What questions should a mentor matching questionnaire ask?

Ask about five things: the skills each side holds or wants, the specific goal driving participation, seniority and function, realistic availability, and preferred working style. Anything you would not use to form a pair is a question you should cut, because every extra field lowers completion rate.

How long should a mentor matching questionnaire be?

Aim for under 10 minutes. Completion rate falls sharply past that, and an abandoned form gives you no matching data at all. Free-text fields are the main time cost, so keep them to two or three.

Should mentors and mentees answer the same questions?

Mostly, but not entirely. Both sides need skills, availability, and working style. Mentees additionally need a goal statement, and mentors need capacity limits and the topics they are willing to be matched on. Using a shared core with two short branches keeps the data comparable.

How do you match mentors and mentees fairly?

Score against stated criteria rather than intuition, and record the score. MentorStack's PAIR engine scores compatibility across five dimensions: skills, goals, seniority, availability, and cross-functional fit. Whatever method you use, the test is whether you could explain to a participant why they were paired the way they were.

Mentor Matching Questionnaire (Free, 2026)

How to use this

Send this to both mentors and mentees during intake. Sections 1 to 4 go to everyone. Section 5 goes to mentors only. Section 6 goes to mentees only.

Cut any question you will not actually use to form a pair. Every field you add costs completion rate, and an abandoned form gives you no data at all.

Once responses are in, pair against the answers rather than against your sense of who would get on. Record why each pair was formed. If a participant asks why they were matched the way they were, you want an answer that references the questionnaire.

Section 1: Basics

Full name: [FREE TEXT]
Job title: [FREE TEXT]
Department or function: [DROPDOWN: Engineering / Product / Design / Sales / Marketing / Customer Success / Finance / People / Operations / Other]
Level: [DROPDOWN: Individual contributor, early / Individual contributor, senior / Team lead / Manager / Senior manager / Director / VP or above]
Time at [COMPANY]: [DROPDOWN: Under 6 months / 6 to 12 months / 1 to 2 years / 2 to 5 years / 5 years or more]
Location and time zone: [FREE TEXT]

Section 2: Skills

Which of these do you have real working depth in? Select up to five.

[CHECKBOXES: adapt this list to your own competency framework]
- People management
- Hiring and interviewing
- Technical architecture
- Product strategy
- Data analysis
- Stakeholder communication
- Public speaking and presenting
- Commercial and pricing
- Project and program management
- Cross-functional influence
- Career navigation and promotion
- Domain expertise in [YOUR INDUSTRY]
Which of the above do you most want to develop over the next 12 months? Select up to three.

[SAME CHECKBOX LIST]

Asking both sides the same skill question in both directions is what lets you match a mentor's depth against a mentee's gap, rather than matching on job title and hoping.

Section 3: Availability

How often can you realistically meet? [DROPDOWN: Weekly / Every two weeks / Monthly / Less than monthly]
Which windows usually work? [CHECKBOXES: Early morning / Mid morning / Lunch / Early afternoon / Late afternoon]
Are there periods in the next six months when you will be unavailable (parental leave, sabbatical, a known crunch period)? [FREE TEXT, OPTIONAL]

Availability mismatch is the most common cause of a pair that never gets started. It is worth two questions.

Section 4: Working style

What do you find most useful in a professional relationship? [SINGLE SELECT: Direct challenge and honest feedback / Structured guidance and frameworks / Space to think out loud / Practical introductions and door-opening]
How do you prefer to meet? [SINGLE SELECT: Video / In person / Phone or audio only / No strong preference]
Is there anything about how you like to work that a match should know? [FREE TEXT, OPTIONAL]

Section 5: Mentors only

How many mentees can you take this cycle? [DROPDOWN: 1 / 2 / 3]
Which topics are you willing to be matched on? [CHECKBOXES, reuse the Section 2 skill list]
Are there topics you would rather not be matched on? [FREE TEXT, OPTIONAL]
Have you mentored before? [YES / NO]
If no, would you like the mentor briefing before the program starts? [YES / NO]

A "no" on question 18 is not a problem. It is a signal to route that person through the mentor training checklist before kickoff.

Section 6: Mentees only

In one sentence, what do you want to be different in 12 months? [FREE TEXT]
What is currently in the way? [FREE TEXT]
Which of these is closest to your goal? [SINGLE SELECT: Get promoted / Move into management / Change function / Build a specific skill / Grow my internal network / Navigate a hard situation I am in now]
Would you prefer a mentor inside your own function or outside it? [SINGLE SELECT: Inside / Outside / No preference]

Question 23 matters more than it looks. Cross-functional pairs consistently produce broader network effects, and a mentee who explicitly wants an outside perspective is a strong candidate for one.

Section 7: Consent and expectations

I understand that what is shared in mentoring sessions is confidential between the pair, except where a safeguarding or policy issue arises. [REQUIRED CHECKBOX]
I commit to the meeting cadence I selected above for the duration of the program. [REQUIRED CHECKBOX]

Both of these become the basis of the mentor and mentee agreement signed at kickoff.

Scoring the responses

If you are matching by hand, score each candidate pair out of 5, one point each:

Mentor has depth in at least one skill the mentee named in question 8
Mentor's willing topics overlap the mentee's stated goal in question 22
Seniority gap is one to three levels, not zero and not six
Cadence answers match, or differ by one step at most
Function preference in question 23 is satisfied

Pairs scoring 4 or 5 are strong. Pairs scoring 3 are worth forming if supply is tight. Below 3, leave the mentee unmatched this cycle rather than forming a pair that will lapse in month two. An unmatched mentee you can explain is better than a bad match you cannot.

Mentor Matching Questionnaire