Measure What Matters

An OBJECTIVE, I explained, is simply WHAT is to be achieved, no more and no less. By definition, objectives are significant, concrete, action oriented, and (ideally) inspirational. When properly designed and deployed, they’re a vaccine against fuzzy thinking—and fuzzy execution. KEY RESULTS benchmark and monitor HOW we get to the objective. Effective KRs are specific and time-bound, aggressive yet realistic. Most of all, they are measurable and verifiable. (As prize pupil Marissa Mayer would say, “It’s not a key result unless it has a number.”) You either meet a key result’s requirements or you don’t; there is no gray area, no room for doubt. At the end of the designated period, typically a quarter, we declare the key result fulfilled or not. Where an objective can be long-lived, rolled over for a year or longer, key results evolve as the work progresses. Once they are all completed, the objective is necessarily achieved. (And if it isn’t, the OKR was poorly designed in the first place.) (Location 173)

As LinkedIn CEO Jeff Weiner likes to say, “When you are tired of saying it, people are starting to hear it.” (Location 716)

Objectives and key results are the yin and yang of goal setting—principle and practice, vision and execution. (Location 718)

The more ambitious the OKR, the greater the risk of overlooking a vital criterion. To safeguard quality while pushing for quantitative deliverables, one solution is to pair key results—to measure “both effect and counter-effect,” as Grove wrote in High Output Management. When key results focus on output, Grove noted: [T]heir paired counterparts should stress the quality of [the] work. Thus, in accounts payable, the number of vouchers processed should be paired with the number of errors found either by auditing or by our suppliers. For another example, the number of square feet cleaned by a custodial group should be paired with a . . . rating of the quality of work as assessed by a senior manager with an office in that building. Table 4.1: Key Results Paired for Quantity and Quality Quantity Goal Quality Goal Result Three new features Fewer than five bugs per feature in quality assurance testing Developers will write cleaner code. $50M in Q1 sales $10M in Q1 maintenance contracts Sustained attention by sales professionals will increase customer success and satisfaction rates. Ten sales calls Two new orders Lead quality will improve to meet the new order threshold requirement. (Location 756)

few goal-setting ground rules: Key results should be succinct, specific, and measurable. A mix of outputs and inputs is helpful. Finally, completion of all key results must result in attainment of the objective. If not, it’s not an OKR.* Table 4.2: An OKR Quality Continuum Weak Average Strong Objective: Win the Indy 500. Key result: Increase lap speed. Key result: Reduce pit stop time.. Objective: Win the Indy 500. Key result: Increase average lap speed by 2 percent. Key result: Reduce average pit stop time by one second. Objective: Win the Indy 500. Key result: Increase average lap speed by 2 percent. Key result: Test at wind tunnel ten times. Key result: Reduce average pit stop time by one second. Key result: Reduce pit stop errors by 50 percent. Key result: Practice pit stops one hour per day. (Location 779)

Or as Larry Page would say, winning organizations need to “put more wood behind fewer arrows.” That, in very few and focused words, is the essence of our first superpower. (Location 815)

The “professional employee,” Peter Drucker wrote, “needs rigorous performance standards and high goals. . . . But how he does his work should always be his responsibility and his decision.” At Intel, Grove took a dim view of “managerial meddling”: “[T]he subordinate will begin to take a much more restricted view of what is expected of him, showing less initiative in solving his own problems and referring them instead to his [or her] supervisor. . . . [T]he output of the organization will consequently be reduced. . . .” (Location 1159)

Classic OKR-Writing Mistakes and Traps (Location 3221)

To get leaps in productivity or innovation, follow Google’s “Gospel of 10x” and replace incremental OKRs with exponential ones. That’s how industries get disrupted and categories reinvented. (Location 3424)

To power positive business results, implement ongoing CFRs (conversations, feedback, and recognition) in concert with structured goal setting. Transparent OKRs make coaching more concrete and useful. Continuous CFRs keep day-to-day work on point and genuinely collaborative. (Location 3436)