OKRs

OKR stands for Objectives and Key Results.

It’s a collaborative goal-setting tool used by companies to create focus, alignment, and engagement around measurable goals.

Objectives

Concrete, action-oriented, and inspiring goals that qualitatively describe what we want to achieve.

Key Results

The way we measure progress in achieving the objective. If we achieve all of the key results, it will lead to success in the corresponding objective 👈.

Why OKRs?

Focus

Identifying a few wildly important goals, and saying no to everything else

Alignment

Aligning ourselves around those goals and collaborating to achieve them

Accountability

Having a framework for measuring progress and holding ourselves accountable

It’s a shift in mindset, where the question changes from "were we busy doing the tasks?" to "did we move the needle for our organization to thrive?”

“OKRs have helped lead us to 10x growth, many times over. They’ve helped make our crazily bold mission of ‘organizing the world’s information’ perhaps even achievable. They’ve kept me and the rest of the company on time and on track when it mattered the most.”
Larry Page, CEO of Alphabet

Setting OKRs

		Brainstorm	Check
1	Objective	What is the outcome* we are trying to achieve?*	Concise Motivating and challenging (should make you slightly uncomfortable). Achieving this will move the needle for our customers or company Up to 3 objective per division
2	Key result	How are we going to measure* it?* `metric` How will we know we got there? `target` Tip: start with the phrase “as measured by…”	Demonstrates the result of the work the team has done, not the work itself Create 5 web pages” is an initiative (see below) “5% increase in page views” is a key result Measurable on a monthly basis If achieved, it would indicate progress in the associated objective Our goal is to achieve 100% on ~70% to 80% of all KRs, otherwise we weren't ambitious enough Up to 3 KRs per objective
3	Initiatives	What steps* will we take to make progress toward the outcome?*	This is the work itself, i.e. the roadmap! They are hypotheses for what work will deliver the biggest impact This should not be copy/paste from the key result above.

Need inspiration? Here’s a guide on practical examples

Process

What are the steps to implement OKRs and what role does each team play?

First, senior leadership will develop a 4-year strategy and identify our winning aspirations which are company-wide objectives and key results. See Mission 2026 in Our Strategy.
Then, each division will collaborate with senior leadership and their team members to build up to 3 team-level OKRs aligned with the company’s goals (i.e. they should help meet the company OKRs!).
Finally, key result data will be updated in Lattice monthly (see below for the process).

OKRs are not roadmaps!

Objectives are goals that show where we are going and KRs are how we measure our progress to getting there. They don’t tell you how to make progress. That’s up to the team to strategize and develop a roadmap.

Create and Update OKRs in Lattice

OKRs should be created and updated in Lattice. Monthly updates are facilitated by automatic reminders that are sent via Slack every month.

Quarterly reviews will be promoted, to ensure that all OKRs are still up-to-date and relevant for each period.

Lattice allows a hierarchical structure for these Objectives and Key Results, whereas both Company level and Department level OKRs are possible.

What does this mean in practice?

OKRs on the Company sheet will become Company level OKRs in Lattice
OKRs on other, department sheets will become Department level OKRs in Lattice

Team OKRs should never be tied to individual performance or compensation, as such Individual goals will not be used for the purpose of OKRs in Lattice.

Lattice University is a great platform that stores multiple videos on how to handle, create and maintain goals in Lattice. Please refer to this library if you wish or reach out to the QS team (@a user).

OKR Days

To promote the quarterly cadence of OKR reviews, we are introducing OKR Days, which are a great way to assess our goals with an agreed schedule.

This would be a dedicated day in the quarter, where the selective executive team members will review the goals set in Lattice with the respective OKR owners. The goal of OKR Days is to see for each past quarter:

What has gone well?
What can we do better?
Check if there are any revisions/modifications required to the OKR.

The result of these reviews will be implemented by the executive team members, potentially requesting for some details from the respective OKR owner team.

Calendar

'Set and forget' is a common mistake. Once OKRs have been collaboratively set it is necessary to regularly review them to track progress!

Key results are updated monthly by the owners of each KR.
OKRs are reviewed with management at the cadence of the team’s Management meetings

Objectives and key results can be updated or replaced at any time if they no longer are relevant or have been completed.