OKR is more than just 3 months planning tool - it is the agile management technique your managers & teams will love
OKRs (Objectives & Key Results) are a further development of MBO, KPIs and SMART to be more agile and adaptive in these challenging times and disruptive market situations.
What do OKRs do differently?
The most eye-catching differences to previous management techniques are quarterly planning & execution cycles and full transparency on the goals, results and progress of every unit of the organization.
Besides OKRs create a strong alignment and focus of each member and every team to work towards 3 - 5 objectives per quarter. Often these objectives are not operationally but rather innovation, market and customer driven. From our experience, adding an employee engagement OKR is also helpful to collect ideas and showcase what the organization does for their staff.
How can OKRs help my organization?
OKRs provide a clear set-up and planning guideline to develop Objectives and Key Results for a given year and quarter out of the Mission, Vision, Culture and Strategy of a company. Once the company objectives for the next quarters are set, department / team and individual OKRs can be aligned to the company priorities for the next 12 -14 weeks and everybody can work towards these objectives with the right actions. Weekly tracking of OKRs enables to measure these actions again the key results and if needed correct these actions to be successful. The transparent reporting, measurement & tracking of OKRs gives each the company leaders and great snap shot which objectives will be achieved and where the teams need more support, guidance or resources.
Check out how we can support you to implement OKRs: https://www.okrasia.com/services
How can OKRs support my employees?
To introduce OKRs in an organization which previously used other management & planning techniques could be tricky and can be supported by highlighting the advantages of each team member by using OKRs. As the company aligns to and communicates openly the 3 - 5 priorities in each quarter, it protects staff from over ambitious managers who every 2 weeks come up with new ideas and do not focus on finishing. It also gives engaged staff to shine transparently their team or individual achievements in the weekly OKR reporting. OKRs can create an fair employee experience, but taking out the 1:1 review and rating cycle with their managers and base performance on a company-wide tool.
OKRs are a great tool to plan and execute adaptively to new market situation and customer demands without loosing focus on getting things done. It gives clear measurements for action results of teams and individuals and foster a culture of participation, alignment and collaboration.
If you are interested in OKRs please comment or contact us on carsten@okrasia.com