A Profession Is Either Passed On — Or It Dies
By Mike Torchinsky · April 24, 2026 · Leadership
There is a quiet shift happening inside many professional communities. One that few people openly discuss.
People are slowly stopping teaching each other.
This is not an abstract observation.
Over the past five years, I’ve had dozens of conversations with colleagues in executive search, partners in consulting firms, and heads of practice in law firms. The pattern is always the same: investment in developing junior professionals is shrinking. Formal mentoring programs still exist on paper, but real knowledge transfer from senior to junior happens less and less.
The reasoning sounds rational.
A partner’s time is expensive. Junior employees don’t stay long. Knowledge shared today may leave for a competitor tomorrow. The ROI of mentoring is hard to calculate. So it’s treated not as an investment, but as charity.
The logic is understandable.
And yet, it slowly destroys professions from the inside.
How Mastery Used to Be Transferred
Complex professions have always worked in a similar way.
A senior shows. A junior observes. Over time, they begin to see for themselves.
This is how doctors, lawyers, engineers, and craftsmen learned for centuries. This is how consulting and executive search worked not so long ago.
By modern standards, this model is inefficient. It is slow. It doesn’t scale. It requires serious time investment from those who carry the knowledge.
But it produces professionals of a completely different caliber.
When I started my career in executive search, I was surrounded by people who showed me how the profession actually works. Not theory you can read in a book. Living practice that you can only observe.
After one of my early candidate meetings, a senior colleague asked:
“Did you notice how he reacted when he spoke about why he left his previous role?”
I hadn’t.
“There’s a story there. Check the references.”
There was a story. A serious one. Without that conversation, I would have missed it.
There were dozens of such moments in my first years. Each added a layer of understanding that no textbook can provide.
How to read between the lines of a CV. How to sense when a client says one thing but means another. How to feel that a candidate who looks perfect on paper will never work with this particular owner.
This is a different kind of knowledge.
It cannot be fully articulated in instructions. It cannot be transferred through online courses. It exists only inside live practice and moves from person to person through shared work.
Why Knowledge Transfer Slowed Down
The first reason is obvious: time became more expensive.
A senior professional’s time is now measured in billable hours. Every hour spent explaining something to a junior is an hour not spent on a client project. In the short term, the choice is clear.
The second reason is the labor market structure.
Average tenure in one company has decreased. Investing two years in developing someone who will likely leave in three is economically irrational — especially if they leave for a competitor or start their own practice.
The third reason is deeper.
Our planning horizon has shortened.
“What will I get from this investment next quarter?” If there is no answer, the investment doesn’t happen.
“What will happen to this profession in twenty years?” Few people ask that question anymore.
The Consequences Are Already Visible
I see young consultants who master tools but not the craft.
They know how to use LinkedIn and ATS systems. They can build longlists and write reports in the correct format.
But they don’t see what a mentor-trained professional sees.
They don’t notice when a candidate avoids eye contact on an uncomfortable question. They don’t feel when a client formulates requirements that no real person can meet. They don’t understand when negotiations should stop — and when pressure should continue.
This is not their fault.
No one taught them.
Will AI Replace Mentors?
AI can already do many things that seniors used to teach.
It searches for information. Structures data. Generates first-level analysis.
Every year, it gets better.
But AI transfers knowledge — not judgment.
It explains rules, but doesn’t show when they should be broken. It analyzes patterns, but doesn’t feel the context of a specific situation.
The paradox is this:
The more technical work AI takes over, the more valuable the human part of the profession becomes.
Exactly the part that cannot be algorithmized and is transmitted only from person to person.
AI will not replace mentors.
It will only increase the value of what mentors pass on.
Why I Continue to Teach
There are a few people I share what I’ve accumulated over twenty-five years.
We discuss real cases.
Last week, for example, we analyzed a situation where a client rejected a candidate at the final stage without explanation.
What really happened? How do you find out without destroying the relationship? How do you use this experience in the next project?
These conversations take time.
They don’t generate immediate revenue.
The result will be visible years later — when these people become professionals of a different level.
But I still do it.
Because someone once did it for me.
Because it matters. Because it’s useful. Because it’s interesting for both sides. Because it’s necessary.
And because this is exactly what separates professionals from temporary players.
Conclusion
A profession that stops passing on knowledge begins to degrade.
First, nuances disappear. Then depth. What remains is pure technique without understanding.
Form without substance.
This doesn’t happen in one year or five. It is a slow process that becomes visible only when it is already too late to fix.
A profession is either passed from person to person — or it slowly dies.
There is no third option.
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