Thanks for the reply Sarah. I think that's raised more questions :) where do sub objectives fit into the picture? I was following the example of the American football team which is frequently given (see slideshare.net/mobile/jaymeh13/obj...) but I've yet to see anyone follow it directly. It made sense to me that KRs became the Os of their direct reports. The owner of the football team had an objective to make money for the owners and one KR was to win the Superbowl, which became the objective of the head coach, and their KR became the objective of the offensive coach, etc. This seemed like the right approach to me to ensure all the okrs ultimately align with the company's strategic vision. Does that make sense?
That's a perfectly good way to make sure everyone is pulling in the same direction. It's just a bit more prescriptive than how we formulate our OKRs here.
Maybe the difference is rooted in the fact that we try hard to make sure our Os are pretty high-level and not easily measured. (Winning the Super Bowl is a measurable result, so we'd gravitate toward keeping that in the KR column.)
So, if Atlassian were that football team, the coach's Os would be more like "Build a team with world-class talent" – which certainly contributes to winning the Super Bowl. The coach may also have co-owned the "win the Super Bowl" KR with the owner.
We're probably wandering into the realm of subtle-but-thrilling differences here 😉 The main thing is to make sure OKRs are aligned at all levels. And you can do that in whatever way makes sense for you.
Thanks for the reply Sarah. I think that's raised more questions :) where do sub objectives fit into the picture? I was following the example of the American football team which is frequently given (see slideshare.net/mobile/jaymeh13/obj...) but I've yet to see anyone follow it directly. It made sense to me that KRs became the Os of their direct reports. The owner of the football team had an objective to make money for the owners and one KR was to win the Superbowl, which became the objective of the head coach, and their KR became the objective of the offensive coach, etc. This seemed like the right approach to me to ensure all the okrs ultimately align with the company's strategic vision. Does that make sense?
That's a perfectly good way to make sure everyone is pulling in the same direction. It's just a bit more prescriptive than how we formulate our OKRs here.
Maybe the difference is rooted in the fact that we try hard to make sure our Os are pretty high-level and not easily measured. (Winning the Super Bowl is a measurable result, so we'd gravitate toward keeping that in the KR column.)
So, if Atlassian were that football team, the coach's Os would be more like "Build a team with world-class talent" – which certainly contributes to winning the Super Bowl. The coach may also have co-owned the "win the Super Bowl" KR with the owner.
We're probably wandering into the realm of subtle-but-thrilling differences here 😉 The main thing is to make sure OKRs are aligned at all levels. And you can do that in whatever way makes sense for you.
Great, thanks Sarah. Good luck with them :)