Questions to Ask an Employee with a Bad Attitude
For a manager sitting down with someone whose behaviour is wearing on the team: twenty questions that start from what you have actually observed, find out what is driving it, and end with a specific agreement about what changes.
The questions
Open any question for the note
I want to describe three things I have seen in the last two weeks, then hear how you saw them. Can we do that?
Why ask it
Opening with dated, observed behaviour keeps the conversation off the word attitude, which nobody can defend against or agree to fix. Asking permission to describe them first also signals this is a two-way meeting rather than a verdict.
Does that match what you remember, or do you see those moments differently?
Why ask it
If they deny the events outright you have a factual dispute, not a behaviour problem, and the meeting has to slow down to specific dates and witnesses. Some form of agreement here, even a grudging one, is what makes everything after it possible.
What was going on for you in that meeting on Thursday?
Why ask it
Anchoring to one moment gets you a cause instead of a character assessment. Common real answers are that they had already raised the point twice, or heard the decision from someone else first.
Has something changed for you here in the last few months?
Why ask it
Most sudden attitude shifts have a date attached: a promotion that went elsewhere, a new manager, a project cancelled, a colleague leaving. If they name one, the rest of the conversation is about that event and not about their personality.
Which part of this job would you hand off tomorrow if you could?
Why ask it
It is easier to answer than what is wrong, and it points straight at the source of the resentment. Watch whether the thing they name is central to the role, because that changes what you are dealing with.
Where are you spending time on things you think are pointless?
Why ask it
Cynicism usually starts with work that visibly goes nowhere: reports nobody reads, meetings with no decision, rework caused upstream. You may be able to remove one of these by the end of the week, which buys more credibility than any speech.
Is there something I have done, or not done, that is part of this?
Why ask it
Asked plainly and then followed by silence, this is the question that changes the temperature of the meeting. Expect a soft answer first; the real one often comes after you accept the soft one without arguing.
Do you have what you need to do the job: time, information, tools, the authority to decide?
Why ask it
Some behaviour read as attitude is what being blocked looks like from the outside. If they name a missing approval or a permission they have been chasing for a month, you have a fix rather than a performance issue.
Who on the team is hardest for you to work with at the moment?
Why ask it
You are not inviting gossip, you are checking whether there is one unresolved conflict driving everything. If the same name comes up that other people have raised, the problem may be a pairing rather than a person.
What do you think it is like to be in a meeting with you right now?
Why ask it
This asks them to look from outside without you having to characterise them. Answers range from genuine surprise, which means nobody has told them, to an accurate description, which means they know and have decided it is justified.
When you disagree with a decision here, what do you do with that?
Why ask it
It surfaces the mechanism behind the sighing and the side comments: usually a belief that raising things directly has not worked. The answer tells you whether you need to build a route for disagreement or hold a line about how it is expressed.
Is anything outside work taking more from you than usual? You do not have to tell me what it is.
Why ask it
Naming the limit before they answer is what makes it safe to say yes. If the answer is yes, the conversation moves to leave, load and support, and any performance discussion should wait for a separate meeting.
Do you still want this job?
Why ask it
Six words, asked without heat, and the pause before the answer is usually more informative than the answer. A no, or a long hesitation, redirects the whole meeting toward a managed exit or a move, which is a better use of everyone's time.
If nothing here changed for the next year, would you stay?
Why ask it
People who will not say they are unhappy will often admit they would not stay. It also stops you negotiating small adjustments for someone who has already decided to leave.
What would have to be true for you to want to be here?
Why ask it
This asks for conditions rather than complaints, which is harder work and more useful. If the list is entirely about other people changing, you have learned something about what to expect from the next few weeks.
Of everything you have raised, which parts are mine to fix and which are yours?
Why ask it
The split is the pivot of the meeting. Someone who cannot allocate a single item to themselves is telling you that the behaviour will continue no matter what you change.
What will be different in the next two weeks, and what will I actually see?
Why ask it
Insist on observable things: arriving on time to the stand-up, raising objections in the meeting instead of afterwards, replying to the client within a day. Anything phrased as being more positive cannot be assessed and will not hold.
How do you want me to tell you if I see it again?
Why ask it
Agreeing the signal in advance turns the next correction into something you both expected rather than an ambush. It also removes the argument about whether they were told.
What do you think should happen if this does not change?
Why ask it
Asking them first is more effective than announcing it, and their answer shows whether they grasp the seriousness. You still have to state your own answer plainly, including where it sits in your formal process.
When we sit down again in two weeks, what do you want to be able to say?
Why ask it
It closes with them describing a good outcome, and it books the follow-up while they are in the room. Meetings like this fail more often from never being repeated than from being badly run.
Running the Conversation
Practical guidance for the conversation itself
Before you sit down
- Write out three specific incidents with dates and the effect each one had: the client who had to be called back, the two colleagues who stopped raising ideas. Without these you will end up arguing about adjectives.
- Decide which category this is. Conduct, such as shouting or refusing an instruction, goes down a disciplinary route. Disengagement is a management conversation. Treating one as the other is where managers get into trouble.
- Know your own limit before you start: what happens if nothing changes, when, and who else has to approve it. Never invent a consequence in the room.
- Check what you have already told them. If nobody has ever named the behaviour directly, this is a first conversation, not a final warning.
- Check your own contribution honestly. Unclear priorities, a promotion handled badly, or credit taken for their work all produce what looks like a bad attitude.
- Book somewhere private with no glass, and give it a full hour so the difficult part does not land in the last three minutes.
In the room
Describe behaviour, never diagnose the person
You rolled your eyes and left during Thursday's review is arguable and fixable. You have a bad attitude is neither, and it invites a defence of their character rather than a change in what they do.
Ask, then stop talking
The useful answers arrive after an uncomfortable pause. Managers fill that gap with reassurance and lose the very thing they came for.
Take one complaint seriously on the spot
If something they raise is fair and small, say so and fix it that week. Being visibly right about one thing is what makes them believe the rest of the conversation was in good faith.
Do not trade the standard away
You can accept that the workload is unreasonable and still say that snapping at the support team is not an option. Both halves have to be in the same conversation.
Stay out of health and diagnosis
If they mention illness, medication, caring duties or a bereavement, stop assessing behaviour and move to what support and adjustments exist. Take advice before going any further.
When it is not an attitude problem at all
- They applied for a role and did not get it, and nobody explained the decision.
- They are the person who keeps getting the unglamorous work, and they know it.
- They raised a real problem twice, were ignored, and stopped raising things.
- They are covering an absent colleague's workload with no end date named.
- There is an unresolved conflict with one person that everyone has learned to work around.
- They are ill, exhausted or caring for someone, and have decided not to say so.
- They are being managed by two people who want different things this week.
- In each of these, questions about their attitude will read as blame for something the organisation caused, and will make the next month worse.
After the meeting
- Send a short summary the same day: what you observed, what they said, what you each agreed to do, and the date you are meeting again. Keep it factual and free of adjectives.
- Do the things you promised first and visibly. Nothing sinks a conversation like the employee delivering their half while yours goes quiet.
- Tell them when you see the change, not only when you see a repeat. One noticed improvement does more than three corrections.
- If the behaviour continues after a clear agreement, move to your formal process rather than holding the same meeting a fourth time. Repeated informal chats become evidence that the standard is optional.
- Do not brief the rest of the team on the conversation. Say that you are dealing with it and let the change speak, or you have created a second problem.