Measure What Matters OKR Starter Kit by John Doerr

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Measure What Matters OKR Starter Kit by John Doerr
Measure What Matters OKR Starter Kit by John Doerr

Get started with OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) based on the book Measure What Matters by John Doerr.

Get started with OKRs (Objectives and Key Results) based on the book Measure What Matters by John Doerr.

John Doerr

Ask your team...

What is most important for the next three (or six, or twelve) months?

Successful organizations focus on the handful of initiatives that can make a real difference, deferring less urgent ones.

Their leaders commit to those choices in word and deed. By standing firmly behind a few top-line OKRs, they give their teams a compass and a baseline for assessment.

What are our main priorities for the coming period? Where should people concentrate their efforts?

An effective goal-setting system starts with disciplined thinking at the top, with leaders who invest the time and energy to choose what counts.

This Starter Kit

This Coda doc is designed to help you and your team get started with

OKRs⁠

. If you are new to OKRs or an expert, we recommend taking this process a step at a time.

If you and your team would like to go step-by-step with creating OKRs, start with

Brainstorming⁠

. To see the completed worksheet, you can jump straight to

Simple OKR Worksheet⁠

. In order to save your changes, you need to copy this template →

Copy doc

⁠

and create a free Coda account.

What are OKRs?

OKRs stand for Objectives and Key Results. In this goal-setting system, objectives define what we seek to achieve; key results are how those top-priority goals will be attained with specific, measurable actions within a set time frame. Everyone's goals, from entry level to CEO, are transparent to the entire organization.

The benefits are profound. OKRs surface an organization's most important work. They focus effort and foster coordination. They keep employees on track. They link objectives across silos to unify and strengthen the entire company. Along the way, OKRs enhance workplace satisfaction and boost retention. See more

OKR examples⁠

for

OKR planning⁠

⁠

Additional Resources

Dive into the book...

⁠

Measure What Matters⁠

includes a broad range of first-person accounts that demonstrate the focus, ambition, and explosive growth that OKRs have spurred at so many great organizations.

Get the book.⁠

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This link can't be embedded.⁠

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Watch the TED talk...

John shares his take on what makes the difference between success and failure. Telling stories of ambitious leaders and teams, John's keen observations and insights bring light to an oft overlooked aspect of dreaming big.

Watch the TED talk⁠

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Explore WhatMatters.com...

Dig into more stories and resources at

WhatMatters.com⁠

⁠

FAQs

What is an indicator of a well-written OKR? What kind of verbs can be used to promote a better transformation?

Check out

Best Practices Checklist⁠

for principles from other great companies who run OKRs.

Incorporate action verbs into the start of your KRs and quantify the desired input metrics. “Post good content on social media” is less effective and more subjective than “Post 10 tweet threads that get 100 likes each this quarter” which sharpens clarity and can align team members together.

How can I set up automated alerts to stakeholders of OKRs?

Check out

Steps⁠

for instructions on how to set up your doc to ping stakeholders and incorporate other advanced features into your OKR kit.

What are the new updates to this doc?

We’ve added the

Advanced OKR Worksheet⁠

for folks who want to dig deeper and really customize the doc tightly to their team’s needs!

Notably we’ve added steps on how to set up powerful automations to your doc so that stakeholders of OKRs are pinged based on customizable triggers, steps on how to set up grouping so that your OKRs are well-organized, and more high-level advice on how to write effective OKRs in