Doc Brown and Marty McFly: A Mentoring Case Study for IP and Legal Professionals Future and Present
- Carlo Cotrone
- 1 hour ago
- 4 min read
Like many of my generation, I have great fondness for the Back to the Future trilogy of movies released from 1985 to 1990. Indisputably iconic, the trilogy has engaging characters, imaginative story lines, and a fanciful alchemy of science, futurism, and timeless themes of growing up and older.
A mentoring relationship between protagonists Marty McFly and Doctor Emmett Brown ("Doc") is evident from the outset and evolves throughout the trilogy.
Besides being fun to watch, the characters' relationship reveals salient insights that IP and legal practitioners can apply to their professional and personal lives.
Marty and Doc
In the year 1985, Marty is a somewhat insecure 17-year-old high school senior who loves to play the guitar and hang out with his girlfriend. Doc is a much older eccentric scientist-bachelor who's devoted his family fortune to building a time machine.
Early on, we learn that Doc is a mentor to Marty, who provides assistance with Doc's science experiments.
When Marty unwittingly travels back to 1955 in Doc's DeLorean time machine, he encounters a much younger version of Doc, who helps him get back to the future (of 1985).
Over the course of their adventures, including subsequent journeys to 2015, an alternate version of 1985, and the Old West of 1885, the bond between the characters deepens and each grows individually.
Mentoring Insights
Mentors and Mentees Can Be in Different Fields or Firms
Marty and Doc seemingly could not be any more different in terms of personality, generation, background, knowledge, and interests.
We don't know how the two originally met, but Marty clearly values Doc as a mentor and friend.
In the IP and legal realm, no matter how much we want to, we can't always find a mentor in our own organization. Even when our practice group or department assigns one to us, absent authentic synergy and commitment, that person may be a mentor in name only.
The example of Marty and Doc reminds us that sometimes mentors and mentees may emerge from outside our organization and yet have a significant positive impact. We should embrace such relationships, whether as mentor or mentee.
A Mentor Generously Shares Wisdom and Experience
Despite having notably more education and seniority, Doc invites Marty into his life and his quest to realize his inventive dreams. Through twists, turns, and barriers that present existential dangers to Marty's future, Doc works tirelessly to help him find his way.
Someone who selflessly shares wisdom and experience with a mentee certainly deserves to be called a mentor.
As IP and legal professionals, we can easily spot the genuine article. A true mentor is priceless.
Mentors and Mentees Aren't Perfect
As the odyssey unfolds, we observe some of Marty's blind spots and crises that ensue as a result. For instance, he conceives a betting scheme to get rich using a sports almanac from 2015; the scheme backfires, creating a dystopian 1985. And his insecurities about being called "chicken" lead to a music career-ending car accident that tarnishes his future.
Doc stumbles as well. He is socially awkward and struggles to achieve a satisfactory work-life balance.
These imperfections notwithstanding, Doc and Marty each focus on the good in, and potential of, each other. They accept and seek to understand each other.
It's common for IP and legal professionals to hold themselves to unreasonably high standards of strength and performance. Mentor-mentee relationships like that of Doc and Marty offer a safe space of vulnerability that promotes meaningful teaching and learning.
Mentoring Relationships Are Bidirectional
The Back to the Future trilogy has its share of poignant moments. Among them is the reunion of Marty and Doc at the end of Part III, in which Doc introduces his young family to Marty.
At that moment, we realize just how much Marty has "mentored up" throughout their adventures, helping Doc to loosen up, take social risks, and find new happiness.
A consequential mentoring relationship involving an IP or legal professional--whether as mentor and mentee--is much the same. The mentor learns by seeing the world through the mentee's eyes and feels affirmed by helping the mentee navigate obstacles.
Mentees Ultimately Choose Their Own Path
From the opening clock scene in the trilogy, to the final scene in which Marty declines a road race--thus averting the aforementioned car accident--it's clear that Marty is in the driver's seat of his life, sometimes literally but always metaphorically.
He's making his own decisions, with agency to follow, or not follow, available courses of action. As mentor, Doc can only teach, admonish, and encourage. The rest is up to his mentee.
This is the same mentoring paradigm in IP and legal contexts. A mentor can and often does give his or her very best to the mentoring relationship, but the mentee's attainment of success and realization of his or her full potential are never a given.
Like a parent, a mentor must step aside and hope that the mentee exhibits humility, emotional intelligence, and sound judgment when presented with opportunities and challenges.
Find a Mentor and Be a Mentor
The above sage mentoring insights are low-hanging fruit for IP and legal professionals who seek to grow and help others to grow.
Doc Brown perhaps said it best:
"Your future hasn't been written yet. No one's has. Your future is whatever you make it. So make it a good one."
