Comment by bipson
1 month ago
I think just because this startup botched OKRs they still make a lot of sense.
Intel and Google apparently relied on them heavily in their formative years. But:
- they should be cascading (so conflicting OKRs between departments should not happen)
- you should never, ever tie them to individual performance results/compensation/rewards
My sense was OKRs came later for both Intel and Google. Do you know around what year/size they started?
I worked with some ex-Google person who tried to get us to use OKRs. That totally didn't work. Larger company.
Like many things I don't think they're necessarily a bad idea it's just that good ideas always lose to culture. With the right culture/leadership it's not the process that matters. I.e. OKRs aren't going to fix an organization that isn't aligned and conversely there are infinite other ways to align an organization with the right culture and leadership. So in practice, like other things, it just ends up making things worse because it's never a real fix.
Google started using okrs at under 50 people because one of the board members was intel veteran. Not sure about the early years since i wasn’t there for that regrettably but in 2011 when i joined my impression of okr process was that it’s complete and utter bs and giant waste of everyone’s time. iirc google+ hit their okrs swimmingly…