✦Career · 10 recordsQuarterly OKRs

OKRs fail as a filing exercise: written in week one, opened in week twelve. This keeps the set small enough to remember and puts the review in the middle of the quarter, which is the only point at which knowing you are behind is still useful.

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Goal

Finish the quarter having moved three things Month 3

Three objectives, each with a number that moved.

Set them Week 2

Small enough to remember without looking them up.

  • Write down the three things this quarter is actually forDo firstDay 3
  • Give each one a number that has to moveDo firstDay 7
  • Agree them with whoever needs to agreeDay 12

Work and review Month 3

The mid-quarter check, which is the whole point of writing them down.

  • Mid-quarter review: what is behind, and what gets droppedDo firstWeek 6
  • Write the honest end-of-quarter scoreMonth 3

Routines

  • Check the three numbersweekly
✦ It comes with a note

Three, and a review in week six

The number of objectives is a claim about what you will not do. A list of seven is a list of none.\n\nThe review is in the middle on purpose. A review in week twelve is a post-mortem; six weeks in there is still time to drop one, change approach or ask for help.

✦ Questions

Quarterly OKRs, answered.

Three at most, and two is often better. The number of objectives is a claim about what you will not do, and a list of seven is really a list of none — it stops being a set of priorities and becomes an inventory of everything already underway.
A key result is a number that moves, not a thing that gets finished. "Ship the onboarding rewrite" is a task; "new users reaching day 7 goes from 22% to 35%" is a key result, and the difference is whether doing the work but achieving nothing counts as success.
Because a review in week twelve is a post-mortem. Six weeks in there is still time to drop an objective, change an approach or ask for help, which is the entire practical value of having written them down.
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