A good process is more critical than a good idea. For things to work smoothly in an organization, it is critical that everyone involved work towards the same goal. Because of this, every organization will eventually decide to implement the OKR system.
But as with anything else, there are many ways to approach setting and tracking OKR goals. Keeper reading to learn more about this effective goal-oriented approach.
Know Your Company’s Objectives
Effective OKRs begin with understanding your organization’s goals. Once you’ve defined your vision, turn it into actionable team OKRs to propel your company forward. Remember to balance your OKRs, so that each one supports the next.
Align your team with a clear vision, set easily tracked and monitored goals, and communicate frequently to make sure you’re all moving in the right direction.
Choose The Right Tools
OKR software is essential for setting and tracking progress against your goals. The best systems will help you set SMART (Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound) objectives by letting you define a clear metric for each one. This makes it easy to track progress against each objective and provides valuable feedback on how effectively they are achieved in real-time.
Get Your Entire Team Involved.
Involve your entire team when you’re setting OKRs. That includes managers and people at all levels of the organization — even frontline employees such as sales reps or customer service representatives.
The more people involved, the better it is for everyone. It helps teams feel invested in their success by making them feel like they’re part of creating their own goals. It also helps ensure that there’s buy-in from these objectives (e.g., sales reps), so that employees are motivated to help make them happen.
Create an OKR Goal Statement.
The objective statement is one of the most important parts of OKR goals. It should be clear, concise, compelling and written in the present tense, and follow a simple format. An objective statement should be clear, but leave room for creative interpretation.
Develop Key Results
Your key results are like a map. They show you how to reach your destination of achieving the objective. The best way to measure your progress is by using key results, which are measurable targets.
Plan Your Initiatives
OKRs are not just about setting goals; they also involve defining how you will achieve those goals by breaking them down into smaller pieces called initiatives. If you don’t plan your initiatives upfront, it’s easy to lose sight of what needs to be done as you work on tasks under each objective.
Summary
The goal is to create clear and measurable OKR goals, which will help you focus on what’s important and help your team avoid getting lost in the details.
It’s easy to get bogged down by all the activities that need to be completed to achieve a goal, but it’s important to focus on the few things that matter. OKR goals help teams avoid getting distracted by minor issues, which can take away from their ability to complete larger tasks.
