Companies that are doing well even in the recession have one thing in common: their staff are focused and kept informed about what's going on in the business.

Often, though, the communication isn't there and staff are more concerned with losing their jobs than they are with how to drive the business forward. They are as demotivated as they have been in a long time just when you need them to perform to their maximum.

There are going to be redundancies but if everyone's got their heads down it's down to the way the owner has handled it. I actually think it should motivate people when others lose their jobs because they have survived. It's a time to dig deeper and provide more.

Motivating staff is one of the most basic, fundamental things for any business but it's even more important in a recession. People who don't know how to performance manage their staff think that it has to involve a cost but that's not true. A lot of businesses have spent money unnecessarily. Corporate days don't work; they're just a jolly. In my old job I remember running around in an SAS suit shooting people when all I was bothered about was what was going on in the office.

I own a financial services business so the downturn hit us in January 2007 when the lenders started to pull out. I sat down with the staff and told them I wasn't putting any money into incentives. We ran incentives with time off; where if they'd made 12 sales by 2pm on a Thursday they got the Friday off.

Once a week we had a team meeting that was purely for motivation because others in the industry were going bust and I didn't want morale falling.

Another option is to create an achievement culture where you pit one person against another. As long as you maintain the momentum, that will increase the company's performance and keep them motivated because they're focused.

But the individual concerned has to pick what actually motivates them and that's quite difficult for a lot of employers. They think that success is motivation and that's wrong. My PA, for example, is not motivated by money, alcohol or time off. She's motivated by Chanel makeup.

The biggest part of motivation is communication. Managers coming out of meetings with bad news written all over their faces aren't going to do the staff any good. And all the time this is going on the business has to be operational. You don't want your staff on the floor wondering if they've still got a job; you want them on the phones calling every single customer and being more proactive than they've ever been.

Every single morning in my businesses an email is sent communicating company performance to date. I can tell you how much revenue we've got to date, how much we need today and how many sales days are left. I asked a sales director recently if he knew how many sales days there were in January and he didn't, which is shocking to me. The answer is 21. If you break down the figure you need to hit by 21 to get a daily rate, it starts to look achievable and that motivates staff.

If you're not talking to the people who actually do the job your company isn't going to survive. But those that are open and have good communications and focus will come through this, as long as they're commercially viable and aren't carrying too much debt.