There are various point of views when it comes to existence of individual OKRs (read this post on Why Spotify ditched individual OKRs?). Some experiences recommend not having individual level at all whereas others argue in their favor. Again, there is no right or wrong way. Companies have to take their own calls based on work culture, team dynamics & ongoing refinement.
One frequent question that gets asked is – Do my manager’s key results become my objectives? We will say, it depends. There are situations where this kind of alignment makes sense and there are also use cases which do not allow for this kind of goals. From our experience, this is gross simplification of OKRs and cannot be scaled when the team size goes beyond initial 20-25 members.
If adopting for the first time, feel free to skip creating individual level OKRs in the initial couple of cycles. See if individuals feel at least informed of the overall direction, since company & team level OKRs are created. Refine the process & once you are confident of adoption, introduce individual level OKRs. And just like Spotify did, feel free to tweak the framework so that it actually adds value.
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