Future Fit Lean Coffee – OKRs What and Why

OKRs are not new.  They’ve been around for more than 20 years.  In US and Europe that are being used extensively, and use is growing, but the uptake in Africa, and South Africa, has been comparatively slow.  Why is that?  It’s not that they don’t work.  Perhaps it’s because we really don’t understand them, and their place in the modern workplace.

“OKR” stands for “Objectives and Key Results.”  OKRs are an effective goal-setting and leadership tool for communicating what needs to be accomplished and what milestones need to be met to accomplish it.  OKRs are used by many of the world’s leading organisations to set and enact their strategies, and have been particularly successful for organisations needing to change and grow quickly.

What are OKRs?

Objectives and Key Results, or OKRs, is a goal-setting methodology for organisations, teams, and individuals to set ambitious goals with measurable results.
As organisations scale, communication becomes the biggest challenge.  OKRs create a common language for everyone in the organisation to discuss what’s valuable.

Why OKRs are Important Right Now

According to Gartner, “There is no going back to the work model that prevailed before the pandemic.”  The new work model is going to be “Work-from-Anywhere” – and that includes Hybrid.  But there are challenges:

• Staying aligned with priorities – Communicating the company mission, goals, and culture is not easy for leadership under normal circumstances, let alone when dealing with a remote workforce
• Keeping informed – Communicating or staying on top of developments and metrics becomes more difficult and time-consuming
• Isolation – Sharing the ‘tribal knowledge’ of how to get things done and who can help becomes a real challenge when simply looking up from your desk and asking a question is no longer an option
• The risk of dividing the workforce – Failing to keep remote workers involved can culminate in them feeling dislocated and like second-class citizens compared to their office-based counterparts
• The trust issue – The number one challenge for leadership is typically referred to as ‘accountability’ when what is really meant is ‘trust’.  The issue is not being able to keep tabs on remote team members.

Remote monitoring systems are not the solution.  They seek only to maintain a status quo of command and control, and that cannot work effectively with the new “Work-from-Anywhere” work model.

The solution

The solution is to enable your organisation to orchestrate strategy and deliver business results with OKRs, including solving the challenges of switching to the “Work-from-Anywhere”, or hybrid, model.

The topic for discussion at this Future Fit Lean Coffee is – “OKRs – What are they and Why are they Important Right Now?”

We hope that you can join us.