Understanding the Dynamics of Formal Mentoring Program: A model for Effective Implementation

India has emerged as the fastest growing economy in the world, and with the Indian government's initiatives like “ Make in India” and “Digital India” campaigns gaining popularity, firms worldwide, are witnessing a huge growth opportunity to expand business in India. India has become the favourite sourcing destination for the west and many MNC's are setting up innovation centres in India due to the availability of skilled workforce. Bengaluru is considered to be the IT hub of India because it contributes more than 35% of total revenue for the Industry in India. IT industry in India has a major contribution in the Indian economy and has transformed the society by providing remarkable employment opportunities for the youth. Youth employment in India is increasing at the rate of 9.5% every year and is bound to increase in the coming years. An effective employee development program which can help the new employees to adjust to the company, learn tricks of the trade and grow professionally, is the need of the hour. Many IT companies have a formal mentoring program to address these issues. This paper attempts to study the various aspects of mentorship acceptance and the benefits associated it, from the perspective of protégés. The study focussed on IT firms in Bengaluru. The objective of the study is to investigate whether gender of employees has a significant difference on acceptance of mentoring and whether the acceptance of mentoring by protégés increases its benefits. The study highlighted that there is no significance difference between genders on mentoring acceptance and emphasised the importance of mentoring acceptance to enhance the benefits received by the protégés.