WHAT DOES MENTORSHIP REALLY MEAN? RETHINKING PHYSICAL THERAPY MENTORSHIP PROGRAMS
by Mike Evangelist, Chief Clinical Officer, JAG Physical Therapy
Our profession puts a tremendous amount of focus and resources into “mentorship programs” for new graduate physical therapists — and rightly so. But after years of building and refining ours at JAG Physical Therapy, I’ve come to believe the concept itself needs a recalibration.
In this article you will learn:
- What separates a real physical therapy mentorship program from a checklist
- Why your mentors need to be trained and led, not just assigned
- Who a mentorship program should actually include
- How to build a productivity ramp-up phase that respects what new grad PTs can handle
What Makes a Strong Physical Therapy Mentor?
Every company has some form of mentorship. Far fewer have strong mentors — and without them, no mentorship program can be effective.
A strong mentor is also a strong leader. That means:
- Process and consistent follow-up. A mentorship program needs a defined structure, not ad hoc check-ins.
- Milestones. Set a standard that every mentor works toward with every mentee, so progress is measurable rather than assumed.
- Technology support. In many companies, mentors and mentorship coordinators are also treating clinicians. Training another person is manual, time-consuming work on top of a full patient load. AI tools and learning management systems can and should ease that burden — freeing mentors to focus on the coaching itself, not the administrative overhead around it.
We want mentors who enjoy the experience enough to keep coaching new physical therapists for years to come. That doesn’t happen by accident.
Should Mentors Be Part of Your Clinical Leadership Track?
If your company has a leadership training program, ask yourself: are your mentors in it?
They should be. Mentors carry one of the most important jobs in the company — training the next generation of clinicians and, by extension, the future of the company’s growth. They belong among your clinical leaders in training, not off to the side of that pipeline. At JAG, that’s part of why our professional development pathway treats new graduate mentorship, advanced clinical training, and administrative leadership as three connected tracks rather than three separate programs.
It’s also worth putting your mentorship coordinators front and center — in interviews and in your marketing. Who are they? What’s their experience? How do they approach mentorship day to day? These are people, not a program feature, and they’re a real factor in recruiting and retaining new grad PTs.
Who Should Be Included in a Physical Therapy Mentorship Program?
Many companies set a 3-, 6-, or 12-month mentorship “graduation.” Others limit mentorship exclusively to new grads or clinicians with under 12 months of experience.
Here’s the question worth sitting with: does a clinician with 10 years of experience know everything about patient care? Most PTs I know never want to stop learning — they’re always looking to add another tool to the toolbox.
Build a mentorship pathway that lets everyone stay involved and keep learning alongside their peers. Make it exciting and engaging for PTs at every stage, not just the newest ones. Poll and survey your staff for what they’d actually want out of it, then act on what you hear. Once people trust they have a real voice in the program, they show up for it differently.
What Should a New Grad PT's Ramp-Up Phase Look Like?
In an outpatient setting, productivity ramp-up is its own design problem. A few questions worth asking:
- What do DPT programs expect for student productivity during the final clinical rotation?
- Will new grad PTs work alongside experienced clinicians, or on their own from day one?
- How long is your company’s ramp-up phase?
- How often does mentor-mentee check-in happen, and what does that process look like? Consistent, meaningful communication is the throughline that makes the rest of this work.
A real ramp-up phase matters because it takes time to learn an office’s specific workflow and clinical operations — plus a new EMR and whatever AI tools go with it.
Why New Grad PTs Can Handle More Than We Give Them Credit For
Here’s the factor I think gets underweighted: physical therapists are among the most intelligent, dedicated, and driven people in the country. If anyone can multitask, PTs can — they were already doing it as students, juggling coursework and clinical rotations at once.
My recommendation: build in a real learning phase, but don’t hold new grads back from a full caseload for longer than necessary. They can handle it — more than they, or we, sometimes give them credit for. What they need most is confidence and support from their company to get there and stay there.
A Message to the Next Generation of Physical Therapists
I’ve never been more excited about our profession than I am right now. Between attending CSM every year and speaking at universities across the country, I’ve watched incredible new physical therapists enter this field — with plenty more close behind them.
Physicians need us to help care for their patients. Patients need us to help them reach their functional goals and stay ahead of injury. And the country needs us to keep building physical therapy into one of the most reliable, versatile, and trusted options in healthcare.
Let’s make a pact: be great mentors for the next generation of clinicians, and keep bringing PTs together to make the profession better for everyone in it.
If you’re a PT student or new grad wondering what a real mentorship program looks like in practice, take a look at JAG’s New Graduate Clinical Mentorship Program — or explore current clinical opportunities at JAG Physical Therapy.
FAQs
How long does a physical therapy mentorship program typically last?
It varies by employer — many run 3, 6, or 12 months before a formal “graduation” point. At JAG, we believe mentorship works better as an ongoing pathway that clinicians can stay engaged with well past their first year, not a program with a hard end date.
Is mentorship only for new graduate physical therapists?
No — and we’d argue it shouldn’t be. Experienced clinicians benefit from continued mentorship too. A program built only for new grads misses PTs who want to keep learning throughout their career.
Mike Evangelist earned his master’s degree in physical therapy from the esteemed Northeastern University program in 2004. Mike has since enjoyed rehabilitating a variety of different patients, including local high school and elite college athletes, as well as professional soccer, baseball, and lacrosse athletes. He specializes in sports medicine rehabilitation, including soft tissue massage and joint mobilization techniques from the International Academy of Orthopedic Medicine and Mulligan Techniques. His other specialties include neurological and vestibular rehabilitation. Mike is a member of the American Physical Therapy Association.