Objectives and Key Results (OKRs) are awesome — everybody says so! Larry Page, CEO of Alphabet and co-founder of Google, said "OKRs have helped lead us to 10x growth, many times over". So why do they work so well for some companies, and so badly for others? OKRs should be more than another stick to hit UX and Product teams with. How do you write successful OKRs for research and UX groups touching many parts of your organisation? How do you write OKRs for a design system team?

1. Help your UX team succeed
with OKRs that don’t suck
(aka an introduction to Strategy Deployment)

2. What the heck is strategy
deployment?

3. –Apple’s Vision Statement
“Apple designs Macs, the best personal computers in
the world, along with OS X, iLife, iWork and professional
software. Apple leads the digital music revolution with
its iPods and iTunes online store. Apple has reinvented
the mobile phone with its revolutionary iPhone and App
Store, and is defining the future of mobile media and
computing devices with iPad.”

7. Strategy Deployment

8. Strategies are interconnecting
stories told throughout the
organization that explain the
objective and outcomes, tailored to a
specific time frame. We call this act
of communicating and aligning
those narratives strategy
deployment.
Strategy deployment is about setting
the right level of goals and objectives
throughout the organization to
narrow the playing field so that
teams can act.

9. What the heck are OKRs?

10. Objectives & Key Results
One kind of strategy deployment

11. O: Delight customers with extraordinary support.
KR: Critical issues resolved within 1 hour
KR: Feedback rating average score > 90%
KR: Average turn around time for
complaints less than 24 hours

12. Objective
Qualitative + Time Bound + Actionable +
Aspirational + Upward facing
Key Results
Quantitative + Drive behaviour + Set by the team

13. OKR

14. OKR
OKR OKR

15. OKR
OKR OKR
OKR OKR OKR OKR

16. What the heck has this got to
do with UX work?

17. O: Delight customers with extraordinary support.
KR: Critical issues resolved within 1 hour
KR: Feedback rating average score > 90%
KR: Average turn around time for
complaints less than 24 hours

18. http://www.flickr.com/photos/video4net/4103102579/
USER RESEACH DEVELOPMENT

19. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.

20. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.
KR: number of P1 usability issues released

21. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.
KR: number of P1 usability issues released
KR: total P1 usability issues discovered

22. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.
KR: number of P1 usability issues released
KR: total P1 usability issues discovered
KR: time before first usability test

23. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.
KR: number of P1 usability issues released
KR: total P1 usability issues discovered
KR: time before first usability test
KR: cadence of usability tests

24. O: Usability testing produces actionable
improvements in the product.
KR: number of P1 usability issues released 👍
KR: total P1 usability issues discovered 🤷
KR: time before first usability test 👍
KR: cadence of usability tests 🤷

26. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.

27. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.
KR: Reduce time QA blocked by UX

28. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.
KR: Reduce time QA blocked by UX
KR: Reduce UX time spent in QA

29. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.
KR: Reduce time QA blocked by UX
KR: Reduce UX time spent in QA
KR: Design System covers 50% of
[LEGACY PRODUCT] UI components

30. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.
KR: Reduce time QA blocked by UX
KR: Reduce UX time spent in QA
KR: Design System covers 50% of
[LEGACY PRODUCT] UI components
KR: Deliver [NEW PRODUCT] with 100%
Design System components

31. O: Deliver a prototype design system that
enables the product teams to deliver polished UI.
KR: Reduce time QA blocked by UX 👍
KR: Reduce UX time spent in QA 👍
KR: Design System covers 50% of
[LEGACY PRODUCT] UI components 🤷
KR: Deliver [NEW PRODUCT] with 100%
Design System components 🤷

32. Things to try…

33. Use the O to tell a story

34. The cascade runs both ways

35. Use pre-mortems to help
generate OKRs

36. Use OKRs when planning &
prioritising

37. Use OKRs during
retrospectives

38. The people who do the work
set the KRs

39. Retrospect on the OKRs
themselves

40. Things to watch out for…

41. Objectives that should be
Key Results

42. Milestones in disguise

43. Top down OKRs

44. Too many OKRs

45. Only looked at
once a quarter

46. OKRs that only succeed

47. Using OKRs for performance
& status reports

50. http://memegenerator.net/instance/54379154

51. Objective
Qualitative + Time Bound + Actionable +
Aspirational + Upward facing
Key Results
Quantitative + Drive behaviour + Set by the team

52. OKR
OKR OKR
OKR OKR OKR OKR

53. Things to try…
• Use the O to tell a story (because…)
• The cascade runs both ways
• Use pre-mortems
• Use OKRs when planning & prioritising
• Use OKRs during retrospectives
• The people who do the work set the KRs
• Retrospect on the OKRs themselves

54. Things to watch out for…
• Objectives that should be Key Results
• Milestones in disguise
• Top down OKRs
• Too many OKRs
• Only looked at once a quarter
• OKRs that only succeed
• Using OKRs for performance & status reports
• Goodhart's Law & The Hawthorne Effect

55. OKRs

56. @cwodtke

57. @lissijean

58. Or if you wanna chat online:
twitter.com/adrianh
linkedin.com/in/adrianh
adrianh@quietstars.com
adrianhoward.com
quietstars.com
Questions?