In times of economic uncertainty, when layoffs ripple through every industry, the difference between staying employed or finding a new position often isn’t just about talent—it’s about who is advocating for you behind closed doors.

When companies make tough decisions, they don’t just look at résumés; they rely on trusted voices to vouch for employees’ or job candidates’ value. This is typically when people start to draw on the power—or not—of their networks. Who is able and willing to provide sponsorship, and not just mentorship?

If you think sponsorship is just another word for mentorship, you’re not alone. But understanding the distinction could be the key to career survival and advancement. Here’s a simple saying to help us get clarity before we begin: “Mentors talk to you; sponsors talk about you.”

If mentorship is the fertilizer that makes plants grow faster and bigger, sponsorship is the greenhouse that creates the ideal environment for plants to grow.

The main difference between mentorship and sponsorship is who is acted upon. When we mentor people, we are trying to change them. Think of an influential adult with whom you had a relationship when you were a child. Maybe you had a trusted person who listened to you when you had trouble at school or at home and gave you guidance on how to move forward. Perhaps you had a teacher who provided you with the nudge you needed when you weren’t sure if you would enjoy a new activity, and due to their encouragement, you discovered a love for dance or art or history. Or a manager who nurtured you in your first job and gave you impactful feedback when you felt completely in over your head.

This kind of support—coaching, feedback, advice, encouragement—all falls under the category of mentorship. When we mentor people, we are trying, subtly or not so subtly, to affect their behavior, their attitudes, or their skills and abilities.

Now think of a person who perhaps advocated for you to receive accommodations when you were having difficulties at school or at home. Maybe you had a teacher or two write recommendation letters for you when you applied to college. Perhaps you had a coach or orchestra teacher who made sure you were on the field or on the stage when a talent scout was present, making it so that the scout was able to see you perform. Or a manager who defended you in closed-door meetings, perhaps changing the narrative about why a project was not as successful as hoped.

This kind of support—advocacy, visibility, protection—is sponsorship. When we sponsor people, we are trying, subtly or not so subtly, to affect how other people behave toward or think about our protégés.

Mentors act on mentees. Their task is to make mentees better, to make mentees ready and attractive candidates for great opportunities. Or, in the case of a challenging job market, to encourage and maintain the motivation of those who are fearful of losing their jobs or actively seeking job opportunities. But a mentee whom a mentor has helped to craft into an exceptional candidate can still be left out in the cold. This is where sponsors come in.

Sponsors don’t try to make their protégés any different than they already are. They believe that their protégés have something valuable to contribute and what they do is act on audiences. Their task is to make audiences notice their protégé, to think well of them, to want to open the door and invite the protégé to come right on in or keep the protégé at the party longer. In a challenging job market, the person who gets to stay or gets the job is the one who has someone actively championing them.

The issue facing many workers right now is that they might be feeling the impulse to hunker down, to circle the wagons, to keep their cards close to the chest. They might be willing to commiserate with close friends, but the threat they feel is limiting their ability to see the breadth of their network and in turn, limiting the likelihood that they will fully utilize the resources that their networks contain.

This is especially problematic if, in these precarious times, their contacts are all similar to them. Consider: If everyone we know works in or with the federal government, then everyone we know is in the same boat as us—worried about being laid off or looking for a job. This, then, is the risk of non-diverse networks; when our contacts are similar to us, they typically have the same problems that we do and are seeking the same solutions that we are.

For this reason, people whose networks are not sufficiently diverse are more likely to be able to offer us mentorship—our shared misery might very well make us feel better—but they aren’t in a position to sponsor us.

Sponsorship—advocacy for a firm to keep someone on or for a firm to hire someone—is more likely to come from someone different from us in some key dimension, because that difference means they probably have access to different problems and resources than the contacts we have who are similar to us. A federal worker who has connections in the private sector and who is willing to reach out to those contacts is more likely to find someone who can sponsor them for opportunities they would otherwise not know about.

So the takeaway is this: resist the urge to draw close and hunker down. Now is the time to take a careful look at your network and reach out to people for help, particularly if those people tend to spend time in different spaces than you do. And once you reach out, be forthcoming about your need for sponsorship, not (just) mentorship.

Dr. Rosalind Chow is an associate professor of organizational behavior and theory at Carnegie Mellon University, where she directs executive education programs that advance the careers of Black and Latino professionals and advises corporations on their sponsorship programs.