Why OKRs Are So Important for Startups and Established Businesses

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OKRs (objective and key results) are a powerful way to express the visions and goals of any business or organisation. They can help in achieving mission statements, aid in employee engagement, and bring to the forefront the top priorities of a startup or established company.

Here we will look further into why OKRs are so important for businesses across all sectors and why implementing them into your operation today can yield excellent results for your brand and help you stay ahead of competitors.

Team Alignment

Arguably the main benefit of OKRs is to align teams. They connect teams and individual activities and goals toward the business’s strategic mission. You will find managers across the board set company-wide OKRs, while syncing and collaborating with all of the team before putting the finishing touches in place. Each team or department sets individual OKRs to help achieve company-wide goals. To put it simply, objectives and key results make sure everyone is on the same page and moving in the same direction.

Flexibility

When compared to traditional long-term strategic planning, OKRs favour shorter goal cycles. This enables team members to adjust and adapt to change. This goes a long way in lowering risks and waste. Normally, strategic OKRs are set for 12 months, whereas tactical OKRs are normally a quarter of the time. When each cycle finishes, team members can analyse their findings and make adjustments if necessary. For startups in particular, it may be wise to adopt even shorter tactical OKR cycles. This could range between 4 and 6 weeks.

Track Metrics That Inform Company Decisions

The objective part of OKRs is the qualitative goal you’re trying to achieve. However, the key results are tangible metrics you monitor to check whether the company is projected to reach its objectives. This data is vital for making informed decisions about the business regarding its future. If you’re new to OKRs and aren’t yet confident with its framework, why not consider 1ovmany’s OKR canvas? They explain the different stages of the canvas creation which can help you get to grips with the methodology and help you make the right decisions.

Autonomy and Accountability

From the ground up goal setting enables businesses to leverage their frontline expertise of the issues to make adjustments and improvements. Implementing OKRs into the business can help solve frontline problems sooner rather than later. It’s recommended that team members set roughly 60% of OKRs themselves, rather than relying on their manager. Taking this approach gives everyone personal accountability for their objectives and are more invested in achieving them.

Engaged Employees

Keeping employees engaged is a challenge all business owners face. Thankfully, methodologies like OKRs can be put in place to spur everyone on. When OKRs are set, this brings a sense of contributing personally to the higher purpose. This boosts engagement and motivation of the entire team. When employees are engaged and dedicated to their role, this only does wonders for achieving higher job satisfaction and reducing staff turnover rates.

Achieving Beyond Expected

OKRs are designed in a manner to help team members think outside of the box. This allows employees to come up with innovative and creative solutions that come with remarkable results for the business. Employees who work with OKRs have the motivation and encouragement to go the extra mile and out of their comfort zone. When this happens, the business can only benefit as a result.

Changes Cultural Values

Implementing OKRs into your organisation will alter the way your company functions. Your organisation’s culture will begin to value collective outcomes that turn into promising business results. Over time, new starters will come to adopt the OKR system as standard practice and find that your business’s culture is centred around the entirety of it.

Simple to Implement

One of the reasons OKRs work so brilliantly for companies is because they’re simple to implement into operations. They can be integrated into your company without the need of overhauling your existing organisational structure. OKRs have long been used by some of the planet’s most-known giants, including Facebook, Google, and LinkedIn. These organisations were able to use OKRs, integrate them into their systems and ultimately, stay one step ahead.

Identify and Prioritise Risks

When teams track the progress of OKRs, they’re able to not only find areas to improve on but potential risks within the business. Unrefined code could present problems further down the line, or a broken sales process may be costing you customers and money. Because OKRs involve exceptional attention to detail, it’s easier to find these risks early on. This allows teams to take necessary action to mitigate them before they cause extensive damage.

Countless hours are spent year after year trying to align group members with the business’s goals. Thankfully, OKRs are the solution organisations are looking for. They can be used to organise day-to-day operations and align departments. Adopting this methodology into your company can elevate productivity, bring teams together, and most importantly, keep the business thriving.