If you have landed here, the chances are someone in your organisation has started talking about OKRs and you want to know what they actually are before the next meeting. That is exactly what this page is for. It is the starting point for anyone new to Objectives and Key Results, and it points you on to the deeper guides once you want more.
OKRs are really two things at once. They are a way to formulate goals, grounded in goal-setting theory and science, and they are also the name of a framework that describes how you work with those goals to turn them into results. Most newcomers expect a complicated method and are a little surprised at how simple the core idea is. An objective is what you want to achieve, the key results are how you measure that you got there, and the two always travel together.
Where OKRs come from
The thinking behind OKRs is older than the term itself. It grows out of management by objectives in the 1950s, was shaped into the form we recognise at Intel in the 1970s, and then spread widely after it was put to work at Google. None of that history is something you need to memorise. It is worth knowing for one reason: OKRs are not a passing trend, they are a well-tried blueprint that thousands of organisations have already walked through, and you get to learn from all of them rather than reinventing how to work with goals.
Why teams use them
The value of OKRs is that they bridge the gap between strategy and execution, while at the same time creating focus on what is actually important and driving engagement and autonomy in your teams. A common trap when we set goals is that we make them either measurable or ambitious, rarely both. The structure of an OKR forces both into the same place, so the ambition you care about and the number that proves it stay connected. Well-executed OKRs can become the cornerstone of an organisation’s success.
The myths worth clearing up early
Two misconceptions trip people up before they have even started. The first is the fear that OKRs will eat your time, that the administration of the framework becomes heavier than the value it gives back. In practice you decide how much weight to put on the framework, and a light implementation can give you a lot quite quickly. The second is the quiet thought that “we already work with goals.” Most organisations do have goals, plenty of them. What they usually lack is a common language for how a goal is formulated and a structured way of following up on it, and that is the gap OKRs fill.
Who they are for
OKRs are at their best when an organisation wants to change, improve, or find new ways of working, because they give you a way to measure that change and a clear discussion about what it even means. Teams that are happy with the status quo and not dependent on change see less benefit at the organisation level. That said, it is rarely all or nothing. Even in a more static setting, the way OKRs create a clear contract between a manager and a team about what matters right now can drive engagement on its own.
How to take the first step
You do not need a project plan to begin. Sit down with your team and have one honest discussion about what is important for you to achieve in the coming period. Break it into two or three themes, and let the team put a couple of measurable results under each. That exercise takes maybe two hours and gives you a set of draft OKRs, and more often than not it is the discussion itself that becomes the real eye-opener. A rule of thumb to keep you in bounds: somewhere around two to three OKRs per team, and two to four key results per objective.
My one piece of advice for first-timers is to not aim for perfect, aim for good enough to try. The point of OKRs is never the wording of the goals, it is the moment those goals turn into the work your team actually does.
Where to go next
From here you can read the full explanation in What Are OKRs?, look at worked examples, or move on to writing and running your first cycle. Take it one step at a time. That, in the end, is the whole spirit of getting started with OKRs.