Mentoring & SponsorshipAdvising is easy and sponsorship costs you something. This profile shows which one you actually do.
Twenty-four items — four mentoring situations, one evidence question and 19 behavioural statements — measure whether you help people reach their own decisions, read what they need, spend your capital to advocate for them and connect development to their goals. Four banded competencies and a growth plan in 20 minutes.
In brief
Mentoring & Sponsorship is an online assessment in AssessAll's Leadership & Management Catalogue line, with 24 scored exercises taking about 20 minutes. It measures coaching & development, people acumen, stakeholder influence and motivation & engagement. It is built for senior individual contributors and managers who mentor formally or informally.
| Format | Online, one sitting |
|---|---|
| Duration | About 20 minutes |
| Scored exercises | 24 |
| What it measures | Coaching & Development, People Acumen, Stakeholder Influence, Motivation & Engagement |
| Built for | Senior individual contributors and managers who mentor formally or informally; Participants and mentors in structured mentoring, sponsorship and returner programmes; Leaders who want to know whether they advocate for people or only advise them |
| Scoring | Evidence-keyed |
| Report | Available immediately after submission |
| Currencies | INR and USD |
The helpful instinct creates dependence or stops short of advocacy
The four situations are the mentoring moments where good intentions go wrong. Someone you mentor brings a career decision and you have a clear view of what you would do. A mentee keeps seeking reassurance rather than acting on what you discuss. A talented, less-visible person on the edge of your network would be excellent for an opportunity but is not on the decision-makers' radar. The evidence question asks for the distinction between mentoring and sponsorship. The options include telling them what you would do, deciding for them, telling them there is no right answer and stepping back — and the developmental move.
Options are weighted against public research on developmental coaching that builds the mentee's own judgement rather than giving answers, on the distinction between mentoring as private guidance and sponsorship as active advocacy that spends the sponsor's capital, on the evidence that sponsorship drives advancement, on building independence rather than reassurance-dependence, and on connecting development to the person's own goals and purpose. Each weight carries a written rationale. The bank is original AssessAll work; no mentoring programme brand or framework is named. The 19 behavioural statements ask what you actually do, with reverse-keyed items to reduce a generous self-report.
The report bands Coaching & Development, People Acumen, Stakeholder Influence and Motivation & Engagement beneath a 0–100 score, each with a coaching interpretation for the people you mentor now. A narrative generated from your own responses says whether you develop or advise, and whether you advocate or only encourage. The growth plan is built from the lowest competencies and proposes specific practices — a question to ask before offering a view, a boundary for reassurance-seeking, one concrete sponsorship act this quarter — and the item review explains every weight so you can see what telling them cost.
What you walk away with
Coaching & Development, People Acumen, Stakeholder Influence and Motivation & Engagement each land in Emerging, Developing, Strong or Exceptional beneath your 0–100 score. The radar shows the common shapes — the generous adviser who never advocates, the sponsor who never asks what the person wants.
Each band carries a coaching paragraph about what it does in practice: how Developing on Coaching & Development responds to a career decision it has a view on, what Strong on Stakeholder Influence does for a talented person nobody senior has noticed.
Built from your lowest competencies, the plan proposes concrete moves — a question-first opening for the next mentoring conversation, a way to redirect reassurance-seeking into action, one specific room to put a mentee's name into this quarter — rather than a mentoring philosophy.
The item review shows your choice, the evidence-favoured option and the rationale for each weight across all 24 items. Where you gave the answer from experience, the explanation shows what the development research says the mentee learned from receiving it.
The report, in three panels
Illustrative sample — your report is generated from your own responses.
Every competency this test declares, scored from the items tagged to it — so the shape is yours, not a template.
Band edges at 40, 60 and 80. Each band carries its own coaching interpretation for that competency.
Assembled from your lowest competencies, in order — not a generic checklist.
Built for
- Senior individual contributors and managers who mentor formally or informally
- Participants and mentors in structured mentoring, sponsorship and returner programmes
- Leaders who want to know whether they advocate for people or only advise them
- HR and DEI teams selecting and preparing mentors and sponsors for talent programmes
Every mentee you have will remember whether you opened a door. Measure how often you do.
Twenty-four items in about 20 minutes, then four banded competencies, a narrative and a growth plan the moment you finish.
₹649 (incl. GST) · assessment and full report, nothing further to pay
Frequently asked questions
The difference between advising and developing, and between mentoring and sponsorship: helping people reach their own decisions, reading what they truly need, actively advocating for them by spending your own capital, and connecting development to what they care about. Four competencies — Coaching & Development, People Acumen, Stakeholder Influence and Motivation & Engagement — are measured through four mentoring situations, an evidence question and 19 behavioural statements. It suits anyone who mentors, formally or not.
Each option is weighted against published research on developmental coaching, sponsorship and independence, with a written rationale per weight. Refusing to advise does not score well — telling a mentee there is no right answer and stepping back is weighted as abandonment, not development. The strongest options help the person reason and then, where it counts, act on their behalf. Reverse-keyed behavioural statements make a generous self-report read as inconsistent rather than as a high band.
Around 14 to 20 minutes within a 20-minute window. You receive a 0–100 score with its band, four banded competencies with coaching interpretations, a radar, a narrative generated from your own responses, a strengths-and-development summary, a growth plan built from your lowest competencies and a full item review with the evidence behind each weight. The report is complete when it arrives; there is nothing further to unlock.
HR and DEI teams use it to prepare mentors before a programme launches, so the briefing addresses the actual pattern — usually advising instead of developing, or encouraging instead of sponsoring. Individuals use the growth plan as a short list for their current mentees and retake after the programme cycle. It is a development battery, not a selection screen, and works best alongside what mentees report.
Yes. The situations are universal — a career decision, a reassurance-seeker, an invisible talent — and the research base is international. The mentoring-versus-sponsorship distinction matters in every market where advancement depends on who speaks for you. Mentors in India, the UK, the Gulf, Southeast Asia and North America sit identical items. It is priced in INR and USD, and the price on this page is the whole price.
Each battery takes one management capability — delegation, coaching, conflict, influence, decision-making, change — and measures it through situational judgement scored against published evidence, with a competency profile, coaching interpretations and a prioritised growth plan. For the level-by-level readiness verdicts, see Leadership & Management Premium.
See the leadership catalogue →Methodology: Original AssessAll scenarios and items operationalising public, well-established constructs of developing others: developmental coaching that builds the mentee's own judgment rather than giving answers; the distinction between mentoring (private guidance and development) and sponsorship (active advocacy that spends the sponsor's capital to open opportunities) and the evidence that sponsorship drives advancement; building independence rather than reassurance-dependence; and connecting development to the person's own goals, autonomy and purpose. Situational-judgement scoring is literature-keyed with a documented per-option rationale citing the evidence for each weight. Generic public constructs only; no trademarked instrument names or vendor-coined vocabulary, and no items copied or paraphrased from any branded assessment.
Beyond the assessment · Measure. Plan. Learn. Coach. Prove it.
What should you do after taking the Mentoring & Sponsorship?
Use the report as a baseline, not a verdict. Turn it into an individual development plan on Jobulary, with three objectives for the next 90 days; practise the gaps with the Mentoring Programme Kit on Bodhih.org; and, for a team, run the Coaching and Mentoring Programs with Bodhih Training. Then take the Mentoring & Sponsorship again to see what moved.
- Step 1 · Plan · Jobulary
Turn your report into a development plan
Three outcome objectives for a 90, 180 or 365-day cycle, a 70/20/10 path, and a re-measure that counts growth only when it is larger than measurement error. The plan stays yours when the job changes. Free to start.
Start a plan on Jobulary - Step 2 · Learn · Bodhih.org
Practise what the report flags
- Pro KitMentoring Programme KitLaunch a workplace mentoring programme: e-book, 13-sheet Excel manager with matching scores, forms, 42 messages and 80 questions. Start today.
- Trainer ToolkitCoaching Skills Trainer Toolkit
Pro Kits, business simulations, online courses and trainer toolkits, priced in INR and USD.
- Step 3 · Train · Bodhih Training
Train the whole team
- Classroom programmeCoaching and Mentoring ProgramsCoaching and Mentoring by Bodhih: leadership and management training that builds confident people leaders. In person or live virtual, customised to…
- Classroom programmeReverse Mentoring Program for Leaders
- Classroom programmeHigh-Potential Leadership Program (HiPo)
Customised, instructor-led programmes, in person or live online. Since 2008: 2,000+ companies and 18,000+ programmes.
AssessAll, Jobulary, Bodhih.org and Bodhih Training are Bodhih companies. Use one, or close the loop: measure here, plan, learn, then sit the Mentoring & Sponsorship again to see what changed.
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