The OKR method (Objectives & Key Results) is the goal-setting system used by Google, Intel, Netflix and Spotify. Its principle fits in one sentence: an ambitious, qualitative objective, measured by 2 to 5 numeric key results. This guide explains how it works, how to write good OKRs, and gives you 15 concrete examples, personal and professional, to adapt directly.
An OKR has two parts:
The golden rule: the objective inspires, the key results measure. If your objective contains a number, it is probably a key result in disguise. The vocabulary of the field (KR, KPI, deep work, time-blocking) is gathered in our productivity glossary if a term escapes you. And if your key result cannot be measured without an argument ("improve quality"), it is not a key result.
The method was born at Intel in the 1970s, driven by Andy Grove. John Doerr, then a young engineer at Intel, brought it to Google in 1999, when the company had barely 40 employees. Larry Page would later credit OKRs with part of Google's ability to grow without losing its bearings. The method has since spread far beyond tech, and it also works very well at an individual scale, to structure a year, a quarter or a personal project.
O: Get back to a level of fitness I am proud of.
KR1: Run 3 sessions a week for 12 weeks. KR2: Go from 0 to 10 km without stopping. KR3: Sleep 7 hours 30 on average, measured over the month.
O: Put my personal finances in order.
KR1: Save 15 % of every monthly income. KR2: Cut recurring spending by 100 € a month. KR3: Build an emergency fund of 3,000 €.
O: Hold a conversation in Spanish.
KR1: 90 sessions of 15 minutes over the quarter. KR2: Finish 2 easy books in the original. KR3: Have 6 conversations of 30 minutes with a native speaker.
O: Make my project exist in the real world.
KR1: Publish a first usable version. KR2: Reach 50 active users. KR3: Collect 20 structured pieces of user feedback.
O: Become a real reader again.
KR1: Read 6 books in the quarter. KR2: 20 minutes of reading on 5 evenings a week. KR3: Write a summary note for each book finished.
O: Make myself the obvious choice for the role I want.
KR1: Lead 2 projects visible beyond my team. KR2: Earn a recognised certification in the field. KR3: Have lunch with 6 people who already hold that role.
O: Be genuinely present for the people close to me.
KR1: One fully disconnected weekend a month. KR2: Organise 6 dinners or outings with friends. KR3: Call my parents every week, 12 out of 12.
O: Build a regular creative practice.
KR1: Publish 12 pieces, one a week. KR2: Follow one structured course or tutorial all the way through. KR3: Get feedback from 3 creators I admire.
The examples that follow read on their own, but they make full sense collectively: how they cascade by department and by team is the subject of the Cosmo for teams page.
O: Prove the product solves a real problem.
KR1: 40 % of active users come back every week. KR2: 25 user interviews conducted. KR3: NPS above 40.
O: Make content our first acquisition channel.
KR1: Go from 2,000 to 8,000 monthly organic visits. KR2: Publish 12 SEO-optimised articles. KR3: Earn 15 backlinks from authoritative sites.
O: Make the first use magical.
KR1: Raise day-one activation from 30 % to 50 %. KR2: Bring median time-to-value under 3 minutes. KR3: Halve support tickets related to onboarding.
O: Build a predictable sales machine.
KR1: 30 qualified demos a month. KR2: Demo-to-customer conversion rate of 20 %. KR3: Average sales cycle down from 45 to 30 days.
O: Attract profiles we would not have dared approach.
KR1: 3 senior hires signed. KR2: 50 % of applications coming from referrals. KR3: Average time to hire under 35 days.
O: Turn support into a competitive advantage.
KR1: First response in under 2 hours (median). KR2: CSAT at 95 % or above. KR3: 20 help articles published, cutting recurring tickets by 30 %.
O: Ship fast without breaking things.
KR1: Deploy to production every day. KR2: Halve the rate of critical incidents. KR3: 90 % test coverage on the core modules.
The three coexist very well: a KPI is a permanent health indicator (the dashboard), a SMART goal is a single well-worded aim, and an OKR is a complete system connecting an ambition to its numeric proof over a short cycle. In practice: watch your KPIs continuously, and when a KPI has to move significantly, turn it into an OKR for a quarter. The detailed comparison of the three methods gives the full table and the rule for choosing.
To start today, we offer a free OKR spreadsheet template, with pre-filled examples, automatic progress and no email required. But the real friction point of OKRs is not the writing, it is the weekly follow-up. A spreadsheet works, but nobody opens it. Cosmo has OKRs built in: you create your objectives and key results, progress is computed as you update the key results, and the dashboard chart shows the key results you have achieved week after week, next to your tasks, habits and calendar, so that follow-up happens in the same place as the action. It is free, and demo mode lets you try it with 8 pre-filled OKRs and no sign-up.
Two to four objectives per cycle at most, with 2 to 5 key results each. The fewer you have, the better the method works.
The quarter is the standard. For personal goals, a cycle of 6 to 12 weeks works very well too.
No. The healthy target is around 70 %, which is the sign of genuinely ambitious goals. An OKR that always lands at 100 % should push you to aim higher next cycle.
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