Quarterly Health Check

Objectives and key results (OKR, alternatively OKRs) is a goal-setting framework used by individuals, teams, and organizations to define measurable goals and track their outcomes. The development of OKR is generally attributed to Andrew Grove who introduced the approach to Intel in the 1970s.

Overview

OKRs comprise an objective (a significant, concrete, clearly defined goal) and 3–5 key results (measurable success criteria used to track the achievement of that goal).

Not only should objectives be significant, concrete, and clearly defined, they should also be inspirational for the individual, team, or organization that is working towards them. Objectives can also be supported by initiatives, which are the plans and activities that help to move forward the key results and achieve the objective.

Key results should be measurable, either on a 0–100% scale or with any numerical value (e.g. count, dollar amount, or percentage) that can be used by planners and decision makers to determine whether those involved in working towards the key result have been successful. There should be no opportunity for "grey area" when defining a key result.

Lessons learned (American English) or lessons learnt (British English) are experiences distilled from past activities that should be actively taken into account in future actions and behaviors.

There are several definitions of the concept. The one used by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, European Space Agency and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency reads as follows:

“A lesson learned is knowledge or understanding gained by experience. The experience may be positive, as in a successful test or mission, or negative, as in a mishap or failure...A lesson must be significant in that it has a real or assumed impact on operations; valid in that is factually and technically correct; and applicable in that it identifies a specific design, process, or decision that reduces or eliminates the potential for failures and mishaps, or reinforces a positive result.”

The Development Assistance Committee of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development defines lessons learned as:

“Generalizations based on evaluation experiences with projects, programs, or policies that abstract from the specific circumstances to broader situations. Frequently, lessons highlight strengths or weaknesses in preparation, design, and implementation that affect performance, outcome, and impact.”

In the practice of the United Nations the concept has been made explicit in the name of their Working Group on Lessons Learned of the Peacebuilding Commission.

U.S. Army Center for Army Lessons Learned (CALL) since 1985 covers in detail the Army Lessons Learned Program and identifies, collects, analyzes, disseminates, and archives lessons and best practices.

In the military field, conducting a Lessons learned analysis requires a leader-led after-actions debriefing. These debriefings require the leader to extend the lessons-learned orientation of the standard after-action review. He uses the event reconstruction approach or has the individuals present their own roles and perceptions of the event, whichever best fits the situation and time available