Welcome to the fourth part of this series titled “5 Ways OKRs Will Fuck Up Your Organization and Why That’s Wonderful.”
- In the first part, we looked at how OKRs will expose your lack of strategy.
- In the second part, we explored how OKRs will expose your inability to describe outcomes.
- The third part examined how OKRs will expose challenges working across functions and departments.
- The fourth part was all about how OKRs will expose your teams’ inability to generate results autonomously.
This is the fifth part, and it describes how OKRs will expose your inability to learn and improve continuously. Let’s dive into it!
Improvement as Part of the OKR Approach
The concept of improvement is baked into OKRs. After every cycle, you reflect on what happened, identify potential for improvement, and define actions to work more productively in the future. This is something that’s really needed. The first cycles of using OKRs probably won’t go well. They might be better than what you’ve done before but there will be plenty of room for improvement.
Areas of Improvement
In the Holisticon OKR Guide I identify several topics that often show up during OKR Retrospectives and usually need attention:
- The process of setting OKRs: most people will want to discuss more efficient and effective ways of setting them.
- The quality of OKRs: groups usually find out that poorly set OKRs make it harder to track progress and to define when they have been achieved.
- The quantity of OKRs: most groups start out setting a huge number of Objectives and corresponding Key Results, and then learn that this makes it hard to keep focus.
- The cadence of inspecting OKRs: most groups will need to adjust the frequency and/or the way they inspect OKRs.
- Cross-team OKR collaboration: organizing work on OKRs across teams is not trivial and needs frequent adjustment.
Why It’s So Difficult to Improve
While the OKR framework offers this magnificent chance for improvement, most clients I work with are unable to take advantage of it. There are several reasons for this.
There is No Dedicated Space for Discussion
Bewilderingly, this is the number one reason I see. There is no awareness that something like a Retrospective is part of the process. Or people skip it because they don’t see any value in spending time on it. When I ask why this is the case I usually get the answer that people can always speak up and suggest improvements in any meeting. That’s a really nice idea. But that’s not how it works. People need dedicated time and space for this. They need an explicit invitation to talk about things that are not going well.
People are not Used to Talking About Improvements Openly and Constructively
Now let’s assume you have provided a space. You set up a Retrospective and, wow, you even brought snacks! But the meeting is lackluster. You ask people for possible improvements but don’t gain any worthwhile insights. The meeting feels like a waste of time. What’s going on?
If people are not used to working this way, they won’t immediately be good at it. The required candor has to develop first. People need to know that it’s really safe to talk about these issues without any kind of repercussions. Plus, they also need to develop a certain sensitivity for improvement potential. I can often witness a change happening in people over time. It’s like an “improvement recorder” gets activated and they start making mental (or actual) notes when they see a problem that should be addressed.
Things Don’t Actually Change
You have concluded your first Retrospective, maybe even several of them already. And yet, things don’t change for the better. You (and probably everybody else) wonder why this is happening.
It’s very common for people to talk about improvements but to not actually make improvements. The decisions that were made during the Retrospective are not acted on. As soon as everyone leaves the room, people forget what they talked about. At the beginning of the next Retrospective, someone meekly asks “But what about the topics from our last Retrospective..?” If this repeats time and again, at some point someone will propose skipping the Retrospective altogether.
How to Make it Happen
Of course, I won’t leave you without a few ideas that will help you rectify the situation. Here are three things you can try:
Use Liberating Structures
There are thousands of formats for Retrospectives that you can find online. I’m sure most of them work really well. Personally, I’m a big fan of Liberating Structures. They work wonders in a Retrospective. For example:
- Discovery and Action Dialogue: Collect topics for improvements first and decide which are the most important ones. For each of these topics you can run a Discovery and Action Dialogue. The sequence of questions will help you understand the problem better, think of possible solutions, and identify specific actions.
- TRIZ: “How can we make sure our next OKR cycle ends up being the least productive one in company history?” Ask a question like this and follow the steps outlined in the description. It’s going to lead to great results and will deliver tons of fun along the way.
- What I Need From You: Especially when you have a team of representatives from different functions, it is extremely useful to ask what people need from each other in order to be successful. This will surface tensions in the way people collaborate that they usually don’t voice on their own.
Make Sure Someone Drives Each Topic
It’s a good idea to dedicate enough time at the end of each Retrospective to look at the results and ask two questions:
- Who is going to make sure this topic keeps moving forward?
- What is the first step we need to take to get the ball rolling?
If someone takes responsibility for a topic, it only means they will ensure steady progress. It doesn’t mean they’re solely accountable for it. Often, this responsibility simply includes identifying the right people to involve and setting up a follow-up meeting.
The first step is necessary because we often believe things will magically start happening once the Retrospective concludes. They won’t. But once we have started working on an important topic, chances of us taking a second step are much higher.
Check Progress Regularly
Don’t wait for the next Retrospective to talk about the topics from the last one! Check in regularly. You can dedicate a few minutes every time you check the progress of your OKRs. Just ask for any updates, what the next step is going to be, and if the people involved need anything to make this a success. This is going to work wonders!
You Can Do It!
By following these tips, you will change the way people look at Retrospectives. Continuous improvement is essential in complex environments. And since OKRs already offer the opportunity to make it happen, why not take advantage of it?
