Rural and remote health systems continue to face persistent workforce challenges that affect the delivery of chronic disease care, including diabetes management. Mentorship is widely recognised as a valuable strategy for supporting health professionals, with demonstrated benefits for practice development and workforce sustainability. However, many mentorship approaches are developed in well-resourced settings and assume stable infrastructure, protected time, and workforce capacity. This article examines how mentorship can be designed for constrained health systems. It proposes a systems-oriented perspective that positions mentorship as part of routine practice rather than as a separate professional development activity. 

The article emphasises flexibility, co-design and cultural safety, with attention to how mentorship can be integrated within workforce development pathways. This reframing has implications for strengthening rural health services by supporting continuous, context-responsive learning within routine practice. More broadly, this approach offers a scalable pathway to workforce strengthening in geographically dispersed and resource-variable health systems.