Simple yet effective tips for successful goal setting
“How to OKR” is a format taken from the monthly Perdoo newsletter OKR Insider. To get OKR tips, goal setting hacks, and best practices delivered directly to your mailbox, join our mailing list.
1. Without a metric, it’s not a Key Result
Key Results can be seen as a feedback mechanism for achieving your Objective. Without a metric, deciding whether you achieved an Objective or not is only based on gut feelings. That’s why when goal setting using OKRs, you should make every Key Result measurable.
2. Set OKRs so ambitious that they make goal setting feel uncomfortable
When defining a target for your Key Result, there’s a good rule of thumb: the Key Result should make you feel uncomfortable and getting to 70% should represent a significant achievement. The reason for this is that setting challenging goals unlocks creative thinking, and stretches your capabilities.
3. Ensure everyone in your company uses OKRs
OKR is a goal setting framework that, in theory, only needs to be used by a few people in a company, e.g. leadership and management. However, involving every employee , from intern to CEO, will help you tap the full potential of OKR. After all, you want everyone’s work to be connected to the company’s strategy. You want transparency on all levels so that everyone is aware of the company’s top priorities, and how they contribute to them.
4. Make OKRs part of your day-to-day business
OKRs are often misinterpreted as something you set at the beginning of a quarter, and don’t touch again until the middle or even the end of the same quarter. Instead, you should keep your OKRs top of mind by making them part of your daily processes. If you frequently check in and update OKRs regularly you should see increases increases in transparency, happiness, and your success rate. If you have weekly team meetings for discussing to-dos and evaluating progress, base them on your OKRs. This is how you become a truly goal-driven company.
5. Focus on the Key Results that are actually key
When setting Key Results, it’s crucial that you focus on the most important outcomes. If you’re a SaaS company, an Objective could be to achieve the steepest revenue growth since launch. SaaS companies have different forms of revenue metrics such as Monthly Recurring Revenue (MRR) from new business as well as from accounts expanding. To save complication we recommend you focus on the highest possible denominator for the Objective: in this case the overall MRR.
6. Look at your vision & mission before setting your company-level OKRs
In a perfectly aligned company, all efforts contribute to the mission (the purpose of your organization) and bring you closer to your vision (where you want to be in 5–10 years). At Perdoo we combine both into what we call your Ultimate Goal. If you don’t have a mission or vision yet, it’s about time! Company OKRs should always push the company closer towards realizing its Ultimate Goal , or fix problems that stand in its way. Your Ultimate Goal is great source of inspiration to pick the right Objectives.
Originally published at www.perdoo.com on February 6, 2017.
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