True mentorship is not about hierarchy. It’s about co-creation. Photo: File
When I was asked to write a Women’s Month piece about the importance of women leaders and mentors, I knew I couldn’t write a celebratory piece. For me, it felt important to pause, reflect, and be honest about some of the more complicated realities that often go unnamed. Thus, this article is not an attempt to speak on behalf of all younger or older women, but rather a reflection shaped by my own experiences and conversations. It’s an endeavour to think out loud about what mentorship means, and how we might reimagine it in ways that serve not only individuals, but the collective.
One of the things I’ve noticed, and what many have quietly shared with me, is the unspoken tension that sometimes exists between younger women entering the workplace and older women who have already paved the way. It’s not something we easily talk about, but it’s there. Younger women often feel underestimated — told they’re too young, too inexperienced or too new to challenge the systems around them. Older women, who fought hard to secure their place in spaces that weren’t always welcoming, sometimes fear that younger voices are moving too quickly, disrupting carefully built structures or threatening hard-won recognition.
What results is not always open conflict, but a kind of subtle competition whereby opportunities are withheld, mentorship is hard to access, or innovation is quietly discouraged.
But here is where we must go deeper: this tension did not emerge in a vacuum. It is not simply about “older versus younger”. It is also about patriarchy. Patriarchal systems and behaviours have historically dictated who gets power and who does not, who gets a seat at the table and who remains standing. These systems have never been generous toward women, and they have deliberately cultivated an environment of scarcity. When women are told both directly or indirectly that there is limited space for them in leadership, that their presence in boardrooms or decision-making spaces is exceptional rather than ordinary, it is no surprise that competition emerges. Scarcity is a symptom of patriarchy, and women are too often left to carry the consequences of fighting over crumbs in spaces where they should have had equal access all along.
Recognising this matters because it shifts the narrative. The real issue is not that women cannot work together, but that the environments we operate in have been shaped by systems that benefit from division. When opportunities are made to feel limited, collaboration becomes harder. But when abundance is created and structures actively dismantle barriers, intergenerational mentorship for women can flourish.
For me, true mentorship is not about hierarchy. It’s about co-creation. It’s about ensuring that growth is not only individual, but collective. When younger women enter the workforce, they should be seen as a sign of progress and the very proof of what older women’s struggles and sacrifices made possible. Their perspectives don’t replace the wisdom of those who came before them; they expand it, carrying it into new spaces. Similarly, the role of older women should not be reduced to that of distant role models. Yes, they are mentors, but they can also be collaborators, friends, and companions in growth. Their wisdom is not only a map of the past but a resource for shaping the future.
This Women’s Month, I find myself asking: how can we reframe the way we think about mentorship? How can we move beyond the mindset of competition and scarcity, and instead see mentorship as reciprocal? Younger women have things to teach just as much as they have to learn. Older women have things to learn just as much as they have to teach. The flow of knowledge, power, and joy should move in both directions.
We need spaces where women can speak honestly about these feelings without judgment. We need to challenge the patriarchal systems that limit opportunities in the first place so that mentorship does not happen in an environment of scarcity, but one of abundance. Reimagining mentorship in this way allows us to move beyond rivalry. It allows us to build cultures where women don’t just survive the workplace but shape it into something healing, abundant, and joyful.
I don’t have all the answers. But what I do know is that women’s progress cannot be built on silent competition. It must be rooted in shared purpose and an honest acknowledgment of the forces that have shaped the spaces we occupy. My hope is that we begin to see mentorship not as hierarchy, but as humanity. That we create spaces where intergenerational power is not a threat, but a gift. And that, together, we rise not as competitors, but as collaborators in collective liberation.
Unopachido Akwande Mubaiwa is a citizenship engagement coordinator at the Frederik Van Zyl Slabbert Institute for Student Leadership Development at Stellenbosch University.