OKRsObjectives and Key Results

Nikos Batsios, Agile Coach/ScM @ IXG, PDU Mobile Core Ericsson’s HTE Learnathon, 4th & 5th February 2015

–Jurgen Appelo

“OKRs? A good mix of common sense”

a little bit of history

Peter Drucker: MBOs 60’s

George Doran: SMART 80’s

Andy Grove: OKRs @ Intel early 90’s

John Doerr: OKRs @ Google late 90’s

Rick Klau: OKRs @ Google StartupLabs 2013

what are OKRs?

• OKRs are a framework to connect personal and organizational goals. Could help in a simply way to create structure for organizations, teams and individuals.

• could be used as a self-improvement framework for your personal life and for yourself at work.

how they work?• first you set up an “objective”

• then you set-up a number of “key results”, that will help you hit your objective

• then you decide how often you will reflect on your learning and your improvement

• reflect, adapt, and re-start

what is an objective?what <point_of_view> want to accomplish for the next

few months

• less is more, (4-6 objectives per quarter are enough)

• each objective should be ambitious and feel a bit uncomfortable (stretch goals, slightly out of reach)

• the purpose is improvement not compliment

• keep them stable during the “working” period

< point_of_view >: my organization, my department, my team, myself

objectives examples

• I want to grow my agile coaching skills (personal)

• i want to be a healthy runner (Jurgen Appelo)

• improve Blogger’s reputation (Rick Klau)

• improve internal employee engagement

which are your objectives for the next few months? {2’}

what are key results?how <point_of_view> will accomplish the objective

• should clearly make the objective possible

• less is more (five or fewer per objective)

• you must define multiple key results (if one fails, you have others)

• are quantifiable

• lead to objective grading

< point_of_view >: my organization, my department, my team, myself

key results examples• i want to be a healthy runner

• run 75km per week • run at least 10km per day • average running time < 55min/10km • no pain in my back, legs or feet

• improve blogger’s reputation • re-establish Blogger’s leadership by

speaking at 3 industry events • coordinate Blogger’s 10th birthday PR efforts • ID and personally reach out of top xx

Bloggers users • fix DMCA process, eliminate music blog

takedowns • setup @blogger on twitter, regularly

participate in discussions re:Blogger product

• i want to grow my agile coaching skills • publish 3 new post in my personal blog • read two new books • read two articles per week • practice 2 new insights from books/articles

with my teams

• improve internal employee engagement • average weekly satisfaction score of at least

4.8 points • conduct weekly fun fridays all-hands meeting

with an external speaker • implement OKR’s in all teams and

departments by January 31st

which are your key results for every objective you have set for the next few months? {5’}

grading the OKRs• regularly update each key result on a 0-100% or

0.0-1.0 scale

• 60-70% or .6-.7 should be your target

• score matters less than the process

• use low grades to reassess: worth doing? what will we do different to achieve our objective?

grading example• objective: grow my agile coaching skills (52.5%)

• key results:

• publish 3 new post in my personal blog (30%)

• read two new books (30%)

• read two articles per week (100%)

• practice 2 new insights from books/articles with my teams (50%)

where to start in your organization?

• commit to the OKRs process

• identify an OKRs “champion” who fully understand the benefits of the approach and can support anyone on getting started or staying on track (CxO, line manager e.t.c)

• set OKRs on organization level, management level, team level, personal level. they should all work together to keep the whole organization on track

• encourage bottom-up objectives (too much top-down dictation kills motivation and aspiration)

• make them public to the whole organization

• communicate OKRs: make use of 1-1 conversations to develop, negotiage, review personal OKRs, team meetings, stuff meetings e.t.c to set, negotiate, review, achieve alignment

• experiment to find your own way

benefits• discipline thinking (the major goals will surface)

• communicates accurately (lets everyone know what is important)

• establishes indication for measuring progress (shows how far along we are)

• focuses effort (keeps organizations in step with each other)

consider the following• OKRs must be supported by the entire organization..

Everyone should agree on their goals and priorities

• we should focus on setting measurable goals or quantifiable targets

• should be aggressive yet realistic. should be stretched but not to the point of breaking ourselves and our teams

• should not be connected to bonus payments, or performance evaluations. it could be seen as an easy way for someone to figure out what she/he was working on and what had been accomplished

group exercise

our case study (10’)

• we are <your_team_name_goes_here>!

• we are passionate about helping organisations find better ways of doing business

• we are doing that by creating the environment where new insights can emerge! we are bringing an ultimate conference experience in your city!

2015 summit we are bringing un ultimate conference experience in

your city

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sharing & reflections (5’)

inspiration• Rick Klau, Startup Lab workshop: How Google sets goals:

OKRs

• Jurgen Appelo, What are OKRs? A good mix of common sense

• BetterWorks, Getting Started with Objectives & Key Results (OKRs)

• BetterWorks, Goal Science Best Practices

• Kris Duggan, Keys to OKR success: A Q&A with the Man Who Introduced OKRs to Google, John Doerr

thank you