Why OKRs Are Easier Than You Think: Making OKRs Stick

Table of contents:

  • 1. Understand Your Organization's Strategy
  • 2. Extract OKRs from Your Strategy
  • 3. Define Bottom-Up OKRs
  • 4. Leadership Ownership is Key
  • 5. Align Teams to Shared OKRs
  • 6. Track and Review Consistently
  • 7. Keep the Heartbeat Going
  • 8. The Importance of Discipline
  • 9. OKRs can become difficult when they’re treated like a performance management process or delegated to a team without influence.

Many organizations struggle with OKRs, but the truth is, they don’t have to. OKRs can be simple if approached the right way. I’ve helped various organizations like Colgate, Perrigo, SWIFT, Bosch, Hamilton, and the Indian School of Business implement OKRs successfully, and here’s what I’ve learned: it’s all about making them simple and making them stick.

Here’s a step-by-step guide to simplify your OKRs and make them more effective.

Step 1: Understand Your Organization's Strategy

Here’s a step-by-step guide to simplify your OKRs and make them more effective.

Step 1: Understand Your Organization's Strategy

Before diving into OKRs, you need a clear understanding of your organization’s strategy. Strategy is about making deliberate decisions—where to focus and where not to. Whether it’s market expansion, innovation, or people development, clarity in strategy is essential for OKRs to succeed.

The more ambiguous your strategy, the harder it will be to create meaningful OKRs. Spend time decoding your strategy to ensure your OKRs are aligned with the organization’s core goals.

Step 2: Extract OKRs from Your Strategy

OKRs should flow directly from your strategy. For instance, if your focus is market growth, a good OKR could be: “Win in the top 3 markets by 2025,” with key results such as achieving 20% market share by Q4 2025 or signing 10 new distribution partners by Q2 2025.
Aligning OKRs with your strategy ensures that they stay relevant and focused, helping to drive the company’s success.

Step 3: Define Bottom-Up OKRs

While top-down OKRs are essential, bottom-up OKRs bring in the goals from teams on the ground. These OKRs allow teams to set their goals in alignment with the organization’s strategy. For example, a product development team could set a bottom-up OKR to ensure the product is market-ready by Q2 2025, contributing to the company’s larger goal of market expansion.
This approach fosters ownership and accountability, ensuring everyone is contributing towards shared objectives.

Step 4: Leadership Ownership is Key

OKRs work best when leadership is fully invested in the process. Successful companies like Google ensure that leadership drives OKR success by staying involved in every step of the process. At Colgate, OKRs worked for over three years because the CEO and the executive team took responsibility for OKR rituals and progress.
Leaders need to live and breathe OKRs, ensuring accountability at every level.

Step 5: Align Teams to Shared OKRs

OKRs aren’t about working in silos. To achieve big wins, teams need to align their OKRs with the organization’s overall goals. This alignment helps foster collaboration across departments. Shared OKRs allow different teams to work together towards the same objective, ensuring greater impact and stronger results.

Step 6: Track and Review Consistently

Setting OKRs is just the beginning. The real impact comes from tracking and reviewing progress regularly. Tools like GetJop, Quantive, or Profit.co can help, but it’s the leadership’s responsibility to ensure consistent reviews—at least once a month.
In these reviews, focus on wins, losses, and the necessary adjustments. This isn’t about performance reviews but a forward-looking conversation to drive growth and change.

Step 7: Keep the Heartbeat Going

The cadence of OKRs is crucial. Set, reset, and adjust your OKRs every quarter. Daily check-ins and monthly meetings ensure that OKRs are at the forefront of your team’s focus. OKRs should be integrated into your daily operations, not just reviewed occasionally.

The Importance of Discipline

The hardest part of OKRs isn’t the system itself—it’s the discipline. Consistent focus is key to ensuring that your organization stays aligned with long-term goals. Leaders must push for accountability, ensuring that OKRs remain a priority.
OKRs are simple, but success depends on the discipline to focus, track, and adjust regularly.

Psst: OKRs can become difficult when they’re treated like a performance management process or delegated to a team without influence.

OKRs help organizations succeed, but it’s the enthusiasm and energy of people that make them happen. This energy stems from a deep understanding of the business strategy.

Want to learn more about how OKRs can help your organization? Reach out to us at Atlas Learning. At Atlas Learning, we help leaders and organizations succeed with clear, effective OKRs.

Atlas OKRs is part of Atlas Learning Pvt Ltd, one of the world’s leading management and leadership consulting firms, helping companies like Colgate, SWIFT, Hamilton, and InMobi implement OKRs for long-term success.