"When managing difficult people, if it isn't written down, it's as if it didn't happen." Colleen Kettenhofen

Many managers and supervisors are promoted to management positions based on their hard skills. Yet few of them have had training in the area of managing people. Especially managing difficult people. In conducting seminars on managing people, one challenge I hear managers and supervisors face nowadays is how to manage a difficult employee. You can't control them, but you can control their environment in the hopes of coaching the employee to better performance.

Here are 10 Management Tips for Managing Difficult People:

1. Document, document, document. As far as the courts are concerned, if it isn't written down it's as if it didn't happen. Even if you have a prospective employee sign a form saying they know they can be terminated at any time, without cause, and without warning or reason. You never want to terminate without proper documentation. Terminating an employee without cause, reason, or prior warning, can make it easier for the difficult person to win a wrongful termination lawsuit.

2. Document training and coaching. Any type of training you provide for your difficult employee is considered coaching. In managing difficult people, many managers assume the documentation is to build a case for termination. It is not! It's really to show everything you did to try and salvage the difficult employee. This includes any and all training. Whether you trained the employee, someone else trained them, or you sent them to a seminar to be coached to better performance.

3. Avoid the word "attitude." In managing difficult people, why would you want to avoid saying something like, "Pat, I don't like your attitude?" Because it's too subjective. It's not specific enough.

4. Focus instead on specific behaviors or the quality of their work. For example, what should you do if every time you delegate a special project to the difficult person, they fold their arms, exhale loudly, roll their eyes, and sarcastically mutter under their breath, "Okay, whatever?!" You would want to say in a low controlled tone something like, "Pat, every time I delegate a special project to you, the arms are folded, you're rolling your eyes, muttering under your breath, 'Okay, whatever.' What seems to be the cause of this?" Notice I listed specific behaviors. So focus on facts.

5. Be objective, not subjective. As mentioned, when managing difficult people, be objective by mentioning specific behaviors, or specific declines in the quality of their work. For example, when documenting the employee's "attitude," you might document the following: "Every time I delegated a special project to Pat so-and-so, he/she would fold their arms, exhale loudly, roll their eyes, and mutter under their breath, "Okay, whatever!" Now, if this were ever read by a jury, or your Human Resources department if you have one, or your manager, they would have a clear picture of this person's attitude.

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