Rock your planning process: understanding strategic Big Rocks

When setting OKRs, great teams start with identifying their Big Rocks.

The Coda Team

Rock your planning process: understanding strategic Big Rocks

By The Coda Team

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OKRs · 3 min read
Big Rocks, also commonly called big bets or strategic initiatives, are the top priorities for the company and are typically set by leadership. Why are they called Big Rocks? The principle is simple: if you’re trying to fill a jar with rocks, you need to put the bigger rocks in first because then there is room for pebbles to fill the gaps. If you put the pebbles in first, the big rocks won’t fit. The analogy applies well to the workday. If you fill your time with small tasks, your main priorities will never fit into your schedule. It’s important to prioritize the initiatives that will contribute to reaching your company’s goals and de-prioritize tasks that don’t directly align to those goals.

What are Big Rocks in strategic planning?

Big Rocks are the top priorities for the company. They should be clear, succinct, and easy to repeat from memory by each person on the team. During the strategic planning process, each team member should anchor their projects and initiatives on the company’s Big Rocks to ensure they are doing the right work that will contribute to the company’s success in achieving its goals.

What are examples of Big Rocks in planning?

 Big Rocks are unique to each company. Some companies are just starting out and set Big Rocks around acquiring their first customers. More established companies may focus efforts on improving their product or growing their revenue. A company’s Big Rocks should be clear, concise, measurable goals that the entire company is working toward. These are examples of Big Rocks that a small startup and large company may set for the fiscal year.
Small startup
  • Grow revenue by 10%.
  • Simplify product experience.
  • Generate pre-set solutions.
Large company
  • 25% increase in revenue.
  • 10% decrease in CAC.
  • 25% improvement in customer satisfaction score.
How Coda uses $100 voting to set Big Rocks.
As a leadership team, we enumerate and rank the key challenges facing the business. Then smaller groups of leaders develop strategies against those key challenges, and we review them together. We then run a few $100 voting exercises to get a pulse on where we may have alignment, then we debate further and ultimately decide. By the end of the process, we have a small set of Big Rocks. — Lane Shackleton, CPO at Coda

Who should be responsible for Big Rocks?

 The leadership team typically sets the Big Rocks. These are the goals that everyone works to support. Individual teams are responsible for prioritizing the work they will do in order to move the company toward achieving those goals. At Coda, we plan our work quarterly and use OKRs to prioritize and organize our work. An OKR represents a significant, action-oriented objective, with a specific, time-sensitive, and measurable milestone to achieve it. We’ve put together 5 tips for writing effective OKRs for more guidance on crafting OKRs. Each key result has a single driver, or directly responsible individual (DRI), accountable for moving the goal forward until it’s achieved. In this sense, DRIs are essentially responsible for the company’s Big Rocks. Choosing a DRI for each KR is important, and we have tips for how to choose the right DRI for accountability.

Creating and tracking Big Rocks with Coda.

 With Coda, you can create and track your Big Rocks, OKRs, and work in a single place. That way, the entire team has one central view of progress toward Big Rocks. Check out this tutorial for a deeper view of how to optimize your planning process.
Coda Tutorial on Planning & OKRs

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