’Reilly, 1992, for a review of this literature), this research has shown that racial mi-norities are more likely than not to engage in developmental relationships with White seniors. Indeed, in some of my own earlier research I found that Blacks formed 75% of their within-company developmental relationships with Whites,
mostly White men. Hence, much of the research on race and mentoring has centered on cross-race pairings (Thomas, 1990, 1993).
