How to set OKRs - a collaborative process

How often have you tried your best to set objectives and key results and never really got anywhere?

OKRs work the best when you have a collaborative process to set them, because then everyone can "see their fingerprints" on them, and everyone has had chance to input and shape them, and nobody can come back later on and reject them.

Plus getting expertise from your colleagues in other areas will make the OKRs well-rounded and with better outcomes!

Who should I involve in setting my OKRs?

In a word, everyone. Well maybe not everyone! But key people from all the different departments that you work with.

That could include:

• Sales / Business development
• Account management / Retention
• Marketing
• Commercial
• Finance
• Strategy
• Partnerships
• Customer services
• Engineering
• Design
• Data
• Other Product groups

In each of the departments you should already have somebody that is your day-to-day partner. Someone that you talk to regularly about your plans, and who contributes their expertise, and acts as your gateway to the rest of that org.

Think carefully about which level of each department you engage with. It's probably easiest to go in at your level, but it can be more effective to go in one level up. The higher you go, the easier it will be to talk more abstractly about high-level outcomes without getting stuck in the detail. And buy-in from more senior folks will unlock more action later down the line.

If you're partnered up with one or two key departments, you'll probably listen to them more than the others, and take more of their ideas and requests into account.

Or if your product team has more independence and you operate across the company, you'll probably want to draw from a wider group of people.

When you're choosing people, think about what kind of involvement you want from them, from "lots" to "a little":

• Are they actually proposing goals and outcomes?
• Are they reviewing and providing feedback?
• Are they just being informed about progress?

You can discuss with each person beforehand what level of involvement you want from them. They may have a different view - perhaps they need more from you next quarter to acheive their goals so they want stronger alignment.

What timeline should I follow to set OKRs?

Some people say they can set OKRs in a week. Others take 3 months. It really depends on a) how large your organisation is, and b) how autonomous your team is.

Our recommendation is to start thinking about your next cycle's OKRs when you hit the halfway mark of the current cycle.

So if you operate in quarters, start thinking about your next OKRs when you reach 6 weeks of the way through the current quarter. By then you'll have made some progress with your current OKRs and can use whatever you've learned to help draft your next set.

Other departments may not be that proactive, but most of the time they'll be happy to be nudged along to your timeline.

The reason it can take a while to get right is that you've got to go through a few repetitive steps (see next section). And in between each step, everyone needs time to digest the latest proposals, find some data to back up their ideas, discuss the pros and cons, align dependencies, and so on.

If your company is very small (< 100 people), you could take less time. Maybe 2-3 weeks.

Or if you have a very autonomous team without many dependencies, you could take even less time. Maybe 1-2 weeks.

How do I draft and refine my OKRs?

The role of OKRs is not just to collect a list of requests or requirements and to write them down. OKRs are about agreeing on the most important outcomes, not outputs. So when you're talking to your colleagues in other departments, try and avoid talking about specific features at first and stick to "what will this feature achieve for customers or the business?"

The first draft of OKRs is always the hardest because you're starting from a blank piece of paper. Here's a suggestion:

Just write. Write a few paragraphs about what you think is the most important things to get done. Or a list of specific features if you like - once you've got a few written down you can go back and think more deeply about why you think those features are the most important, and what they achieve. Reverse engineer the outcomes!

Ask your key stakeholders to do the same. Then you can all come together and compare your first drafts. It must be an open and honest discussion, with everyone listening to all the other proposals and ideas about what's valuable and what's important.

Try to agree, and summarise what you've agreed on. This will form the basis of the first shared and collaborative OKR draft.

If you or some of your stakeholders have already managed to write their own first drafts in OKR format, great! If not that's fine too. Once you've agreed on any key outcomes you can start to collectively summarise them into OKR format.

So:

• Write your own thoughts about what's important, in any format
• Ask key stakeholders to do the same
• Get together and take turns to share your thoughts
• Discuss and agree on the parts you all think are most valuable
• Collectively propose those things into OKR format

Now you've got a straw-man, you can refine.

Take that first draft on a little roadshow around other departments and other people to get their input and suggestions. As you go along you can iteratively refine the KRs, the metrics, the targets, the wording and so on.

After you've visited everyone individually or in small groups in your roadshow, you have created a second draft. You can keep doing this process, perhaps with larger and larger groups until you get no more new feedback or until you're happy with what you've got.

When should I share my OKRs?

Early and often, to increasing audiences as the OKRs become more refined.

Share your intial thoughts (in whatever format) with the few key people who are directly contributing to your OKRs.

Share your first draft (produced collaboratively, above) with the next level of experts and relevant people around the business. And with any dependencies, or teams that you'll need support from, or teams who will be affected by your work. They need visibility and also to be aligned.

Share your second draft (produced as a result of the previous step) publicly to everyone who might be even just a tiny bit interested. This is more like "publishing" your OKRs for any last minute pushback or vetoes; so when you do this step it can be helpful to include some long form writing with it to explain the rationale and strategy, and any insight or data you have to back it up.

How should I get my OKRs signed off?

Some companies have a formal process where the executive team or senior management of your business unit will gather to review and approve OKRs.

Other companies have a very informal process where teams create and share their OKRs, and as long as no-one stands up and shouts, "no!" then you're good to go.

It's up to you to figure out which one your company is. If in doubt, try the latter.

The one key tip is to ensure no-one is ever surprised by your OKRs in a meeting. Always meet with people before-hand to share and discuss and answer any tricky questions. Group review meetings can focus on productive discussion rather than strong critique or challenge, which can throw people off their stride and end up de-railing a meeting.

Example OKR setting process, end-to-end

Example steps you might go through for setting OKRs in a medium sized company that runs in quarters.

• T-6 weeks: review progress of current OKRs (mid-quarter scoring)
• T-5 weeks: compile list of key stakeholders, invite them to join OKR setting, write initial thoughts
• T-4 weeks: first meeting with stakeholders to produce first draft of OKRs
• T-3 weeks: roadshow of first draft, meet with senior stakeholders in other departments
• T-2 weeks: meet with delivery teams to check they're comfortable with commitment
• T-1 weeks: publish second draft widely, wait for vetoes, prepare to execute

Can I change my OKRs mid-quarter?

Yes. Despite the best process in the world, things change. You might learn more about your company, the industry, the market, your customers and so on which means your targets change. That's fine.

For small changes you can usually just make the change yourself and inform people of the rationale.

For larger changes, it's worth discussing with people first: present the current OKR, the new information, and gather ideas on what to do: keep the current OKR, change it slightly, or pivot more seriously and create new Os or KRs. Once aligned, then make the change and proceed.

That's the lot folks - good luck!

The secret to success for OKRs is communication. Keep everything out in the open, public, shared, and up for discussion.

The best way to do that is to use an OKR dashboard, for recording OKRs and tracking your progress.