Probation period: what to ask your manager in the first week

A new hire starts their probation period, gets assigned tasks, and tries to do them well, but has no idea what criteria will be used to judge them in three months. By the end of the period, the outcome can surprise both sides.

Clarify what counts as a result

Ask the manager directly: what needs to be done by the end of probation for it to count as passed. A vague "fit in with the team" doesn't check anything — ask for concrete examples of tasks or metrics. If the criteria are fuzzy, offer to write them down yourself: "just to confirm I understand correctly...".

Agree on a midpoint check-in

Don't leave feedback for the last week. Suggest a short conversation after a month: what's working, what should change. That leaves time to adjust course, instead of finding out about a problem once the final decision is nearly made.

Ask about workflow separately

Beyond the tasks themselves, clarify practical details: who to ask when something's unclear, how approvals work, where to find the documents you need. Not knowing these small things often looks like slow work from the outside, when really the person is just hunting for the process, not stuck on the task.