The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes

Zixuan Feng; Igor Steinmacher; Marco Aurelio Gerosa; Tyler Menezes; Alexander Serebrenik; Reed Milewicz; Anita Sarma

doi:10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031

The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes

Zixuan Feng
, Igor Steinmacher
, Marco Aurelio Gerosa
, Tyler Menezes
, Alexander Serebrenik
, Reed Milewicz
, Anita Sarma

Software Engineering and Technology

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Academic › peer-review

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Abstract

Mentorship in open source software (OSS) is a vital, multifaceted process that includes onboarding newcomers, fostering skill development, and enhancing community building. This study examines task-focused mentoring strategies that help mentees complete their tasks and the ideal personal qualities and outcomes of good mentorship in OSS communities. We conducted two surveys to gather contributor perceptions: the first survey, with 70 mentors, mapped 17 mentoring challenges to 21 strategies that help support mentees. The second survey, with 85 contributors, assessed the importance of personal qualities and ideal mentorship outcomes. Our findings not only provide actionable strategies to help mentees overcome challenges and become successful contributors but also guide current and future mentors and OSS communities in understanding the personal qualities that are the cornerstone of good mentorship and the outcomes that mentor-mentee pairs should aspire to achieve.

Original language	English
Title of host publication	2025 IEEE/ACM 18th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025
Publisher	Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers
Pages	203-214
Number of pages	12
ISBN (Electronic)	979-8-3315-3871-2
DOIs	https://doi.org/10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031
Publication status	Published - 12 Jun 2025
Event	18th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025 - Ottawa, Canada Duration: 27 Apr 2025 → 28 Apr 2025

Conference

Conference	18th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025
Abbreviated title	CHASE 2025
Country/Territory	Canada
City	Ottawa
Period	27/04/25 → 28/04/25

Funding

We thank the Outreachy group for their valuable feedback on the survey design and our survey respondents. We also thank Diane Mueller and Nate Waddington for their contributions. This work is partially supported by NSF grants 1901031, 2235601, 2236198, 2247929, 2303042, 2303043, and 2347311. Sandia National Laboratories is a multi-mission laboratory managed and operated by National Technology & Engineering Solutions of Sandia, LLC (NTESS), a wholly owned subsidiary of Honeywell International Inc., for the U.S. Department of Energy\u2019s National Nuclear Security Administration (DOE/NNSA) under contract DE-NA0003525. This written work is authored by an employee of NTESS. The employee, not NTESS, owns the right, title and interest in and to the written work and is responsible for its contents. Any subjective views or opinions that might be expressed in the written work do not necessarily represent the views of the U.S. Government. The publisher acknowledges that the U.S. Government retains a non-exclusive, paid-up, irrevocable, world-wide license to publish or reproduce the published form of this written work or allow others to do so, for U.S. Government purposes. The DOE will provide public access to results of federally sponsored research in accordance with the DOE Public Access Plan.

Keywords

Mentoring
Open Source Software
Strategies

Access to Document

10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031

pdfFinal published version, 2.19 MBLicence: TAVERNE

https://arxiv.org/pdf/2501.05600

Cite this

Feng, Z., Steinmacher, I., Gerosa, M. A., Menezes, T., Serebrenik, A., Milewicz, R., & Sarma, A. (2025). The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes. In 2025 IEEE/ACM 18th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025 (pp. 203-214). Article 11024418 Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. https://doi.org/10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031

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abstract = "Mentorship in open source software (OSS) is a vital, multifaceted process that includes onboarding newcomers, fostering skill development, and enhancing community building. This study examines task-focused mentoring strategies that help mentees complete their tasks and the ideal personal qualities and outcomes of good mentorship in OSS communities. We conducted two surveys to gather contributor perceptions: the first survey, with 70 mentors, mapped 17 mentoring challenges to 21 strategies that help support mentees. The second survey, with 85 contributors, assessed the importance of personal qualities and ideal mentorship outcomes. Our findings not only provide actionable strategies to help mentees overcome challenges and become successful contributors but also guide current and future mentors and OSS communities in understanding the personal qualities that are the cornerstone of good mentorship and the outcomes that mentor-mentee pairs should aspire to achieve.",

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publisher = "Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers",

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Feng, Z, Steinmacher, I, Gerosa, MA, Menezes, T, Serebrenik, A, Milewicz, R & Sarma, A 2025, The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes. in 2025 IEEE/ACM 18th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025., 11024418, Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, pp. 203-214, 18th IEEE/ACM International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025, Ottawa, Canada, 27/04/25. https://doi.org/10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031

The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes. / Feng, Zixuan; Steinmacher, Igor; Gerosa, Marco Aurelio et al.
2025 IEEE/ACM 18th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, 2025. p. 203-214 11024418.

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceeding › Conference contribution › Academic › peer-review

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AU - Serebrenik, Alexander

AU - Milewicz, Reed

AU - Sarma, Anita

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AB - Mentorship in open source software (OSS) is a vital, multifaceted process that includes onboarding newcomers, fostering skill development, and enhancing community building. This study examines task-focused mentoring strategies that help mentees complete their tasks and the ideal personal qualities and outcomes of good mentorship in OSS communities. We conducted two surveys to gather contributor perceptions: the first survey, with 70 mentors, mapped 17 mentoring challenges to 21 strategies that help support mentees. The second survey, with 85 contributors, assessed the importance of personal qualities and ideal mentorship outcomes. Our findings not only provide actionable strategies to help mentees overcome challenges and become successful contributors but also guide current and future mentors and OSS communities in understanding the personal qualities that are the cornerstone of good mentorship and the outcomes that mentor-mentee pairs should aspire to achieve.

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Feng Z, Steinmacher I, Gerosa MA, Menezes T, Serebrenik A, Milewicz R et al. The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes. In 2025 IEEE/ACM 18th International Conference on Cooperative and Human Aspects of Software Engineering, CHASE 2025. Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. 2025. p. 203-214. 11024418 doi: 10.1109/CHASE66643.2025.00031

The Multifaceted Nature of Mentoring in OSS: Strategies, Qualities, and Ideal Outcomes

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