What Makes a Good OKR - 5 Common OKR Mistakes to Avoid

What Makes a Good OKR Process

Objectives and key results (OKRs) is a methodology for setting goals in a way that makes them easier to achieve. It’s typically applied every quarter. This is how the OKR process looks like: 

1. First, you set 3–5 high-level Objectives for your team to pursue. 
2. Then, you define 2–3 Key Results to work as success measures to determine whether you’re moving towards your goals, and how well.

Optionally, you can score Key Results on a sliding scale from 0 to 1 at the end of each quarter (0 = no progress; 1 = target was hit or exceeded; 0.1-0.9 = somewhere in between). In this case, you should check in during the quarter, see how you’re tracking so far, and predict what the final score will be. 

A good OKR process implies that you keep Objectives and Key Results fresh in your mind, keep them updated, and they will serve as an early detection system for goals, processes, and aspects of business that need extra attention.

Why Do You Need a Good OKR Tool

Important notice! Setting good OKR processes without employing dedicated OKR apps is a fool’s errand. A bright example of such tools is KeepSolid Goals - a web-based app for goal-setting, planning, and project management. Our OKR software lets you apply a smooth OKR process in your business and efficiently reach your goals. It allows you to:

• Set an overarching Objective
• Add relevant Key Results
• Invite team members and appoint them to their Key Results
• Assign tasks that will bring you closer to your goals to the relevant members
• Monitor the progress and performance of your teams and projects with detailed reports

What are Common OKR Mistakes

A good OKR is impossible if you get into any of the most common pitfalls. So, let’s take a look at some of the common OKR mistakes and how to avoid them! These mistakes are quite universal, meaning that you can make them regardless of the type of company you run.

OKR mistake #1: confusing Objectives with themes

The term "customer experience" isn't an objective. “Ecosystem” isn't one of them either. They are themes rather than goals. They don't say anything about where you want to go or what you want to accomplish. Instead, write your goals such that you can see clearly if you met them when looking back later. 

For instance, your marketing team’s Objective can be “Increase visitors to the new product landing page”. When paired with Key Results like “Refine organic search to drive website visitors” and “Drive a 30% increase in click-through rates in the customer newsletter”, they form a good OKR process that will actually facilitate the achievement of your goals. 

OKR mistake #2: counting all your work as OKRs

Your OKRs, particularly Key Results, should never become an exhaustive list of everything your team has to do. This includes tasks from the “business as usual” category like closing out the quarterly books or fixing bugs. 

Make no mistake: if you want to CHANGE the way you do business, it's worth considering. For example, “Reduce late expense report submissions by 20%” or “Improve response time on customer-reported bugs” are both good OKR examples. Simply make sure that your OKRs only contain the most important things and activities.

OKR mistake #3: confusing tasks with Key Results

Do NOT write your OKRs and Key Results as a to-do list. Not only will this lead to forgetting about them when they’re done and scoring them all a 1, it will also prove quite a chore. Plus, you might find it difficult to abandon the task that wouldn’t get you closer to your goals, just because it’s a set-in-stone Key Result.

Think about it that way. The R in OKR stands for “result”, and that is why Key Results should represent - what you achieved, not what you did along the way. So, a good example of a Key Result for email marketing would be to “Reach a click-through rate of 45% for email newsletters” instead of “Send more email newsletters”. 

It's up to you how you get the 45 percent boost, it’s flexible. But it is getting to the increase that should be your focus within a good OKR process, not the repetitive actions you take to get there. Not that tasks aren’t relevant in the OKR process, but you must first and foremost learn to quantify what counts first. Consider outcomes — not output.

OKR mistake #4: confusing Key Results with gut-feel

Another bad OKR example would include Key Results like “Better customer engagement”. Not only is that hard to score, but this OKR is also bad because it’s highly subjective. It would mean nothing in the context of setting goals.

To make it easier to score, always phrase the Key Results as observable results. This will, first and foremost, render them scorable (planned to increase a click-through rate by 20% but only got a 10% increase - score this Key Result a 0.5). This will also provide you with hard data, allowing you to set and manage goals based on data.

As a side note, don’t try to phrase Objectives to be objectively scorable. They are a broader idea of what you wish to achieve, and their purpose is to keep your team’s activities focused in a single direction.

OKR mistake #5: dogmatically pursuing a wrong OKR

This is arguably the biggest OKR mistake - following an Objective and Key Results even when you see they’re no longer relevant. New information comes to light, the business landscape shifts, things change. Sometimes, the only logical solution is to abandon a bad OKR you no longer believe in and replace it with a new good OKR.

However, merely dropping a bad OKR is not enough. Score it a 0, and after some time look at all your zeros and ask yourself some important questions. Why did you miss this OKR? Why was this the wrong Objective? How will you avoid the same mistake next quarter? What did you learn from this zero?

One of the biggest benefits of KeepSolid Goals is how its very design and logic helps users avoid some of the common OKR mistakes. Don’t believe us? Try for yourself with the free KeepSolid Goals trial!