How To Handle 'Difficult' Employees

A business with employees is inevitably going to have issues with employee relations. This can occur between the business owner and an employee or between employees. With people sharing a space for a large part of their week, this is not a surprise and so, clashes in personality is common. With so many other business related problems to deal with, a business owner may feel resentful dealing with petty arguments among employees. Unfortunately, this is all part of being a business owner. If you haven’t experienced it yet, you probably will in the future. 

Dealing with these issues is as important as balancing your books because employees are the means by which your business survives so happy employees are long-term employees. A good work atmosphere has been proven many times to be a productive workplace so don’t ignore complaints related to other employees. 

What is a difficult employee?

A difficult employee is not necessarily a bad employee i.e. they may be good at their job but perhaps they don’t work well with others or make others uncomfortable in the work environment. What makes this occur is often just a clash of different personalities, however, there are occasions when an employee could simply have a bad attitude to work.

Employees with a bad attitude can manifest in many ways. They may do their work poorly with zero enthusiasm and an unfriendly demeanor. If they work directly with customers, this can have a negative effect on repeat customers and cost you future work. 

The ‘perfectionist’ employee

Another occurrence is ‘the perfectionist’ where the employee may be very good at their job, even to the extreme where they believe they are the only ones that do the job well and will not allow others to do the work or complain to them about how they do it, leading to a feeling of ‘bossiness’. In more extreme cases, the employee will also believe the business owner is not doing a job as well as they would and they may begin undermining the employer to other employees, ignoring direction and 

Although a hard work and perfectionist attitude may have some advantages, if it creates a toxic environment, it will ultimately fail due to the loss of employees and/or frustration of the business owner. 

Try General Critique

People can take direct criticism in a hurtful way so before attempting to talk directly with the employee, start by using general announcements to all employees requesting changes in behavior or policies. Sometimes the employee may not realize they have a negative behavioral characteristic. With an announcement, they may become more self-aware about the possibility of their behavior and this is the first step in modifying behavior. 

Modify the Workplace Structure

Although every situation is unique, you may have the opportunity to modify the working conditions to try and isolate the bad behavior from other employees. If the employee can do their job without interacting with others, they could be given ‘their own space’ to do their work. 

Sometimes, some employees may not have a problem with the difficult employee and in these cases, you could try and design your workflow to have only those employees interact with the difficult employee while insulating others. 

Identify the Problem

Ok, so assume isolation won’t work and the person does not believe they are behaving badly as per the general announcements. At this point you may not have a choice but to address the employee in person. However, before directly critiquing the employee, start by asking them how they are and how they find work. In doing this, you may be able to uncover the reason for the bad behavior. It's possible that the employee’s behavior may be related to working conditions or other employees which means you may have other options to improve the working environment for that employee, improving their behavior and thus resolving the toxic work environment. 

For this method, you need to be open to negative feedback about your business but keep open minded and consider any issues the employee may bring up. Some problems that come to light might not only be experienced by one employee. 

Discuss the Problem

Finally, after exhausting every other option, you should have a disciplinary discussion with the employee. Although these types of discussions are difficult to navigate, some general considerations are to systematically highlight the complaints and allow the employee to reply to each. This allows the employee the opportunity to defend themselves and they also will not perceive the discussion as simply criticisms. Based on their answers, you will be able to determine if they are willing to try and change their workplace behavior and this will dictate your future course of action. 

In Summary

Employee relations is an important aspect of running a business and can be a make or break in its success. Dealing with behavioral issues is complicated as it is unique to each individual but with the techniques explained above, you can begin to take the most subtle approach to resolving the issue, followed by more direct actions. Nobody wants to let an employee go but if that employee is affecting the work environment for others and adding to the stresses you as a business owner are experiencing, maybe it’s time to find a new employee. 

If you are unsure about how to address your difficult employee or none of the above methods worked, contact David D’Silva for advice and let's build your team and productivity together.