Recently I read several articles on OKRs (Objectives and Key Results), a method for setting and tracking the goals leading to better alignment of goals in an organization. OKRs were started by Andy Grove of Intel and first documented in his book “High Output Management” from 1983. The OKRs concept is built on Management By Objectives approach created by Peter Drucker in 50s.
The central principle of OKRs is that each objective (what) is accompanied by several key results (how), that are measurable and can be answered in yes/no format. Great introduction to OKRs is this TED talk by John Doerr, who also wrote a book about it “Measure What Matters”. Doerr has a web site www.whatmatters.com with more content.
OKRs are apparently used by all Google employees. The process of using OKRs at Google is described in the “Startup Lab Workshop” video (over an hour). The video is from 2012 and is considered by some not up to date, but still explains in detail basic concepts.
A web site by one of the proponents of OKRs who makes living teaching companies how to use them is here. It has many interesting articles, including an article about using Shared OKRs from an ex-employee of Google.
2018-01-14: Updated category.