Humility Is an Undersung Leadership Skill. Adam Grant Says These 2 Interview Questions Screen for It; Inc., September 13, 2021

JESSICA STILLMAN, Inc.; Humility Is an Undersung Leadership Skill. Adam Grant Says These 2 Interview Questions Screen for It

How to figure out if someone is truly a humble team player in a job interview.

 

"In life, it's often those who toot their own horn the loudest who draw the most attention, but an absolute mountain of evidence shows that humility is actually an essential skill for great leadership. Academic studies show staying humble helps us learn more quickly, and that teams of humble leaders tend to perform better. Jeff Bezos has even cited intellectual humility as his top sign of true intelligence. 

Which means if you're hiring for any sort of leadership position, you're going to want to assess the ability of candidates to empower others, acknowledge their own limitations, and learn from errors. But while screening for applicants' willingness to trumpet their accomplishments is easy, how do you get at a quieter trait like humility?"

The Best Leaders Are Humble Leaders; Harvard Business Review, 5/12/14

Jeanine Prime and Elizabeth Salib, Harvard Business Review; The Best Leaders Are Humble Leaders:

"In a global marketplace where problems are increasingly complex, no one person will ever have all the answers. That’s why Google’s SVP of People Operations, Lazlo Bock, says humility is one of the traits he’s looking for in new hires. “Your end goal,” explained Bock, “is what can we do together to problem-solve. I’ve contributed my piece, and then I step back.” And it is not just humility in creating space for others to contribute, says Bock—it’s “intellectual humility. Without humility, you are unable to learn.”

A recent Catalyst study backs this up, showing that humility is one of four critical leadership factors for creating an environment where employees from different demographic backgrounds feel included. In a survey of more than 1500 workers from Australia, China, Germany, India, Mexico, and the U.S., we found that when employees observed altruistic or selfless behavior in their managers — a style characterized by 1) acts of humility, such as learning from criticism and admitting mistakes); 2) empowering followers to learn and develop; 3) acts of courage, such as taking personal risks for the greater good; and 4) holding employees responsible for results — they were more likely to report feeling included in their work teams. This was true for both women and men."