What we’re reading: The “growth mindset” question, and other tried-and-true hiring practices

Hiring approaches may change, but there’s much that remains constant: SHRM reveals old-school techniques that retain their power, and Inc. covers a simple way to uncover a candidate’s potential for growth. Plus: Tips for turning around a toxic culture, creating a great environment for transgender employees, managing with empathy, and more.  

HIRING
Inc.: Facebook Exec: One interview question that instantly reveals someone’s true colors
How one team leader discovers whether candidates have the “growth mindset” vital to success. “She asks candidates to tell her about a hard or challenging situation they've encountered in their career. Once she gets the story, Shuo asks an immediate follow-up question: If you could revisit that experience, what would you do differently?”

SHRM: Viewpoint: Your approach to hiring is all wrong
Despite new practices and technology, it’s hard to say whether today’s approach to hiring means more success. This roundup of tested advice, from a Wharton School Professor of Management, covers retention, the hiring process, and candidate vetting.

CULTURE
Harvard Business Review: Keep your company’s toxic culture from infecting your team
A look at the signs of a toxic culture, what can be done to correct it, and why it can be such a problem: “Far too often, the rules of our organizational culture overshadow the values and the norms of other cultures we belong to – national, community, even family.”

Stanford Social Innovation Review: ‘Trans-forming’ the workplace to be transgender inclusive
For the 1.4 million adults who identify as transgender, unemployment and workplace inclusion are major issues. Here are 10 ways to ensure transgender employees can count on your organization to welcome and support them.

LEADERSHIP
Inc.: The 2 surprising traits all great leaders share, according to Melinda Gates
Philanthropist Melinda Gates, making the rounds in support of her new book, pushes the case for “love” in leadership: “When you show empathy and kindness, it allows employees to trust you and be vulnerable. And that's what drives breakthrough ideas and beyond-the-call-of-duty performance.”

TRENDS
Fast Company: Have we finally outgrown HR?
A look at the evolution of HR, including the top capabilities of the emerging HR paradigm and a few reasons “human resources” has given way to titles centered around “people.” “To some people outside of HR, the idea that we refer to our employees as ‘resources’ feels, well, a bit inhumane.”  

Forbes: What Google has learned about remote work: Six tips
Google just completed a multi-year study on remote workers, and the Center for Values-Driven Leadership has a look at what they learned, plus their own tips. Among them: “Create a rhythm to your team’s work that includes regular opportunities to check-in with remote workers, both as a whole team and 1:1.”