When times get tough, it can be easy to let some of your people processes fall away as you concentrate on the basics of the business.

Take the performance review. They can be unpopular, sucking up a lot of time and making employees and managers stressed. So why not skip them?

Because good performance reviews work. They’re an effective way to track people's progress, provide feedback, gain insight, support development, and align individual performance with company goals, which helps the business achieve results.

They just have to be done well. So here are some tips for getting the most out of your performance reviews:

• Target the right people - Not everyone has to have full, formal reviews. Prioritise the positions that have a genuine opportunity to deliver over-and-above results.

• Focus on the conversation - documentation provides a basic way to articulate expectations, track performance, and measure results, but it shouldn’t replace honest, 2-way communication with your people.

• Keep it simple - structure the review around the objectives needed for success in the role, the skills needed to achieve the objectives, and a development plan that aims to improve skills, reach goals, and help with career development.

• Get the review cycle right - align full-scope reviews to an annual cycle and schedule regular check-ins at meaningful times throughout the year.

• Use software - Good software will help lighten the admin load and make it easier to chart and really analyse employee performance.

This article has more on these effective steps for improving your employee performance reviews.