Performance reviews should serve as important stepping stones in employees’ careers — they’re an opportunity to explore strengths, improve skills and develop plans for future success.

But performance reviews can also be stressful events for both managers and employees when they’re not executed properly. And these challenges increase when managing remote employees. Physical distance, technology hiccups, communication difficulties and other factors make remote performance reviews less than intuitive for many managers. And most importantly, organizations cannot rely on strategies that only work well for in-office conversations.