Intro:

This document is designed to assist managers and teams in crafting high-quality OKRs that maintain focus on executing the company's strategy and achieving ambitious results.

It is recommended to use these quality checklists during quarterly planning when formulating OKRs for the new period.

They will help you find potential areas of improvement and strengthen your OKRs.

Checklist for planning OKRs with the team

Principle of use: you evaluate OKRs on all presented items, if an item is not fulfilled (no tick), then it is a potential area of improvement and OKRs need to be improved.

Objective quality

Is the Objective easy to remember?
- If not, try simplifying the wording so you can use it regularly in your work.
Does your team's Objective address the current business challenges?
- If not, revise the goals to ensure they help address current business needs.
Does the your team's Objective align with the Strategic OKRs?
- If not, adjust the goals to ensure their achievement positively impacts the company’s Strategic Objectives.
Do you believe the Objective is attainable?
- The Objective should be ambitious, pushing the boundaries of what is possible, but the team should not be 100% convinced it’s impossible to achieve. If you feel this way during planning, reconsider how to approach the OKR (conduct a brainstorming session, explore new tools/hypotheses/approaches).
Is it necessary to change working methods to achieve the Objective?
- If not, the Objective is likely not ambitious enough.
Are you proud to be working on this Objective?
- If not, try reframing it to make it inspiring for the team while still aligned with the company’s Strategic Objectives.

Key Result quality

Can your team measure this KR?
- If not, you need to define a clear logic for calculating the metric (if necessary, seek help from the analytics team) or replace this metric with one that you can measure.
Can your team regularly measure the progress of this KR throughout the cycle?
- If not (e.g., the metric can only be measured once per quarter), you need to revise the monitoring process (adjust the calculation so that you can track results weekly) or replace this metric with one you can measure regularly. Without regular monitoring, managers lose the ability to promptly identify deviations and respond to them, increasing the risk of failing to achieve the result.
Do KRs provide value to the customer or business?
- If they don’t, you need to refine your goals so they directly contribute to customer or business metrics.
Does your work have an impact on the KR?
- If not, you should delegate this OKR as an expectation to the team that can genuinely influence it (a team whose responsibilities align with the OKRs).
Can actual values of KRs change significantly during the cycle?
- If not, you need to reconsider your approach to achieving the KR (develop new hypotheses, select new tools to achieve the goal) or adjust the timeframe for working on the KR.

Links between Objective and Key Results

Are the Key Results sufficient to measure and achieve the Objective?
- If not, you need to add the missing indicators to ensure a complete and accurate evaluation of the objective's achievement.
Are your team's Key Results quantitative?
- Qualitative key results are acceptable, but if you have the opportunity to set quantitative metrics for the objective, it should be prioritized.
Is the situation excluded where the Objective is achieved, but KR values have not changed?
- If such a situation is possible, you need to revise the list of KRs and include only those metrics that are critical indicators of the objective's qualitative achievement.

Checklist for review of team OKRs by manager (when agreed or before entering into OKR Board)

Principle of use: you evaluate OKRs on all presented items, if an item is not fulfilled (no tick), then it is a potential area of improvement and OKRs need to be improved.

No more than 5 Objectives
No more than 2-5 Key Results per Objective
Availability of a rating scale or the very wording of the OKR makes it clear how the progress will be measured
High-quality Objectives (ambitious, clear, easily understandable, can be articulated in one breath)
Link to Parent Objectives (including strategic ones)
OKRs are focused on new challenges, not operational tasks
Key Results are measurable
Key Results provide value to the customer or business (not projects, actions, tasks)
Links between Objectives and Key Results
Current data (quarter, year)
Binary OKR not overused (when there are only 2 states of goal fulfilment ‘not fulfilled’ - 0% and fulfilled ‘100%’)
Cross-OKRs are created correctly (1 owner for the objective, each team involved in cross-objective implementation is assigned specific key results

Self-assessment of the quality of OKRs planning