Influencing Behaviour. Secondary Factor.
Teams perform better if the goals that guide work are clear, specific, and challenging rather than vague, ambiguous, and unchallenging.
People perform better if the goals that guide work are clear, specific, and challenging rather than vague, ambiguous, and unchallenging (Latham et al., 2008; Latham & Locke, 2013; Rainey & Jung, 2015).
Four motivational factors for improving team performance through setting effective goals are:
When leaders are able to effecttivelly communicate what they expected of teams, the course of action people should take to accomplish the objective becomes clearer and the chances that you will reach the goal increase.
This again enhances self-efficacy through positive reinforcement and roused commitment, which in turn benefits future effort and performance (Bandura, 2012, 2013; Wright, 2001). In addition, goal clarity supports people in knowing what is expected of them and what behavior is functional for goal achievement, lowering role ambiguity (Davis & Stazyk, 2015; Pandey & Wright, 2006). If belief in one’s capacities is strong and role ambiguity is low, higher performance can be expected (Bandura, 2013; Davis & Stazyk, 2015; House & Rizzo, 1972; Pandey & Wright, 2006).
Objectives and key results (OKRs) are a goal setting framework used by many executives to establish definable goals and track progress toward them.
Unfortunately, most OKRs fail because the goals themselves are:
When people are rewarded for achiving tasks as measures for success over impacts, plans become set in stone.
Objectives aren’t activities. Delivering a new IT system, designing a new strategy, developing a new operating model isn’t the end-game.
Objectives represent meaningful change, growth and improvement. Effective objectives are:
This reflects an activity, not an outcome.
This is an audatious, inspirational goal with a clear direction.
"When people are rewarded for achiving tasks as measures for success over impacts, plans become set in stone, limiting our ability to adapt to change."
- Matthew Hodgson, Scrum.org Professional Scrum Trainer
For developing complex products, setting task-based milestones createsa fixed mindset about what is actually required to achieve executive goals. Key Results should measure impacts, not activities or deliverables.
KR1: Email out agenda 1 day before
KR2: Discussions are timeboxed
KR3: Finish the session on time
These are poor Key Results as they reflect task-based milestones. While you can easily claim these have been achieved, there is no indication that operational excellence has been impacted.
KR1: Lead time to deliver agendas decrease to 1 day
KR2: 4/5 quality rating from attendees (up from 2/5)
These are effective Key Results. Without specifying a plan or tasks, they outline a measurable impact
Tasks and deliverables as Key Result areas create a fixed mindset about what is required to achieve an objective. To improve ability to pivot to disruptive change, and encourage adaptive planning, switch to considering:
W. Edwards Demming, the creator of the P-D-C-A loop (on which Scrum is based), argued that setting certain types goals can lead to staff cutting corners and reducing quality in order to meet those targets. Others also highlight that the cascade of management objectives to the team and individual level causes “too much of a Waterfall approach”. In itself, this can create the perspective that once goals are set by executive, and plans are created and approved, that we then track progress of the execution of the plan. The focus on the plan is at the cost of adapting to necessary changes in stakeholder, user and customer needs.
This is where OKRs fail.
In complex environments, OKR initiatives are “experiments” that attempt to realise business goals. In agile terms, each Sprint and Sprint Goal is the hypothesis:
There are four agile Key Result Areas or value-based measures in Evidence Based Management (EBM):
All four areas reflect gaps in customer satisfaction – known and currently unknown ways we can deliver more value either through:
Sprint Review is the perfect time for Product Managers to reflect on progress toward their objectives. During Sprint Review, inspect the measures that reflect the impact each Sprint and Sprint Goal was intended to make:
If there’s been no change in metrics:
If metrics have moved in the right direction:
As more is learned about the effectiveness of the Initiatives, any new Initiatives or adjustments to current ones are added to the Product Backlog. This makes it clear:
ZXM’s poster is a visual reminder of the cycle of setting OKRs with value-based metrics based on Evidence Based Management. It couples Scrum’s inspect/adapt cadence to provide opportunities to adapt toward objectives over (blindly) following a plan.
Formgren, J (2018). Power of making a difference at work. 15 October 2018.
Scrum.org (2020) The Evidence-Based Management Guide. Measuring Value to Enable Improvement and Agility.