OKR what do you gain from applying the method?

OKR what do you gain from applying the method?

So, you are still hesitant to apply the OKR method. Where the OKR method is applied, a positive twist appears between the before and after.

The benefits? Rising Goal presents five of them.

Benefit #1

Teams aligned & committed to the company’s strategy.

Implemented across an organization, the OKR method leads teams to a single trajectory, a single goal. IT, marketing, sales… all manage to align. This convergence is induced by the mixed management model that should be practiced: top-down and bottom-up.

The principle is the following. The executive team presents the main strategic principles to the entire organization: from goals to objectives. From then on, the teams work together to contribute to these strategic OKRs. And then they propose their own tactical OKRs. The implementation can thus take place in a favorable and co-constructed framework.

Benefit #2

Empowered teams

The previous idea brings us this one. The OKRs method is indeed an effective lever to empower its employees.

When a team propose its tactical OKRs, the executive team gets strong feedback on its strategic objectives: are the challenges well understood? Does the team think it is moving in the right direction? At the right time? With the right priorities?
So much information that will allow the executive to refine its strategic communication and empower its teams with confidence.

Is it a benefit or an opportunity? Both in reality. Anyway, you get it when you involve your teams in the definition of OKRs. The message received is loud: “your voice counts”. It also opens many doors, namely those of involvement, autonomy… so many ingredients conducive to success and long-term gains.

Benefit #3

Transformation on the right track

This benefit is a consequence of the first two. Bridging a transformation to the strategy, through objectives highlighting the expected impacts of this transformation on the organization, the business, gives all its meaning. So, a well-aligned organization, with empowered employees, creates a good climate for transformation.

OkRs are particularly sharp to initiate it, ensure its progress and concretize it. The key results play, in this case, a decisive role since they regularly give the temperature of the advancement with a short frequency. They blow possible course adjustments. They make driving more precise at a time when it is sometimes a question of accelerating.

Benefit #4

Shake up managerial postures

As we have seen, implementing OKRs requires adopting a management method, perhaps innovative for some organizations. This induces a new state of mind in the way of exercising the profession of manager. We forget the chef side, the links of anachronistic subordination whose effectiveness still deserves to be proven.

The OKR method recuts the manager’s costume. The latter’s approach is now to put itself more at the service of employees.

What for? To allow them to achieve key results simply. The role of the N+X is to give the means, to put in condition of success its teams during the execution of the objectives, as ambitious as they are. He must thus project himself as a facilitator, a facilitator of empowered individuals.

Also, employees were more likely to feel empowered with a supportive and trusted manager.

In this regard, no more considering OKRs as an evaluation tool.

Benefit #5

Better outcomes and impacts

This Holy Grail, the OKRs lead there. They make it possible to see clearly and focus on the right initiatives.

They spread a strategic and tactical thought which consists in choosing the right actions to avoid the useless. Prioritize initiatives with outcomes, not just outputs, that help the company progress towards its goals.

This mitigates the risks and therefore the (perhaps heavy) losses. This frames experiments and excludes bad development assumptions.

Conclusion

OKR what do you gain from applying the method?

In short. The OKR method is capable of offering significant benefits. It is also capable of other “pluses”. We will put them under the microscope in a future article.

These five attainable gains mentioned presuppose several “investments”:

• Accept a mixed management mode,
• entrust more autonomy to employees,
• accept related transformations (managerial, organizational and eventually cultural).

If the method is simple, its implementation can be a sum of delicate changes to make. Also, the accompaniment of an OKR expert is more than judicious to promote the adoption and success of the method.

Need to be accompanied in the implementation of OKRs?