write in front
Why is it difficult for management to satisfy everyone? Because the methodology of management is constantly changing, if you go to a bookstore, you will find that the most popular type of books must be management. This is because the external environment of the company has been changing. In the 1990s, it was popular to study Japan, and after 2010, it was changed to study. For Huawei, no one is right or wrong, but what kind of management methods the times need.
In the book "Out of Control" KK described to us such an experiment: a group of people who had never piloted an airplane for the first time (with a virtual pilot instrument), no one taught them how to fly, the content of the experiment was to let They do a flight experiment as a team. The experiment required them to fly a plane across the ocean, encountering (virtually simulated) summer storms along the way. During the experiment, the team members were shivering from the cold, not knowing what to do, no one gave them instructions, and because they were sailing on the vast sea, there were too many choices for everyone, so that they could not choose . When everyone was confused, someone whispered at the back of the room, "Why don't you turn right?" The person who gave the prompt was not the team leader and only made a minimal suggestion, but it gave direction and advice to the crowd. If we ask everyone to formulate KPIs in this experiment, since no one has enough skills and no similar experience, there is no way to formulate detailed and accurate KPI indicators. If you switch to an enterprise, especially a startup company, you The employees of the company will have such a problem as the company direction. If you let them specify KPIs, they can only protect themselves by specifying lower KPI indicators. Therefore, it is only by specifying goals as you work, and then continually adjusting your approach to those goals, that you can ensure that your company is moving in the right direction, because only then can you prevent a bottom-up "runaway." What we need to discuss today is how to make good use of OKRs for startups.
What are OKRs?
The full name of OKR is Objectives and Key Results, which can be literally translated into "objectives and main results" in Chinese. This system was originally formulated by Intel, but the largest company that has put it into practice is not Intel itself, but Google. Do you remember when Google was founded? September 4, 1998. Intel fully introduced OKR management in 1999 (a year after its establishment), and is by far the strongest supporter of this methodology. In my opinion, it is precisely by using OKR management that Google can grow into the Google we know today.
As Mr. Li Yunhua said in "Technology Talk: Why KPIs ruined Sony, but OKRs made Google?" " The relationship between OKRs and KPIs described in the article is shown in the following figure:
In his article, he proposed that OKR first needs to determine O, then decompose KR from O, and then express KR in the form of KPI or Milestone. He pointed out a detail, the KR of OKR can be KPI or Milestone, why is this? The key is that OKR requires KR to be measurable, which is translated as "measurable" in Chinese, while KPI's indicator requirements are "quantifiable", which means that the measurement method is more extensive, which can be "quantitative" measurement or "quantitative" measurement. Milestone" measurement.
The difference between OKR and KPI
Taking programmers as an example, if we pay attention to the target, we will think about what should I do next, whether to solve the performance problem of the product, or we can introduce data mining technology to make accurate recommendations. If we focus on performance metrics, since our work is programming for products, then we will wonder what metrics can be used to measure programming work, and naturally we think of lines of code, bugs, unit test coverage, and so on.
How to quantify the number of programmers' bugs? This proposition is actually a false proposition, because whether it is a bug or a bug level is clear, these often become the point of conflict between programmers and testers. In the end, they must compromise with each other, or there is a situation where the two sides are incompatible.
Compared with KPI, OKR is not an assessment tool, but a more instructive tool. To put it bluntly, it is a plan-execution-check cycle. The main goal of OKR's existence is not to assess the workload of a certain team or employee, but to always remind everyone what the current task is. In Google, everyone has their own OKRs, and each team has their own OKRs. No matter the level or the size of the team, everyone needs to formulate and obey OKRs. This OKR needs to be scored after the end of each quarter. The score does not directly determine an employee's promotion and treatment, but more to remind employees how the work is done in this quarter and why the unfinished work has not been completed. What is the focus of the next stage of work?
The key word of OKR is Objectives, and the key word of KPI is Indicators. It is precisely because many of the work of programmers cannot be quantified. For example, if you say to a programmer, the code you write cannot have defects. This is a false proposition in itself, because software It is a mapping product of simulating human behavior. Humans make mistakes, so the software must also have defects. Therefore, programmers can only be driven forward by setting goals. Otherwise, flexible people will cheat in order to complete the target, while honest people will be troubled and confused.
The benefits of OKRs
The biggest benefit of OKR is to motivate people to actively leave the comfort zone, whether actively or passively.
For most start-up technology companies in Silicon Valley, all employees are full of passion and ambition. Otherwise, why would they come to a start-up company? It will be more comfortable to go to a big company, and this can be achieved in the OKR assessment system. OKR requires employees to stand higher and see farther under the premise of maintaining certain organizational goals. Unlike KPIs, OKRs require employees to step out of their "comfort zone", preferably beyond their own capabilities. A 100% completed KPI may not have any driving effect on the development of the company or product, while a 70% completed OKR is almost perfect. Only when you know where the limit is, will you have more room for improvement. OKR believes in and relies on the autonomy and creativity of employees to complete tasks, with the goal of achieving a balance of freedom and direction.
The biggest advantage of OKR is that it is extremely simple, and it is simple enough to start with classification, just three words: "Objective" and "Key Results". Some methodologies for managing performance and strategy execution are full of terminology, and employees are confused and overwhelmed by terms such as Mission, Vision, Core Values, and KPIs! These are all things that startups need to avoid. You worry about failure all the time, and the tediousness means the consumption of labor costs.
For a company, employee attention is a very scarce resource. In this 24/7 world, there are many things grabbing this resource, such as company goals, business unit goals, personal goals, various conferences, industry trends, career considerations, family chores, social media, etc. I went to Singapore last week and met my ex-colleagues. I treat every meeting as my last, because everyone's time is fragmented, and maybe there is no time to get together again in this lifetime.
The essence of using OKR is to let employees clarify their goals, not to use their brains in order to meet the indicators, and not to enter the comfort zone because they meet the indicators. OKR is to pull people out of the comfort zone. If a small and medium-sized company or a start-up company can’t give full play to the subjective initiative of employees, it will be difficult for you to compete with large companies. The company is dissolved.
The troubles of startups
Startups, compared to large enterprises, are very different, I summarize the following points:
1. If you work at a startup, you have a lot of autonomy in your work, and you can also do things you think will be successful, but it also means that you have to do everything as long as the company needs it.
首先我们需要意识到在创业公司工作也可能会涉及到很多无聊乏味的苦差事，做这些事的技术含量和成就感可能要远低于你在一家大公司做的事情。比如为产品做无休止的缺陷修复和改进、接听和拨打各种电话、收发快递以及其他一些或许你会觉得无法全部体现自身价值的工作。针对这一类型工作，我们需要明确它所产生的效果，修复缺陷、改进系统、拨打客户电话、收发快递，这些工作很有可能都能实现"改进产品，提升客户满意度"这样的OKR目标，既然是有利的，我们就需要去明确目标，然后思考如何实现目标，并有针对性地分配任务，创业公司如果能够做到目标实现方式明确及步骤细分，那么一定能够最大化地使用所有人，所以OKR对于创业公司非常重要。
我对于OKR的设定有自己的一套检查机制，每周我会安排半天时间，让所有人逐一说说上一周完成的工作，越详细越好，因为只有详细，你才有机会提出具体问题。我们真正需要去关注的是事情的结果以及所影响的范围，而不是仅仅完成了这一项任务。
2. 谁都希望自己的公司最后会成为下一个Google、腾讯。但你要明白这其中的风险很大，以及最终成功的创业公司其实数量很少。
最近哈佛大学的研究发现美国大约75%的创业公司最终都失败了。你觉得你们公司将会属于剩下的25%呢，还是这75%呢？就算一家创业公司里的每个员工都竭尽所能的工作，就算这家公司所打造的产品真的能改变世界上每一个人的生活，但事实是有时候这些东西与成功没多大的关系，很多创业公司都坚持不到一年。既然我们不知道未来，我们就应该采取更为积极有效的管理方式，采用OKR，而不是KPI，让大家努力拼一把，而不是为了满足KPI指标想尽办法。
3. 虽然许多创业公司会公平对待每一个员工，但对薪水和福利别期望太高。
创业公司往往存在着资金紧张的问题。这意味着许多创业公司提供的薪资与福利和那些已经比较成熟的公司是不能比的。举个例子，在美国一个市场高管求职时的待遇要求一般是15000美元左右每月，对于大公司来说这完全是一个合理的要求，但如果是在创业公司，每月能拿到11000美元就已经非常不错了。既然工资上没有太大的吸引力，那么我们可以通过创造更宽松的考核方式，更加广阔的发展空间，来吸引员工。通过OKR，让每位员工可以看到其他人的目标和完成情况，包括CEO的，这会让他很有参与感，而不是像在大公司，每天做的事情他可能都没有意识到究竟是为了什么，究竟自己的贡献有多大。
4. 来自主管的指导。
创业公司的工作氛围可能会让一些人难以忍受，在一个小团队里工作，要求你必须主动性十足，感觉仿佛回到了大学时代。如果你的主管很忙，那么很有可能他就不会给你太多指导，特别是那种你在别的地方会得到的正式指导。而且别忘了在某些特定的领域，你主管的经验可能还不如你丰富。举个例子来说，如果你是你们团队中唯一一个被聘来负责市场的人，相比于在那些有着多年市场经验及众多市场人才的公司，比如宝洁，你获得的指导会少很多很多，你只能自己领悟闯荡市场的技巧。这种问题的存在，可以通过为主管设定特定的OKR来实现，比如"加强员工的技术归属感"，这一条目标的实现就需要主管加强与员工就业务和技术上的交流，帮助员工制定成长计划、审核计划的实现成绩，一定要做好这一条，初创公司。
5. 最后一条或许是最重要的一条。虽然创业公司有很多的乐趣，但压力可能也会比其他公司大很多。
达成结果、完成指标、保持进步、提高知名度。。。在创业公司工作类似于这样的压力将会纷至沓来。我们已经看到了很多人退出了创业公司因为他们发现无法承受这些精神上的压力。你的工作能够决定这家公司的命运，这种感觉确实不错，但套用《蜘蛛侠》里的经典台词："能力越大，责任越大。"
OKR并非一个自上而下的运动，不是要一成不变地把目标向下分发给低层级业务单元和部门，让他们毫无保留地去执行。正好相反，OKR更加包容，个体在OKR的选择上更具话语权，目标设定是自下而上和自上而下的融合。要通过使用OKR让员工增强归属感，他的每一次付出，都在帮助公司成长，他们对于公司很重要，这样才能不断激励他们。
OKR的落地
OKR如果想要真正落地，最关键的是peer review，其实这是对于管理理念的巨大挑战，因为这种做法意味着集合了扁平化管理和去中心化管理理念。扁平化并没有去掉员工的层级管理理念，只是简化了层级，不会出现美国某大公司的9层管理层级，每一层只管理1位员工的情况，但是还是有管理层存在的，员工之间互相不存在交互（典型的Master-Slave分布式架构）。而去中心化，则意味着各个员工之间可以互相查看对方的目标，也就是分布式系统设计时各个节点需要通信，虽然依然存在弱中心化的设计，但是总体来说没有了Master概念。
即便是在采用OKR方式的众多公司内部，对于OKR的具体方案还是存在一些差异的，大体上可以分为较为宽松的和较为严谨的两大类。无论哪种方式，我觉得如果初创公司想要做到OKR的平稳落地，我认为需要满足以下几点：
- 首先指定较为模糊的目标，统一大家努力的方向，而不是完全计划好，再周全的计划也总是赶不上变化。所以OKR不是计划，只是一个模糊的目标，具体如何实现还需要探索。但有了目标至少有了努力的方向。这样个人的目标、团队的目标和公司的目标才有可能达成一致，从而为产生更大的影响提供可能。看看谷歌的OKR目标："增强Blogger的威望"，而不仅仅是每天发一篇博客的KPI指标；
- 量化OKR必须是一个可度量的目标；
- 目标可以由员工或者技术经理提出，而不是总监。OKR需要统一的是个人的目标和团队的目标。技术经理负责的是团队的目标，而员工在意的是个人的职业生涯和个人为公司做出的影响，两个目标通过共同制定OKR来统一；
- (基本)不作为考核标准。既然OKR是用来统一目标而非衡量成果的，一般不作为考核标准，虽然考核的过程中也会参考，但建议不要太在意分数之间的差距；
- 个人的OKR是对公司内其他员工开放的，包括CEO。
我的应用
对于OKR的使用，我认为应该坚持以下几点，这些也是我在团队管理时使用的方式：
- 采用"长期规划制定，短期定时验收"的策略，即我们需要坚持使用OKR管理方式，这是长期政策，可以通过季度或者月度计划进行约束。 基本格式可以如下所示： 目标：这里必须提出明确的目标，例如完成一个c/s程序设计，实现客户端和服务端的通信。如果你发现不能明确提出目标，那么一定是你还没有想清楚自己接下来1个计划周期内需要完成什么，或者不是那么得明确，只是知道一个大概目标，这都是不合适的，每一个员工都必须明确目标。
执行过程：需要能够尽可能地细化我们的执行方式，尽自己所能实现目标切分和执行步骤切分，这种方式可以避免出现指定的目标空洞或者错误的情况发生，我们要做的是避免失控。 - 坚持采用每周一次或几次的目标执行情况检查工作。对于技术团队管理者来说，一切不可把控基本都是因为自己没有做好检查工作，我们管理一个团队，不仅仅是布置工作，而是要对工作过程中的每一个细节了解清楚，对于每一个难题给出自己的解决方案或者建议，引导团队前进。我比较推荐的检查方式如下所示： 上周工作回顾：这里需要逐一列出自己上周的目标及完成这些目标所做的具体工作。
本周计划工作：这里需要逐一列出自己本周的目标以及完成这些目标所需要做的具体工作。
我们对于技术团队的管理，不仅仅是带来OKR方式，而是带给他们如何最好地通过执行这些管理方式为团队研发成绩做出贡献，所以需要我们完整地掌握知识方法论，并主动不断纠正自己的使用方式。
总结
我个人认为，再好的制度，没有详细的实施方案、严谨的监督方案，也是不会取得成功的。初创公司有它自己的特性，它不像大公司那样船大人多，它相对来说比较轻巧，可以针对实际情况进行适度的快速调整。
在中小型公司，特别是初创公司，最好的方式是每周至少开一次晨会，晨会中Review大家的目标完成情况、讨论遇到的问题、并给出解决方案、指定下一次晨会之前的目标。所有人的目标，都应该能够被其他人看到，这样才不会出现务虚的人，对于初创公司来说，务虚、待在安逸区，两者都是对公司而言非常不利的，必须遏制。
http://www.infoq.com/cn/articles/how-to-make-okrs-actually-work-at-your-startup