As of 13 August 2026, AI can create questions for a new employee's probation review.

What to actually do

1. Hand it to a person

   The route this page recommends

   A person who owns the outcome does this end to end, worth it when the failure is dear.

2. Use a tool built for this

   Second choice

3. Do it yourself

   The distant third

   A chat interface, chat-fluent skill, and roughly 15 minutes until you can act on the result.

   How to actually do it

   1. Open the employee's job description, agreed objectives, probation policy and any review form used by your organisation.
   2. Gather factual examples from the probation period, including completed work, missed objectives, feedback, training provided and support requested.
   3. Paste the prompt into a chatbot and replace each bracketed slot with the role, probation length, objectives, factual notes and relevant policy.
   4. Ask the chatbot to produce the questions, then remove any question that assumes misconduct, introduces an unsupported fact or asks about an irrelevant personal matter.
   5. Compare the remaining questions with the job objectives and probation policy, then send the final list to your HR contact or a suitable colleague for a fairness and process check before the meeting.

   Prompt

   Create a fair, practical set of questions for a probation review for [JOB TITLE] after [LENGTH OF PROBATION]. The review should assess the agreed objectives, quality of work, reliability, collaboration, communication, support needed and next steps. Use these role objectives: [PASTE OBJECTIVES]. Use these factual observations and examples: [PASTE NOTES]. Use this relevant company policy or review framework: [PASTE POLICY OR FRAMEWORK].
   
   Write:
   1. A short opening question that invites the employee's own view.
   2. Ten open questions grouped under clear headings.
   3. Separate questions for achievements, missed objectives, support or training, and future priorities.
   4. Two questions for the manager to check whether expectations or resources were unclear.
   5. A final question about the employee's view of the probation outcome and next steps.
   
   Do not invent facts, performance issues or legal requirements. Do not turn assumptions into questions that imply blame. Keep every question specific to the supplied objectives and evidence. Avoid questions about protected characteristics or personal matters unless they are clearly relevant, lawful and covered by the supplied policy. Mark any area where the supplied information is too thin to write a fair question. Use plain UK workplace English.

   Open it prefilled in ChatGPT or Claude, or copy it into Gemini, which takes no prefill link.