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Michele Goins was delighted when supervisors handpicked her for a mentoring program designed to “fast-track” high-potential employees of electronics giant Hewlett-Packard Co. But she didn’t rush out to tell her co-workers.

“There is that notion that maybe you’ve been granted special status,” says Goins, a Latina in her early 30s who works in a corporate environment where older, white males are predominant. “At first I was a little hesitant to mention it to people.”

Goins eventually told other employees about her participation in the program--part of the company’s accelerated-development plan for getting more women and minorities into top management posts. And she now credits the program with helping her win a recent promotion to quality manager at the company’s communications components division in San Jose.

But Goins’ initial precautions may be more pertinent than ever.

With affirmative-action programs under fire in Washington, programs that grant special status to minorities and women may face a backlash in corporate America. Mentoring programs may suffer if they are perceived to be granting special privileges to women and minorities, according to business consultants who study such issues.

Lee Gardenswartz, a Los Angeles management consultant specializing in diversity issues, says that in today’s climate of anti-affirmative sentiment, it is “more critical than ever” that mentoring programs “identify talent across the board,” regardless of race or gender.

“Saying that your mentoring program is targeted to a special group is high-risk,” says Deborah Yarborough, director of diversity programs for Silicon Graphics, a computer manufacturer headquartered in Mountain View, Calif.

However, she says that minorities and women are more likely to “gravitate to mentoring because maybe they don’t play golf or didn’t go to the same school” as company executives.

Silicon Graphics’ mentoring program is open to white males, and Hewlett-Packard says that six of the 24 participants in its fast-track development program are white males.

Corporate mentoring programs sprouted throughout the Fortune 500 and many other companies during the 1970s and ‘80s as a response to a fast-changing work force that was becoming more culturally diverse. These programs have largely targeted employees--mainly women and racial minorities--who traditionally have been excluded from the informal mentoring relationships that often are critical to the success of senior managers.

Today, many companies see broader benefits to mentoring programs. The programs are often used as a recruitment tool to show job applicants that the firm is committed to helping employees succeed.

Also, as many businesses have slashed their work forces in restructurings or mergers, mentoring efforts are often viewed as a way to help retain top performers.

(On the other hand, corporate downsizing has also slowed progress of some mentoring programs. At Hughes Aircraft Co., for example, a large number of senior manager mentors have been laid off or taken early retirement as the Los Angeles-based company slashed roughly 20,000 jobs since the early 1990s.)

With those broader benefits in mind, some companies have sent out the message that mentoring programs are open to all employees, not just women and minorities.

Specialists in diversity issues recommend that companies communicate the goal of the mentoring program and the selection criteria and provide alternative development opportunities for employees who don’t want to be in such a program.

Occasionally, some minorities are hesitant to get involved in formal mentoring programs because they either don’t want special treatment or are concerned about the perceptions of co-workers. Diversity specialists suggest that employees with such concerns seek out a more casual mentoring arrangement.

Diversity experts also point to a number of other mentoring issues for companies or minority employees to consider.

One of those involves the decision of whether the mentor and employee should be the same gender or race. With the scarcity of African Americans, Asian Americans and Latinos in senior management positions at many companies, however, finding a mentor of similar background can be difficult.

Sometimes “being of the same ethnic background may be helpful because that person can better describe some problems that you as a Hispanic or black may face that others might not face,” says Dave Barclay, vice president of work force diversity at Hughes.

However, Hughes does not always attempt to match employees by race or gender. More important, he says, is finding a compatible match between the mentor and the person being mentored, and reaching a clear understanding of the purposes and ground rules for the relationship.

Hewlett-Packard’s Goins says the race and gender of her mentor were insignificant issues compared to the person’s qualifications.

She had three specific criteria in mind: The person should work in a different department of the company, should be located near her office to make meetings more practical and should have experience in “managing change” within the company.

“In my career at Hewlett-Packard, I don’t know that (a person’s ethnic background) makes that much difference,” Goins says. “What I’m looking for is getting that experience from them and adapting it to my own style.”

Goins says she found the mentor she was looking for in Tom Vos, a senior vice president. Hewlett-Packard’s accelerated-development program includes one year of formal mentoring, after which the employees typically agree to continue meeting on a more informal basis.

Before beginning the program, they go through a “skills assessment workshop” to determine specific job strengths and areas for improvement.

Laura O’Loughlin, research director at New York-based Catalyst, a nonprofit business research firm, says minorities and women aren’t the only ones who can benefit from cross-race or cross-gender mentoring relationships.

“Some companies are finding that white men mentoring women or men or women of color can learn and understand what issues these groups face because they are hearing the problems and discussions that come up between people,” she says.

Catalyst offers a 63-page guide to mentoring. For more information, write the company at 250 Park Ave. South, New York, NY 10003-1459.

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POINTERS Tips for Choosing a Mentor

As part of a pilot mentoring program that began in 1990, property and casualty insurance company Chubb & Son devised “A Guide to Starting a Mentoring Program,” which lists questions employees should ask when deciding whom to approach for mentoring:

* Whom do I respect in this organization?

* Who has recently “made it” who might be inspired by success to help me?

* Who thinks I have potential?

* Who has helped me in the past and might help me again?

* Who is carrying a tremendous workload and could use some relief?

* Who is able and willing to commit time to being a mentor?

* Does this person have a successful track record with the organization?

* Does this person have the knowledge and influence needed to help me?

* Am I willing to accept advice from this person?

* Can I communicate effectively with this person?

* Is this individual someone I can trust?