OKR meaning – Objective Key Result A Summary For Leaders

One of the most important skills that a modern leader can possess is the ability to align their entire workforce to the big vision of the company, that's why talking about OKRs is very important!

OKR Meaning

OKR meaning - Objective Key Result and it's the goal of the OKR methodology is for every member of the organization – from the key stakeholders and leaders down to the team members – to understand the objectives of the company through a set of defined, specific, and measurable actions.

With today’s complex nature of organizations, team members often find themselves feeling lost amidst the rapid changes that they deal with every day. Often, the strategic plans and goals of the company are too high-level and abstract that employees don’t just feel lost, but also feel discouraged and find a lack of purpose.

OKR at Google: A Case Study

OKRs have changed the way many companies achieve their GSDs. Companies like Twitter, Zynga, Oracle, LinkedIn, Trello, Hobsons, Sears Holding Corp., and other huge brands are known to have adopted the Objective and Key Results (OKRs) to achieve their goals.

But it wasn’t a new concept. One of the pioneering companies that used OKRs is no other than Google. When the company was just less than a year old, one of its investors, John Doerr, proposed using OKRs. The idea was adopted by Intel and proven to be highly effective regardless of the type of organization.

How do they do it?

In one of his presentations about how OKRs work, Google Ventures partner Rick Klau gave a very fascinating insight into how Google operates. OKR is pretty simple. It starts with setting up an objective and is followed by identifying several “Key Results”.

Note: The Key Results should be quantifiable.

It’s the only way to know whether you have achieved your objectives. At the same time, your objectives should be measurable and concrete. Saying you want to significantly increase your sales is not definitive and measurable, but rather abstract. You say you want to increase your annual sales by 30%.

At Google, objectives are set annually and quarterly. When Klau took charge of Blogger – a blog-publishing service owned and operated by Google – the objective tackled during one quarter is to improve the company’s reputation.

While Blogger was a huge platform and has been around for many years, it was losing popularity as more and more blogging platforms such as Tumblr enter the industry. To improve Blogger’s reputation, Klau created four Key Results:

• Re-establish Blogger’s leadership by speaking to at least 3 industry events
• Coordinate Blogger’s 10^th anniversary PR efforts
• Reach out personally to Blogger’s users
• Fix DMCA process and eliminate music blog takedowns

Annual OKRs are more high-level, usually encompassing the quarterly objectives of Google. But these OKRs are not set in stone. They change and evolve as the need arises.

According to Klau, Google also adopts OKRs at managerial and team levels, even personal levels. This is critical to how they grade their employees and ensure that every single person in the company gets things done and works together to keep the company on track.

By the end of each quarter, everyone working in Google grades their key results. They adopt a 0-1 scale. The goal is not to reach 1 in every Key Result. Otherwise, it will be assumed that the member has created a Key Result that’s too easy. As Klau puts it, the member is ‘sandbagging it’. Employees are aiming for a score of 0.6-0.7.

Another interesting practice within Google is that their OKRs are open to everyone. Not only do they see each other’s OKRs, but also their scores. It might seem a little intimidating, but it helps employees at Google understand what each other is working on.

How Google sets OKRs article describes the way they use it in more depth.

There are other objective and key results examples to help your company set effective goals.

How OKR works and Key Elements of an OKR

By now, you’ve started to have a pretty good grasp of OKRs and how they can benefit your organization, just as it benefited Google. But the real challenge is setting up your OKRs and brainstorming on the Key Results to achieve your company objectives.

There are just two elements of an OKR:

• Objectives – depending on your role, you start by identifying 3-5 key objectives of your company, team, or even on a personal level. While objectives should be ambitious, they should also be SMART: Specific, Measurable, Actionable, Realistic and Time-Bound. If you’re a manager, you should make sure that such objectives are carefully relayed to everyone on your team.
• Key Results – if the “objectives” answer the question “What?”, the “key results” answer the question “How?”. Thus, they have to be quantifiable, achievable, clear, and difficult, but not impossible. Most importantly, Key Results, which should be composed of 3-5 points, should be measurable. This is the only way to track your or your team’s progress, understand the hurdles, and develop/improve processes along the way.

You may think that OKR is but a reinstatement of traditional goal-setting practices used by most companies even before. However, the OKR process is different because of two additional aspects:

• Cascading alignment of goals
• Breaking up Objectives into smaller, actionable steps

While not a major element of OKRs, the tactic is also a term that is worth mentioning when we talk about OKRs. Tactics fall under Key Results and basically, inform the “how” part. Note that tactics are different from the tasks. They are strategies used to perform those tasks.

Think of tasks as those you deal with on Trello, Asana, or any other project management tool that your company uses. These tasks fall under “tactics” and are necessary for such tactics to work. In most cases, you may need a combination of different tactics to achieve the Key Results that will support your objectives.

OKR basics article tells you everything you need to know about OKRs.

How often should you establish your OKR?

The frequency of your goal-setting process is called cadence. Just like Google, you may have annual and quarterly goals within your organization. OKRs in each department should have the same time constraint to aid with coordination and avoid complexities. Remember, OKR is meant to be a simple process.

Characteristics of Objectives:

• Should specifically answer what you want to achieve within a determined time frame (e.g. after a year or quarter).
• Serves as the Strategic Theme or the “Burning Imperative” as other companies call it, that overarch what you want to accomplish.
• Should be qualitative because it is supported by a set of actionable steps or key
• Each objective must have 1-5 key results that measure it.

Characteristics of Key Results:

• Refers to the “results” that you seek.
• It should help you measure your progress in achieving your objectives.
• Talks about HOW you will achieve your objectives.
• Must be measurable. Thus, it should include a Key Performance Indicator (KPI) that is quantified through a metric.

In most organizations, Key Results (KRs) are typically seen among team-member levels or the junior-most hierarchy of employees. These people don’t make the goals for themselves (unless personal such as development goals) but are assigned goals by their managers or direct leaders. They generally own the Key Results.

Everyone above the team members, although they won’t have KRs, will have contributing goals. These are higher-level goals that bear the same attributes as that of KRs which are aligned with the senior goals. For example, almost in every organization, the CEO owns the top goals of the organization.

The team leaders or heads of each department (say, finance team and recruitment team) also set their junior goals concerning the overall company goals set by the CEO.

There are many OKR benefits but also certainly OKR disadvantages but you can learn how to deal with them and win in creating effective OKRs for your company.

How to Set OKR for Your Team

Step 1: Set the stage.

Reintroduce the concept of OKRs in your team and explain how the KRs are scored and how it affects their performance. Inform them that OKRs are meant to feel ‘uncomfortable’ and it’s perfectly okay to set an ambitious goal and miss it (so long as they are making progress of course). In short, encourage them to move out of their comfort zone.

Step 2: Identify your objectives.

Encourage your team members to participate in the brainstorming process. Note, however, that your team goals should be aligned with the senior goals (company objectives). Try to come up with 3 to 5 aspirational objectives. For example, if your company objective is to improve the business’s reputation and lead the Customer Service Department, your objectives may include increasing the CSAT score to 95%, implementing First-Call Resolution, or Shorter Queueing Time.

Step 3: Identify your key results.

Now is the time to list down the measurable outcomes that indicate whether you have achieved your objectives. Remember that you’re not dealing with tasks. You are dealing with results. Here’s an example:

Objective: Increase profit by 10%.

Key Results:

• Launch seasonal campaigns (summer promos, Valentine’s Day, Holiday fares, ) and double the revenue from the past year.
• Take cash discounts on suppliers to save 10% on purchases.
• Outsource fleet distribution to stores to reduce costs by 20%.

One of your KRs may require collaboration with another team. Follow up with them from time to time and make sure that they’re on board.

Step 4: Review and analyze.

You may find yourself revising your objectives or key results as you review your initial list. If you’re 100% confident that you can hit your KRs, that means you’re not being ambitious enough and you’re still in the ‘safe zone’. Try to increase your target up to the level that you find uncomfortable. Furthermore, see to it that your KRs are articulated in such a way that they can be scored on a sliding scale.

Step 5: Ask for feedback.

As with anything, getting feedback is very important, especially for the people who will be involved in the execution. They may have great suggestions to improve your OKRs.

Step 6: Scoring

A critical aspect of measuring Key Results is scoring. You may adopt Google’s sliding scale of between 0 and 1. This quantitative metric tells whether you missed, came close to, or hit your target. Note that a score of .7 on a key result is considered a success more than 1.

And if you're looking for step by step guide to implement your OKRs, then this article on OKR best practices may help you.

Unique Qualities of OKRs

Companies across various industries continue to adopt the system of OKRs because of its distinctive qualities that transform their organizations.

• Through OKRs, the top company objectives are cascaded to individual, junior-level members more clearly and accurately. This gives everyone a sense of purpose and direction.
• OKRs allow the organization to focus on everyone’s effort and what’s more important to the success of the business.
• It allows everyone to align their goals with the company's goals.
• It easily measures and tracks performance, which motivates employees to do better and contributes to the success of the organization.
• Frequent assessments and progress check-ins drive better execution.
• OKRs are focused on results and outcomes, not merely on tasks.
• Creating OKRs involves tapping into the collective minds of the group, not just a few select individuals or key
• Greatly helps managers measure the performance and progress of their team members, and thus allows for more targeted feedback and coaching OKR approach.
• OKRs allow individual teams to execute effectively.
• It brings transparency to the company as everyone can see what others are working on.
• No doubt, OKRs foster collaboration between members and across teams.

OKR FAQs

The post about objectives and key results implementation will help you understand how to properly and effectively introduce the Objective and Key Results in your company.

How to properly do an OKR evaluation for your team is also very crucial so that everyone will be kept accountable, high performing, and in cadence with the phase of your company.

Summary

I hope with this article you understood the OKR Meaning and what is the application of this framework. Many studies have shown that committing to a goal helps drive performance among employees. More importantly, setting challenging goals motivate them to perform well to achieve those goals.

OKR is a system of goal-setting practices that are meant to help organizations set ambitious goals and achieve them through measurable actions. OKRs are best done annually and quarterly. It is essential to focus on objectives that can be achieved within the given timeframe.

Whether you’re a CEO, an executive, an Ops manager, or a direct manager, using the system of OKRs is a proven way to increase your team’s alignment with the company goals, measure performance, provide adequate feedback to your team, and bring out results.

More importantly, setting OKRs gives every leader like you a clear OKR guideline on what to focus on during a given timeframe. By adopting this popular Google strategy, you too can tremendously foster growth and success within your organization.

Did you like this article?

If you liked this article and you are looking for a way to align everyone in your organization, let’s have a call or simply download our OKR Guide. We also offer OKR consulting and OKR training, but our approach differs from other companies, we believe OKRs should be fully integrated with your product development.