Every sector, including HR, is rapidly adopting AI in 2024. As of early 2024, about 38% of HR leaders are actively piloting or have already implemented generative AI technologies within their operations, showing a significant increase from 19% in mid-2023. This is in line with another survey where 61% of CHROs planned to invest in AI in 2024.
No matter how brilliant your mind or strategy, if you’re playing a solo game, you’ll always lose out to a team.
Says Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn, and we cannot agree more with him!
A manager is incomplete without his team. She can not be successful playing a solo game.
Her success relies on how successfully she can guide her team to perform well.
Ben Horowitz, technology entrepreneur and co-founder Andreessen Horowitz, recalls an incident where he decided to read all exit interviews during a time of particularly high attrition at Netscape to understand why people quit hi-tech companies.
One of the two primary reasons he found out why people quit was:
‘They hated their manager – generally the employees were appalled by the lack of guidance, career development and feedback they were receiving.’
Now, one thing is clear.
It is not just the results, but the route to achieving results a manager takes, which makes him a bad, an average or a great manager.
If you are reading this blog, we are sure you want your name to be in the list of great managers and nowhere else.
What is a ‘Great’ Manager After all?
Jeff Weiner, Steve Jobs, Elon Musk, Jeff Besos, Warren Buffet… What do they all have in common? They are all successful leaders, known globally for founding and running multi-billion-dollar companies.
One more thing that is common between these great leaders is that to succeed, they rely on great managers who keep the teams together and constantly engaged to ensure overall success of the organization.
A great manager is both a people’s & result-oriented person – she truly cares for her team and at the same time is always in the quest for progressing to achieve the best results.
Tech giant Google’s Project Oxygen has proven extremely insightful for managers and leaders as well.
After years of research and analysing data, Project Oxygen listed down 8 characteristics of a good manager:
Be a good coach
Empower the team and do not micromanage
Express interest in employees’ success and personal well-being
Be productive and results-oriented
Be a good communicator — listen to your team
Help the employees with career development
Have a clear vision and strategy for the team
Have key technical skills that help him or her advise the team
Let’s see what other experts have to say.
Kim Scott, author of best-seller ‘Radical Candor: How To Be A Kick-ass Boss Without Losing Your Humanity’ says:
Radical Candor is the secret to being a good boss.
According to Scott, if you ‘Care Personally’ and ‘Challenge Directly’ you achieve Radical Candor. When you care personally for your employees (get to know them personally, beyond work, without crossing the line), it helps you build an honest & transparent relationship with them and making it easy for them to absorb your feedback when you ‘challenge directly’. (More on this later)
In the book ‘The One Minute Manager’ authors Kenneth Blanchard & Spenser Johnson talk about a young man in search of an effective manager who happens to meet an older man who calls himself ‘One Minute Manager’.
During a conversation between them, the ‘One Minute Manager’ says,
How on earth can I get results if it’s not through people? I care about people and results. They go hand in hand.
All experts in the above instances have tried to answer the question, ‘what makes a great manager’.
How can you Become a Great Manager?
Taking inspiration from these and many other experts, coupled with our learning and interactions while working with a number of managers and HR professionals, we have come up with a comprehensive list of 10 questions a manager must ask himself, regularly, in order to become a great manager.
Let’s get started.
Do you Care for Your Team?
In her book ‘Radical Candor’, Kim Scott says,
Caring Personally means demonstrating that you “give a damn” about the people you work with.
To get an affirmative answer to the question, ‘do you care personally’ you must ascertain the following two things:
Are you able to put your employees’ needs ahead of yours?
Do you listen to your employees’ problems with the intent of providing viable solutions to them?
Former Chief Executive of Google, Eric Schmidt says,
Managers serve the team
and rightly so.
A few tips to ensure you are doing a great job when caring for your employees:
Show interest in their lives beyond work, but without crossing the line.
Make time for them. Be there to guide them and interact with them regularly, without being too meddlesome.
Understand your employees’ ambitions deeply and try your best to create learning opportunities for them.
Set the right expectations for them. Don’t promise or commit more than you can offer.
Take your 1-on-1 meetings with your direct reports seriously.
Ask them questions, such as, ‘Are you happy here’, ‘How can I help you achieve your goals’ ‘How can I help you overcome your challenges’ ‘Any suggestions about how we can improve current work processes’
Interactions like these go a long way. They make the employee feel more than just a team member making them feel valued and motivated. As written in ‘The One Minute Manager’: ‘People Who Feel Good About Themselves Produce Good Results’
Does Your Team Trust you or Fear you?
Great managers manage by trust, not fear.
By ‘trust’ we mean, your team must be able to trust your decisions, they should be able to believe that your words will be followed by necessary actions, that you mean what you say, and they can confide in you if they are facing a challenge, professionally and if required, personally as well.
Building trust in your team leads to innovation, better collaboration, encourages creative thinking, and increases productivity.
On the contrary, ‘fear’ implies you use your position and authority to control the team.
The outcome of this approach is detrimental to your team’s growth and may even lead you to lose your employees!
Fear doesn’t get the best of your team as they would always be afraid of failure and hence will never innovate and progress.
In this scenario, your team is afraid of being honest with you when it matters the most and they shy away from sharing the real challenges which can hamper the results.
John Hall, co-founder and president of Calendar, writes in article in Forbes:
Perception is a very real issue for leaders. They must decide how they want employees to view them and act accordingly.
A survey conducted by The Predictive Index in 2018 found that 51% of employees feel a manager who betrays trust is a bad manager.
You don’t want to be that manager, for sure.
Here’s how you can build trust in your team and be a great manager:
Communicate effectively (more on this ahead) with your employees – be honest, transparent, clear and listen to them.
Give them a fair chance to put across their ideas and share feedback.
Be confident about your team and infuse confidence in them by providing autonomy for the delegated task.
Be a manager of your words. Follow your words with actions.
Encourage them to learn from their mistakes and give them constructive feedback.
Are you Communicating Right & Effectively?
The role communication plays in building a highly engaged team cannot be underestimated.
Effective communication (explained ahead) is critical in building a strong manager-employee relationship. And trust is an important outcome of effective communication.
If you are on the journey to greatness, know that winning your employees’ trust goes a long way.
‘Trust’ implies that your employees believe in what you communicate to them, be it feedback, advice (personal or professional), or a decision taken by you or top leadership.
And your employees will trust you only if you are transparent and clear with them, and do not hide relevant information involving or impacting them.
There is no joy in withholding consequential information from your employees, if they will eventually discover it.
For instance, you should update your employees about important decisions like team changes, leadership changes, role changes, project closures or extensions, etc. which will impact them.
A few points to keep in mind for effective communication:
Clarity
Be clear in your communication. Don’t mince your words. Direct communication is the best form of communication.
Timely
Do not wait for the right time to communicate with your employees. If it is a crucial decision involving them, you must convey it immediately, preferably in person.
Honesty
You must convey only the truth, and nothing else. Telling wrong things to the employees will only lead them to distrust you and may also hamper their productivity.
Listen to them
Listening is a very important part of communicating. Once you have shared your part of information, wait for them to share their views or ask questions, and resolve any doubt they may have.
Managers who are self-aware make better decisions, communicate more effectively, and are more relatable.
Are you Manoeuvring you Managerial Style for Each Team Member?
No two employees in your team are the same. Each comes with a unique potential, but have you tapped that potential yet?
Marcus Buckingham, motivational speaker and co-author of ‘Nine Lies About Work: A Freethinking Leader’s Guide to the Real World’ in a Harvard Business Review article says,
…there is one quality that sets truly great managers apart from the rest: They discover what is unique about each person and then capitalize on it.
As much as it is important for you to understand your employees’ motivations and what drives them, it is equally important to understand what puts them off and demotivates them.
Imagine a scenario where you are a manager at an ad agency. One of your employees is very vocal about her concerns and updates you about the challenges on her own, whereas another employee in your team is an introvert and feels talking about challenges can make him look silly.
What would you do?
A great manager would adapt to the behavior of the two. While he would wait for one to come up to him and share the progress and challenges, he would go to the other himself asking about the progress and challenges.
Unlock your team’s true potential and adapt to their style and strengths to help them bring out their best.
After all, that is one of your burning desires, isn’t it?
Is Your Feedback Helping Your Team?
Kim Scott places ‘Challenge Directly’ at par with ‘Care Personally’ in order to be ‘radically candid’ with your employees.
Tell people when their work is or isn’t good enough. BECAUSE you care.
There’s a thin line between your feedback being genuine & heartfelt and fake & harsh.
For instance, the two sentences:
Your work is not good enough or You are not good enough
both are forms of feedback, but the former will have a positive impact on the employee, motivating him to perform better.
In their book ‘Trillion Dollar Coach: The Leadership Playbook of Silicon Valley’s Bill Campbell’ authors Alan Eagle, Eric Schmidt, and Jonathan Rosenberg talk about the delicate art of giving feedback and how Bill Campbell mastered it. An excerpt:
Dave Kinser, Bill’s head of operations at Claris, recalls a time that Bill was going to chew out one of Dave’s fellow executives. Before the “ball busting,” Bill approached Dave, told him about what he was going to do, and asked him if he could talk to the exec afterward. Bill thought the guy would need some moral support. So later that day, Dave tentatively walked into the guy’s office and was surprised to see him excited and pumped up. Bill had indeed delivered the tough message, but the guy felt great about it. Dave went back to Bill’s office and took credit for rebuilding the man’s confidence, when in fact no damage had been done!
A great manager does not shy away from giving negative feedback because she truly cares for her team.
And the best way to give negative feedback is through constructive criticism.
By constructive criticism we mean, you share the feedback in an objective manner, pointing out the implications of the work done and moving forward to a plan to help the employee improve.
Taking reference from ‘Radical Candor’ again here: An ‘obnoxiously aggressive’ manager, someone who is ‘brutally honest” or ‘front-stabbing’ is way better than a ‘ruinous empathetic’, someone who avoids negative feedback because he doesn’t want to make her feel bad.
Here are a few tips to help you give constructive criticism:
Criticize in private and keep the praise for public.
Don’t be arrogant when giving feedback. Back your feedback with a rational explanation, if required.
Be spontaneous with your feedback. Don’t park it for later. The sooner the better.
Don’t forget to follow-up on the progress. Telling an employee what went wrong is not enough. You need to continually check with them if they are able to get it right and help them overcome the challenges.
Do you Micromanage or Provide Autonomy?
Steve Jobs was once quoted saying,
It doesn’t make sense to hire smart people and tell them what to do; we hire smart people so they can tell us what to do.
Google’s Project Oxygen resonated the same belief stating ‘Empower the team & don’t micromanage’ as one of the 8 characteristics of a good manager.
But how do you know you are micromanaging? Most managers do it even without realising, and that can be even more harmful for the team. Below is a quick checklist to find out if you are micromanaging or not.
You are micromanaging your team if / when:
You have difficulty delegating work, and end up doing most work by yourself.
You always feel frustrated with the results, because you feel you could have done a better job yourself.
You want yourself to be cc’d on all mails your employees share.
You constantly ask for updates from your team about where they stand on the work assigned.
We understand, that as a manager you may be tempted to do a certain task yourself (many times), instead of taking time to explain or letting your employees take their chances, but you must always remember that,
A micro-manager can not be a great manager. To be a great manager you must provide autonomy to the team.
So how do you stop yourself from micromanaging? Here are a few suggestions:
Once you have delegated work to the employee, observe their progress, but don’t intervene unless really required.
Do not correct your employees’ mistakes all by yourself. Making mistakes constitutes a great part of learning. Don’t take it away from them.
Provide autonomy to the employee. Once delegated, let them do their best. They would either sink or swim. In either case, be there to guide them through.
When you see the employee is facing a challenge, get to the ‘what’ of the problem, rather than ‘how’. This means instead of dictating how to achieve the expected result, share what is the expectation instead. You may be surprised to see a new working style reaping better results than you expected!
Have faith. Most managers micromanage driven by their fear to fail. Don’t let that fear trickle down to your team, it can damage their confidence making them feel helpless. Set your team for success, being clear what you mean by success, and have faith in the team.
Are you Spreading Positivity?
A successful manager always lets the optimist in her win.
A manager’s aura is contagious, and it must only pump optimism in the team.
You may never realise, but your team draws the motivation and zest to accomplish goals and be productive from the energy you bring to the office.
People are more creative and productive when their inner work lives are positive — when they feel happy, are intrinsically motivated by the work itself, and have positive perceptions of their colleagues and the organization.
Here’s how you can maintain a positive attitude at work for a highly engaged and productive team:
Be a positive leader.
Create a culture of rewards and recognition.
Motivate the employees when they perform good, but be objective in your praise.
Smile more often. It costs nothing and only spreads good vibes.
Are you Holding Regular ONE-ON-ONEs With Your Team?
A Predictive Index survey conducted last year found out that one-on-one meetings have a great impact on how the team sees their manager. Employees rated those managers higher who met them daily or weekly.
One-on-one meetings are your opportunity to strengthen your relationship with your employee. Don’t confuse it with a status update meeting where you discuss only work. A 1:1 goes beyond that!
Ben Horowitz talking about why one-on-ones are important, says:
If you are an employee, how do you get feedback from your manager on an exciting, but only 20% formed idea that you’re not sure is relevant without sounding like a fool? How do you point out that a colleague that you do not know how to work with is blocking your progress without throwing her under the bus? How do you get help when you love your job, but your personal life is melting down? Through a status report? On email? Yammer? Asana? Really? For these and other important areas of discussions, one-on-ones can be essential.
The purpose of a 1-on-1 is to check in with your direct reports’ regularly and understand if they are happy with & at work, if they are facing any challenges, how you can help them overcome their challenges and fears, and build a bond that will take you a long way.
The most important outcome of a 1-on-1 is that you can nip a problem right in the bud!
Through a 1:1 meeting you can ‘care personally’ and ‘challenge directly’.
Emphasizing on the importance of one-on-one, Andy Grove, former CEO of Intel says,
Ninety minutes of your time can enhance the quality of your subordinate’s work for two weeks, or for some eighty-plus hours.
Some quick tips to make the most of your one-on-one meetings:
Set an agenda with your direct reports before the 1-on-1
Take notes and keep them in one place so that you can track the progress in the next 1-on-1 meeting
Make sure you follow-up on the action items discussed.
Do you Recognize Often?
A great manager recognizes her employees often. She never misses an opportunity to spot the hits by her employee and applauds & encourages them for their achievements.
Recognized employees are happy employees.
Whether or not we take work home, we do take our feelings from work back home.
A happy day at work translates into a happy time at home as well.
Regular recognitions to your team also make them recognize your efforts, in turn.
It boosts their confidence, self-esteem and helps you retain your employees.
But, the praise you shower over them must be objective, and not to just sway them away or to make them feel good.
Praising without an accomplishment can sound ingenuine and instil fake confidence into the team, and keep them away from tasting real success.
The author articulates this perfectly in ‘The One Minute Manager’:
Help People reach their Full Potential. Catch them Doing Something Right When he notices you have done something right he tells you precisely what you did right, and how good he feels about it.
Are you Driving Actions?
To be a great manager, you must remember that all your efforts lose meaning if you don’t take required actions.
Progress can only be tracked by the actions taken to achieve desired results.
Having worked with a number of managers now, we believe inaction after a discussion with the employees, or no explanation to the employee for an action promised, can create an atmosphere of distrust and also lower your respect in their eyes.
Here’s how you can avoid this scenario:
Conduct regular one-on-one meetings with your employees, and update them about the progress on the issue they might have raised with you in a previous meeting.
Use an effective one-on-one tool to keep an account of the follow-up items and update regularly.
After you have understood and taken note of a problem an employee is facing, make sure to let him/her know about the status of the same.
Create an action list with your actions due for your team. These to-do/action lists are your way to solve issues/hurdles/roadblocks your team is facing.
Always prioritise team issues/ blockers over other things.
Create opportunities for yourself to find issues to be resolved. Never skip one-on-ones, seek regular feedback, create happy hours / all-hand meetings and ensure you take note of actions items.
Conclusion:
We understand being a manager can be demanding! And knowing that the organization’s success relies on your success in turn, can put your skills to test, not just once, but many times in a single day.
Talking of Steve Jobs’ second stint at Apple as a CEO, Bill Campbell in Trillion Dollar Coach recalls:
He had always been charismatic, passionate, and brilliant. But when he returned, I watched him become a great manager. He was detailed in everything. Product of course, but also in the way he ran the finance organization, the sales organization, what he did with operations and logistics. I learned from that. Steve couldn’t be a good leader until he became a good manager.
That in itself creates an opportunity for you to become a better manager than you were yesterday, by achieving better results with a highly efficient and productive team you have built & nurtured with care or are on the path to build one, and be the great manager you want to be!
FAQs
What defines a great manager?
A great manager effectively communicates, listens to their team, provides support and autonomy, and is transparent with their decisions. They build trust and encourage growth by offering constructive feedback and helping employees learn from mistakes.
What is one skill a great manager should have?
Effective communication is the most critical skill a great manager should possess. It fosters clarity, trust, and engagement, ensuring that everyone is aligned with the company’s goals and feels heard.
How do you define a successful manager?
A successful manager is one who can achieve organizational goals while ensuring their team members are engaged, motivated, and growing professionally. They balance results with employee well-being and foster an environment of trust and accountability.
What are the 7 capabilities of a good manager?
The 7 capabilities of a good manager include communication, problem-solving, emotional intelligence, decision-making, conflict resolution, delegation, and team-building. These abilities help them navigate various workplace challenges and lead effectively.
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How to Roll Out OKRs for First Time: 7 Steps Startegy
How to Roll out OKRs for the first time is a question common among organizations just introducing OKRs.
Imagine a scenario-
You are rolling out OKR for the first time.
One thing goes wrong and… Boom!
Your employees are already hating the process- even before it took a pace.
You certainly wouldn’t want that to happen in your organization. OKRs can surcharge and accelerate your organizational growth. But the key is to get this done right.
That’s why a well-planned rollout is significant for the success of an OKR system.
Introduce the new goal-setting approach strategically but not in a mechanical process. Every organization is unique and can face unique challenges while implementing OKRs.
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How to roll out OKRs: Here are 7 Best Practices for a successful OKR rollout
1 Communicate the OKR Methodology to all the teams
Get everyone in the organization on board with OKRs. Present the concept clearly and precisely. Educate everyone on the OKR language.
While some people will embrace the changes with open arms, there are also going to be some skeptics into the bargain. You must let them express their concerns and provide answers to their “why, how, and what?” questions.
Explain to them the benefits of implementing the OKR framework. Highlight how it’s going to impact the business and the individual success of the employees.
Organize workshops, training, discussions, introductory presentations, and seminars to help your employees’ design quality OKRs. Transparently explain to them the strategic execution, alignment, expectations, and tools they will be required to use for the purpose.
To help everyone speak the same language, document your company OKR framework
2 Inspire with success stories
List the names of reputed companies like Google, Netflix, Intel, LinkedIn, Twitter, etc. which have successfully implemented OKRs. Narrate their success stories to help them visualize how OKRs can cater to their individual success.
For example, OKRs helped LinkedIn become a 20 Billion Company. Jeff Weiner, CEO of LinkedIn, describes OKRs as, “something you want to accomplish over a specific period of time that leans toward a stretch goal rather than a stated plan.
It’s something where you want to create greater urgency, greater mindshare.”
You can either go for an organization-wide rollout Consider running an OKR Pilot first, depending on what fits you best.
If you have a culture that’s open to change and a flexible structure of functioning, an organization-wide rollout will work best for you. But it’s always best to take small steps. Start from one part and gradually move to others.
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Crafting and implementing OKRs across the entire organization can seem overwhelming especially if you are a large organization. Instead, choose a particular part of the organization and run a pilot project.
“If you concentrate on small, manageable steps you can cross unimaginable distances.”
It’s also important to decide “how often?” will OKRs be reviewed. Will it be done quarterly or annually?
4 Go for the Top-down approach
A top-down approach to OKRs was the first pattern attempted. The top management has a significant role in setting the overall direction of the company. Starting from the top provides clarity for the rest of the organization.
“People buy into the leader before they buy into the vision.”
For example, you can start with the senior leadership team. Make them an example to roll out OKRs to the departmental heads. From there you can move on to team leaders, and to the rest of your teams.
5 Get aligned
You can’t just sit with a blank sheet in front and magically start crafting the perfect OKRs. You need to understand the context. Make the company mission and vision your starting point and tailor your OKRs accordingly.
Buy-ins are critical for OKR success. The success of OKRs depends on the collective effort of each team member. You can imagine it as a group dance performance where everyone needs to perform their parts well to make it a masterpiece.
Thus you need to align the efforts of the workforce, executive leaders, and company heads both horizontally and vertically. This will help you foster transparency, smooth cross-functional communication, and reduce overlap among departments.
6 Track and monitor progress
Tracking OKRs are important to evaluate and measure the progress and understand which teams are falling short.
You can identify any issues and make course corrections as required by Monitoring progress.
Leverage technology to track OKRs. It will make the process transparent.
Using OKR software will also automate the calculations and save your time as you are no longer required to manually update the progress of each team member.
Bonus tip: Remember to celebrate whenever you Hit the nail on the head through OKR win meetings and shoutouts to keep
7 Do frequent check-ins
To stay on top of OKR progress, you need to do regular check-ins. Employees might feel overwhelmed with concerns and doubts, especially in the initial days.
Regular check-ins will give your employees direction. And provide them the required assistance and guidance. Frequent Check-in meetings will also identify the overlappings, increase accountability and ensure execution.
Define your preferred frequency of Check-in meetings. You can do it weekly or monthly as per your organization’s needs. Although weekly check-ins are most recommended to keep track of the progress and evaluate continuously.
Have OKR Champions
Consider having OKR champion who starts implementing the OKR framework with a strong war cry. Build a team of champions who will work as ambassadors to head the change. And make the OKR framework run smoothing across the organization.
They work as mentors and internal OKR experts. And can help you adopt and execute OKRs at all levels of the organization. These OKR enthusiasts will make sure that every concern is addressed, every ‘whys and wherefores’ are explained.
Too many objectives and key results: Less is more. Don’t set more than 5-7 Objectives and 3-5 key results.
Fill it, Forget it: Don’t set OKRs just to forget in a few days.
Mixing KPIs with OKRs: KPIs aren’t a substitution for OKRs. They have separate roles and outcomes.
Rigidity: Rigid adherence to rules can lead to disengagement. Instead, move forward with a flexible and intuitive OKR approach
Link OKRs with Recognition: Don’t make the mistake of making OKRs a base for your reward and recognition program. It can negatively affect performance. And compromises the business output.
The start is never perfect
You might struggle when you are just starting. But after a few OKR cycles, you are sure to hit your stride.
To end, OKR’s success depends on consistency. So, remember to continuously reflect, learn, and refine the process.
Hope we were able to answer all your queries in our blog How to roll out OKRs for the first time? If you have questions feel free to comment below.
Pooja Pooja
Types of OKRs: Aspirational OKRs vs Committed OKRs
Every organization wants to grow, but how do you set goals that are both achievable and visionary? The answer lies in the types of OKRs: committed and aspirational.
Whether it’s near-term performance or long-term innovation for your business, you’ll know just how to leverage the power of committed and aspirational OKRs effectively to unlock new levels of success for your business.
Committed OKRs are about clear, attainable targets that teams can confidently deliver within a set timeframe. This type of OKR delivers accountability and is important for day-to-day business success.
Aspirational OKRs, on the other hand; push teams to be bigger and challenge themselves. The moonshots: ambitious OKRs are meant to stretch an organization from its comfort zone, kindling innovation and long-term growth.
In the rest of this blog, we will take the difference between these two types of OKR apart and see how to balance them in such a way that they enable performance as well as inspiration.
What are Aspirational OKRs and Other Types of OKRs?
A committed OKR is a stretch goal that the team has to achieve or complete before the cycle is over. A committed goal pushes the team to reach, but still achievable attainment. All metrics of the Key Results must be completed fully and on time. Consider a situation like this:
Daniel’s organization and his teams have agreed to execute certain OKRs and have mapped a precise action plan on how they are going to do so.
These are called Committed OKRs.
An aspirational OKR sets the bar for success further out, and by design will exceed a team’s ability to execute in a given quarter. When they set such a high bar as to be seemingly impossible they are called 10x goals, or “moonshots.” While most aspirational OKRs are never fully achieved, they exist to push a team to think bigger than a committed OKR. Consider the following case:
Martha’s organization is more visionary. They have stretched goals. And her teams are not likely to fully achieve these ambitious goals.
These are called Aspirational OKRs.
Understanding the distinction between aspirational and committed goals is crucial for effective goal-setting and team motivation within the OKR framework. Aspirational goals encourage ambitious thinking and long-term vision, while committed goals focus on immediate, measurable outcomes.
Learning OKR focuses on the acquisition of knowledge, new skills, or insights rather than a direct achievement of business outputs. Extremely helpful when entering new areas or uncertainties and requires experimenting, learning, and developing new skills, Learning OKRs distinguish between usual output measuring of success and measuring acquisition of knowledge, that will later add value for future objectives. For example:
Jerry wants to gain a deep understanding of machine learning to drive full product development. He wants to finish three advanced courses and test his skills by building a model in sandbox.
These are called Learning OKRs.
Aspirational OKRs and Committed OKRs: Key differences
When you aim for the stars, you may come up short, but still reach the moon.
– Larry Page
Read on to find out the key difference between Committed OKRs and Aspirational OKRs.
Objective
Aspirational OKRs are meant to push the boundaries and encourage employees to achieve visionary objectives. Committed OKRs, on the other hand, focus on committed objectives that offer a more realistic vision of goals with fully achievable results.
Aim
Committed OKRs help companies achieve their goals through individual and team achievements. Aspirational OKRs are often beyond the current capacities of the organization but help in pushing boundaries.
Timeframe
Aspirational OKRs are usually created to focus on long-term strategic vision while Committed OKRs offer short-term operational priorities to guarantee progress in the short term.
Committed OKRs are supposed to have a 100% success rate as each key result comprises fully achievable targets. Aspirational OKRs are usually found to have a success rate of 60-70%.
Committed and Aspirational OKR examples
The difference between committed and aspirational OKRs is subtle. Committed objectives are meant to be fully achievable, requiring teams to concentrate on straightforward priorities without taking unnecessary risks, ultimately serving as motivational tools to foster small wins and consistent progress.
A standard example in the sales team scenario might be like:
Committed OKR
O: Expand to the US market
KR1: Close first 6 start-ups
KR2: Get a meeting-to-close rate of 6%
KR3: Reach average deal size of $200
Aspirational OKR
O: Capture the entire US market in one quarter
KR1: Get onboard 95% of big customers in the US market to grow over competitors
KR2: Get a meeting-to-close rate of 30%
KR3: Reach average deal size of $2000
In the managerial team, these OKRs can manifest like such:
Committed OKR
O: Improve customer satisfaction with the existing solutions
KR1: Increase customer satisfaction score (CSAT) from 85% to 90% by the end of the quarter.
KR2: Reduce average response time from 15 minutes to 10 minutes within the next three months.
KR3: Train 100% of the support team on the new customer service tools within six weeks.
Aspirational OKR
O: Become the market leader in AI-powered customer service solutions.
KR1: Achieve a 30% market share in the AI customer service industry by the end of next year.
KR2: Launch three groundbreaking AI features that no competitor currently offers within 18 months.
KR3: Secure a partnership with at least two top-tier companies by the end of next year.
In a tech context, OKRs like these can come up:
Committed OKR
O: Improve the performance of the app and reliability
KR1: Reduce app crash rate from 2.5% to under 1% within the next quarter.
KR2: Decrease page load times by 30% in six months.
KR3: Fix 100% of the top ten reported bugs within the next two sprints.
Aspirational OKR
O: Revolutionize the user experience of our mobile app.
KR1: Increase daily active users (DAU) by 100% within 12 months.
KR2: Develop and launch a fully AI-driven recommendation system that personalizes the user experience by the end of the year.
KR3: Achieve a 4.8+ rating across app stores by introducing five innovative features within the next 18 months.
How to decide between Committed OKRs and Aspirational OKRs?
Committed OKRs will work best if your organization is newly introduced to the framework or is still in the rolling-out phase.
With each goal achieved, your team’s motivation and engagement will rise higher. In addition, teams easily get into the habit of running Committed OKRs and make it part of their work culture.
But if you have already used the framework in the past, aspirational OKRs can do wonders for you.
Creating a result-driven work culture takes time. It demands discipline, continuous effort, and a mindset shift of employees and management. So you should start simple and focus on learning the methodology first. And set up the necessary processes to make it work.
Setting aspirational OKRs in the very beginning would make your teams feel overwhelmed and over-pressurized. Extremely ambitious Key Results soon become too much to handle. Learning a new methodology takes time. Once your teams are used to the framework and it becomes a part of their work-life, you can consider aspirational OKRs.
With the later process, you can have objectives and a combination of committed and aspirational key results. While some key results will be easier to achieve, others will aim higher. Understanding the distinction between aspirational and committed goals is crucial for better goal-setting and team motivation.
Choosing the Right Type of OKRs
Choosing the right type of OKRs depends on the organization’s goals, culture, and priorities. Committed OKRs are suitable for organizations that need to achieve specific, measurable outcomes within a set timeframe. They are ideal for teams that require a clear direction and a sense of accountability. Aspirational OKRs, on the other hand, are suitable for organizations that want to drive innovation, creativity, and excellence. They are ideal for teams that want to push the boundaries and strive for something bigger.
When choosing between Committed and Aspirational OKRs, consider the following factors:
What are the organization’s goals and priorities?
What type of culture do we want to foster?
What kind of outcomes do we want to achieve?
What level of risk are we willing to take?
By considering these factors, organizations can choose the right type of OKRs that align with their goals, culture, and priorities. Whether you opt for committed or aspirational OKRs, the key is to ensure that they are aligned with your company aims and internal communication processes, fostering a balanced approach to achieving both immediate and long-term objectives.
How to balance Committed and Aspirational OKRs?
There is no one-size-fits-all answer, but where OKRs are aligned with company strategy, teams are well educated, open communication exists, and performance is reviewed regularly, it will help keep the balance between aspirational and committed OKRs intact.
However, the first step in finding equilibrium between the two forms of OKRs is that there has to be a knowledge of the difference. It needs to be apparent from the outset that everyone involved makes it clear the distinction between the two OKRs.
Teams and employees may have suitable insights that will assist in determining what is realistically achievable (committed) and what is a stretch but possible (aspirational). This can help determine what the balance ratio for the OKRs is going to be.
A very critical element to succeed with OKRs is reviewing and tracking the progress. With weekly check-ins, teams can go through their OKRs regularly and update the same performance data. It becomes easy to track how they have progressed on the outcome of the OKR in the OKR review process.
The grading of OKRs is very clear on the distinction between committed and aspirational goals. Committed OKRs are things to be accomplished within the cycle, and grading is binary: pass or fail. That is, an OKR is said to be successful if 100% of it is accomplished; otherwise, it is regarded as a failure. Aspirational OKRs, on the other hand, are graded along a more nuanced scale.
Common mistakes to avoid while setting up Aspirational OKRs
Here are 6 common mistakes organizations commit while setting up aspirational OKRs-
1️⃣Ignoring organizational structure and needs
A common mistake most organizations commit while writing aspirational OKRs is to write something like, “What can be done more if we have extra resources and luck favors us ?” Instead, you can pretend to be a genie and strive to understand “What our customer needs at present moment?”
2️⃣Unrealistic aspirational OKRs
Aspirational OKRs don’t imply setting unrealistic goals. It should be achievable, with the understanding that your teams won’t have any clue about how to achieve these OKRs. Aspirational OKRs demand overuse of resources. They are fluid and flexible. But still helps your teams focus on well-defined goals.
3️⃣Writing a low-value objective (LVO)
Moving forward with a “Who cares?” attitude is a common pitfall among organizations. Low-value objectives go unnoticed even after the successful completion of the key results.
4️⃣OKRs should be framed to gain tangible benefit
OKRs are a tool for organizations to work for big goals in the long run by breaking them into small chunks that can be achieved within a shorter cycle.
5️⃣A committed OKR must deliver a 1.0
It makes the framework stiff and doesn’t leave scope for improvement.
6️⃣Too many OKRs
How many aspirational OKRs you should set for one cycle will depend on your company’s resources. But never aim for too many Objectives and key results. As it can easily divert your focus altogether.
Best Practices for Implementing OKRs
Implementing OKRs requires a structured approach to ensure success. Here are some best practices to consider:
Align OKRs with company goals: Ensure that OKRs align with the organization’s overall goals and priorities.
Make OKRs specific and measurable: Ensure that OKRs are specific, measurable, achievable, relevant, and time-bound (SMART).
Set ambitious yet achievable goals: Set goals that are challenging yet achievable, and provide a clear direction for the team.
Establish clear key results: Establish clear key results that indicate progress towards achieving the objective.
Track progress regularly: Track progress regularly and provide feedback to teams and individuals.
Foster a culture of transparency and accountability: Foster a culture of transparency and accountability, where teams and individuals are held accountable for their progress.
Provide training and support: Provide training and support to teams and individuals to ensure they understand the OKR framework and how to use it effectively.
Review and adjust OKRs regularly: Review and adjust OKRs regularly to ensure they remain relevant and aligned with the organization’s goals.
By following these best practices, organizations can implement OKRs effectively and achieve their goals. Regularly reviewing and adjusting OKRs ensures that they stay aligned with the evolving needs of the organization, helping teams to maintain focus and drive continuous improvement.
Conclusion
Now that you know the difference between committed and aspirational OKRs and how they can impact your organization’s success, it’s the decision time. Choose the one that will best suit your purpose.
And don’t forget it’s a trial and error method. Have regular OKR check-ins and reviews. Collect feedback during and after each cycle. And use your learnings to avoid further mistakes in the next OKR cycle.
Pooja Pooja
Quarterly OKRs: 5 Tips for Successful Wrap-Up
Imagine a scene! the quarter is about to end and it’s time to review and wrap up quarterly OKRs.
The clock’s ticking. Everyone is in a rush. And you are busy evaluating which goals are yet to be achieved. And what has already been done. It’s also time to think about your priorities for the next quarter.
There are so many checklists and questions going in your head.
Have my teams found ways of closing out quarterly OKRs? Will my teams beat the clock and tick all the boxes? Have they reflected on their OKR progress? How will I deal with this end-of-quarter OKRs rush?
Feeling overwhelmed!!
Here is a step by step guide to help you prepare best to wrap up your quarterly OKRs–
Before you start to review and wrap up quarterly OKRs- remember that wrapping up quarterly OKRs is teamwork. And to see the best results every team irrespective of their department have to come together.
Track your team’s OKR progress and gather the key results scores. You can score your OKRs on a scale of 1 to 10 on the basis of how far the objectives have been achieved.
This will help you evaluate your progress in a truly data-driven manner.
If the scores are low this might suggest that your OKRs were unrealistic. On the other hand, if the score is too high it may suggest that your OKRs were not ambitious enough.
Whatever learning you made from this process. It will help you to form the basis for designing your next set of quarterly OKRs.
Make sure everyone is up to date
It is important to ensure that your teams have clarity about their OKR status. At the same time, they have visibility into what other teams have been doing. It can be achieved through regular check-ins with your teams. Check this ebook on OKR handbook.
This step will help you check if your teams are aligned or not. When everyone in your team is on the same page taking decisions based on priorities becomes easy. As you have the data in hand to rely on instead of guessing.
Organize OKR check-ins
The importance of check-ins for OKR success cannot be emphasized enough. OKR check-ins provide you an opportunity to have 1 on 1 discussion in all OKR matters.
With OKR check-ins you can discuss with your leaders and team members about – what went well, what didn’t work for them, what needs to be dealt with immediately, what problems they are facing etc. at an individual as well as team level.
OKR check-ins will help you understand what’s holding teams back. You will further get the chance to push priorities that might have shifted midway.
Dig into opportunities
Organize Quarterly OKRs review meetings to dig into opportunities. During these meetings, go through each key result with your teams. Find out what went well and what needs to be done better.
Let the OKR leaders from each team present their learnings and achievements before everyone. Here teams can give a small presentation highlighting the most important lessons with context.
So that other teams can benefit from their learnings and experiences. And use them in designing their OKRs for the next quarter.
If you are a large-scale company working with multiple departments. The OKR review meetings can be held at the departmental level.
Plan the future
Now that you have gathered the data and matrix you need through OKR check-ins and OKR review meetings. It’s high time to plan for the next quarter.
OKRs have the power to build the future of your organization. But OKR failures can cost you a fortune.
Hence it’s important to find out the core reasons behind your OKR success or failure for the present quarter. And use it as context while designing OKRs for the next quarter.
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Do you need to plan new OKRs every quarter?
“Should OKRs change every quarter?” is a question often left unanswered.
Even after an OKR is achieved, you can roll it forward for the next quarter if necessary.
For example, if your OKR was to increase customer satisfaction by 20% in the present quarter. This could be relevant even for the next few quarters.
In case, of missed OKRs, you need to take a call. And decide whether you want to carry it forward or set new OKRs based on the data gathered.
When should you review and wrap up Quarterly OKRs
You should preferably wrap up the quarterly OKRs at least a week prior to the beginning of the next quarter.
But the preparation and discussions for the next quarter should be initiated almost a month before the new quarter begins. This is because designing OKRs takes dedication, time, and effort.
Bonus Tips:
Maintain Transparency from day one. Keep data transparent so that everyone knows how it’s going.
Create a culture of critical feedback. Be honest when it comes to feedback. At the same time be open to getting feedback from your teams as well.
Celebrate wins– even the smallest ones. Recognize your teams for their achievements more often.
Over-communicate. Communication is the key when it comes to wrapping up quarterly OKRs.
Take a moment
Wrapping up end-of-quarter OKRs will allow you to pause and take a moment to think. It provides you time to reflect on your wins, failures, and setbacks. It’s a stitch in time to make sure that your OKR framework is a success.
Follow the steps given to close out quarterly OKRs and make the most out of the process.
