OKR Do's and Don'ts

Do's

✅ Align with company strategies: you must first make sure that company strategies are defined and create OKRs aligned with these strategies.

✅ Set priorities: Remember that OKR is not a 'to-do list'. For this reason, you should set priorities and create goals in line with these priorities.

✅ Set limits: By writing too many goals it will not be possible to focus on what is important. For this reason, it is necessary to limit the number of OKRs you will write. You must create max 5 goals and 4 KR below them.

✅ Be simple and compelling in your goals: You should set clear, simple and understandable goals when read. These goals should also be challenging goals.

✅ Create measurable KRs: For KRs to be measurable, they must consist of metrics. You should write measurable KRs that can be proven with numbers.

✅ Focus on the future, not the past: Write down where you want to go in the future and how you will do it.

✅ Be development-oriented: Create goals that will contribute to your development and follow them using continuous feedback and check-in meetings.

✅ Be prepared for check-in meetings: Be prepared for check-in meetings with your manager. Enter the progress of your OKRs in advance and enter the meeting by noting down the topics you will talk about or planning ahead.

✅ Track the progress of the goal: After entering the goals, change the progress as the goal progresses. Remember that OKR is a living and dynamic system.

These best practices make more sense when you understand how the full OKR system works — see our comprehensive OKR Guide.

Dont's

❌ Do not write long and very general OKRs: Do not create OKRs that are too long, difficult to understand, and cover general topics. Write clear OKRs that relate to the priority of your business and the company's strategies.

❌ Do not use metrics in your goals: Do not use metrics when determining your goals, use numbers when writing how to reach this goal, that is, in your KRs.

❌ Don't set easy, immediate goals: Don't set easy-to-achieve goals that you can achieve quickly. Instead, write challenging, uplifting, inspiring goals.

❌ Don't use a cascading system: Don't assign your goals top-down to downlines. Remember that OKR is a bidirectional system.

Why Do Organizations Fail at OKRs?

Before moving on to what you should and shouldn't do, let's talk about why many organizations struggle with OKRs.

The most common mistake is treating OKRs as a top-down mandate. Leadership sets the goals, pushes them down through the hierarchy, and expects everyone to comply. That's not how OKRs work. When teams don't have a voice in shaping their goals, they never truly take ownership of them. What you end up with is a nice-looking table that nobody really cares about.

The second major issue is using OKRs as a performance evaluation tool. The moment employees realize that their OKR scores will influence bonuses or promotion decisions, they start setting conservative goals. They write targets they are certain they can hit. The entire purpose of stretch goals disappears.

Then there is the scope problem. Companies try to solve everything at once. When you have seven or eight objectives per team, each with four or five key results underneath, that's not focus — it's a decorated to-do list. The whole purpose of OKRs is to concentrate energy on what matters most. Three to five objectives per quarter is the sweet spot.

Finally, there is the disconnect between OKRs and daily work. If your team writes OKRs at the beginning of the quarter and forgets about them until the retrospective, you don't have a goal-setting framework — you have a documentation issue. OKRs should be part of your weekly rhythm. Visible in team meetings, referenced in one-on-ones, and updated as work progresses.

What To Do: Best Practices That Deliver Results

Now let's go deeper into what separates successful OKR implementations from unsuccessful ones. These insights are not theoretical — they come from observing real teams achieve meaningful outcomes.

Start at the top, but don't stop there. Company-level OKRs set direction. However, team and individual OKRs should not be exact copies of company goals. Each team should interpret how it contributes to the bigger picture. Even when aligned to the same company objective, a marketing team's OKRs and an engineering team's OKRs will look very different.

Keep your objectives qualitative and inspirational. "Increase revenue by 15%" is a key result, not an objective. "Become the first-choice solution for mid-sized companies in our segment" is an objective. It gives direction without dictating the exact path.

Make every key result measurable with a specific number. "Improve customer satisfaction" is vague. "Increase NPS to 50 or above by the end of Q2" is concrete. If you cannot attach a number to it, it is not a key result — it is probably a task or initiative.

Establish a weekly review rhythm. Teams that succeed with OKRs check progress every week, even briefly. A 15-minute review during a team meeting is enough. This keeps OKRs visible instead of buried in a document no one opens.

Celebrate progress, not just completion. OKRs use a 0 to 1.0 scoring system for a reason. Scoring 0.7 on an ambitious goal often means you truly stretched and achieved something meaningful. The approach popularized by Google suggests that 60–70% achievement reflects the right level of ambition. If your culture only rewards 100% completion, people will stop setting bold goals. Appreciate the effort and learning that come from reaching for something difficult.

📝 Need help crafting your first OKRs? See our step-by-step guide on how to write OKRs.

What Not To Do: Pitfalls to Avoid

Some OKR mistakes are subtle. They don't look like mistakes at first. They seem reasonable. But over time, they erode the effectiveness of the system.

Do not tie OKR scores directly to compensation. The moment bonuses are connected to OKRs, the conversation changes. Instead of asking, "What's the most ambitious thing we can achieve?" people begin asking, "What can I safely commit to?" Use OKRs for alignment and focus. Use separate mechanisms for performance evaluation.

Do not expect 100% achievement. It may sound strange, but if teams consistently score 1.0 on all key results, the goals are too easy. If you are hitting everything, you are not thinking big enough.

Do not copy another company's OKRs word for word. Your OKRs should reflect your organization's unique context, challenges, and growth stage. What works in a 50,000-person technology giant may fail in a 30-person startup — and the reverse is also true.

Do not skip the retrospective. At the end of each quarter, take time to reflect not only on whether you achieved your numbers, but also on the quality of the OKRs themselves. Were the objectives too vague? Were the key results truly within your control? The retrospective is where you learn to write better OKRs for the next quarter.

Do not change OKRs mid-quarter unless something radical shifts. If you are rewriting key results every few weeks, it likely means you did not think them through properly. Adjust only when there is a significant change — such as a pandemic, a major competitive move, or a strategic pivot. Otherwise, commit to what you set and learn from the outcome.

⚠️ To take a closer look at what can go wrong, review our guide on the most common OKR mistakes.

OKR Do's and Don'ts by Role

When it comes to responsibilities, OKRs are not one-size-fits-all. What you should focus on — and what you should avoid — depends on your role within the organization.

For executives: Set direction; don't micromanage key results. Define the company-level objectives, then allow your teams to determine how to achieve them. If you are writing key results for every team, you are doing too much. Define the "what" and leave the "how" to the teams.

For managers: You are the bridge between strategy and execution. Your role is to facilitate, not to impose. Help your team understand company objectives, then guide them in creating their own OKRs. Instead of assigning tasks, ask coaching questions: "How does this key result move us closer to the objective?"

For team members: Take ownership of your key results. Do not wait for someone to tell you each week what to work on. If you committed to a key result, it is your responsibility to track progress, raise blockers early, and come prepared to check-ins. OKRs give you autonomy — use it.

For OKR champions: Your role is to coach, not to enforce. If people see you as the "OKR police," resistance will grow. Instead, become the person who helps teams write better goals, facilitates productive retrospectives, and removes friction from the system. Earn trust through support, not authority.

A Practical OKR Checklist

Before finalizing your OKRs for the quarter, run them through this quick checklist. If you can answer "yes" to all five questions, you are in good shape. If not, go back and refine them.

• Can you explain the objective in a single sentence? If it requires a paragraph to explain what you are trying to achieve, the objective is too complex. Simplify it so that a new team member can understand it within seconds.
• Are your key results measurable without ambiguity? There should be no debate about whether a key result was achieved. "Improve the hiring process" is vague. "Reduce time-to-first-value from 14 days to 7 days" leaves no room for interpretation.
• If all key results are completed, does the objective truly get achieved? This question misleads more teams than you would expect. Sometimes teams write key results that are related to the objective but do not collectively guarantee it. Map it out carefully.
• Is the timeline clear? Every key result should have a defined deadline, typically the end of the quarter. If some key results must happen sequentially, make that explicit.
• Does the team understand and believe in these OKRs? This is the most important question. You can write technically perfect OKRs, but if the people responsible for execution do not feel ownership, the results will be average. Ask your team directly: "Do you believe we can achieve this? Do you believe this matters?" If the response feels lukewarm, something needs to change.

🗓️ Want to make your weekly reviews more effective? Read our guide to OKR check-in meetings.