OKR stands for Objectives & Key Results and is a simple framework for setting better goals. It describes WHAT you want to achieve (Objective) and HOW you intend to measure that you have achieved it (Key Result). Well-known OKR users are Google and Twitter, but even the artist Bono uses it for his philanthropic focus. OKR is a goal management with a strong focus on aiming high and doing it together with the rest of the company – it is especially useful for people with high ambitions, clear visions but a great need for collaboration. Each OKR is therefore linked to a Focus Area, in order to create opportunities for several people (perhaps 1000’s) to aim high together towards a common vision. Read more here to learn more about how to create a clear vision for OKRs. Below are two examples of OKR, we hope it gives you inspiration:
OKR for UX Designer, example 1:
Note that in gray text we have written “Data-driven product development” – this is an example of a Focus area. It is important then how this OKR becomes a supportive way of working for you in your everyday life. OKR should help you focus on the most important thing, even though there is a lot going on during the work week. Therefore, after setting up your OKR, it is important to start making brief, recurring comments against it. In OKR’s language, these comments are called “Check-ins”. What opportunities, for example, would this OKR give you for doing insightful Check-Ins, and what kind of feedback would you get from your particular workplace? Here are a few examples to get you started, as it looks in our tool:
OKR for Visual Designer, example 2:
Just as in the previous example, we have added a focus area in the above example – this time “Improving handovers from idea to final product”. This OKR shows examples where Key Results has been used to increase learning – “20 improvement suggestions on how we build our Sketch components from developers”. Here you make sure to ask other departments other than your own about feedback and try to learn and find improvements in the work you do. In modern OKR tools such as Node, feedback between colleagues is a central feature and often a good way to implement a constant transfer of knowledge between different teams. Key Results can also be used to measure range; In “Going from 20% to 85% decision meetings”, the programmer has not only set a concrete key result, but also produced what the situation looks like today (only 20% of components are shared today). In this way, OKR is also used to distribute knowledge about important conditions in the initiatives that each person works with, for example:
