okr-goal-setting

name	okr-goal-setting
description	Set OKRs or quarterly goals — define objectives, decompose key results, align with strategy. Use at the start of a planning cycle.

OKR & Goal Setting

Structure your quarterly or annual OKRs in a focused 2-3 hour session. Claude handles the framework mechanics — decomposition, measurement criteria, alignment checks. You provide the strategic judgment about what matters most.

When to Use

• Start of a quarter or fiscal year when goals need to be set
• Mid-cycle when OKRs need revision based on new information
• When leadership asks for your team's goals and you need to connect them to company objectives
• When you're inheriting a team and need to set direction quickly

When NOT to Use

• You need to decide what to build — use Prioritization frameworks in FRAMEWORKS.md
• You need to track progress against existing OKRs — use Metrics Review
• You need to communicate goals to stakeholders — use Stakeholder Alignment

The AI-Native Approach

Step	Time	Claude Does	You Do
Audit context	30 min	Structure company goals, last quarter's results, strategic priorities	Provide context, flag what changed
Draft objectives	30 min	Generate objective candidates tied to strategy	Choose the 2-4 that matter most
Decompose key results	45 min	Propose measurable KRs with baselines and targets	Validate that KRs are achievable and measurable
Stress-test	30 min	Check alignment, flag conflicts, identify gaps	Confirm with leadership and team

Process

Step 1: Audit Context (30 minutes)

Here's our context for [quarter/year] goal setting:

Company-level goals: [what leadership has set as priorities]
Last quarter's results: [what we achieved vs. planned, what we learned]
Product strategy: [current vision and strategic bets]
Team capacity: [team size, any changes, known constraints]
What changed: [new data, market shifts, strategy pivots since last cycle]

Summarize:
- What should carry forward from last quarter (unfinished but still important)
- What should be dropped (no longer relevant or strategic)
- What's new this quarter (emerging priorities)

Step 2: Draft Objectives (30 minutes)

Based on our context, draft 4-6 objective candidates.

Good objectives are:
- Qualitative and inspirational (what we want to achieve, not a metric)
- Aligned to company goals (clear line of sight to what leadership cares about)
- Achievable within the time horizon (ambitious but not delusional)
- Within our team's influence (we can move this, not just observe it)

For each objective:
- The objective statement (one sentence)
- Which company goal it supports
- Why this quarter (what makes it timely)
- What we'd sacrifice to pursue this (every yes is a no to something else)

Select 2-4 objectives. More than 4 means nothing is a priority.

Step 3: Decompose Key Results (45 minutes)

For each selected objective, draft 2-4 key results.

Good key results are:
- Quantitative and measurable (a number with a target)
- Outcome-based, not output-based ("increase activation to 60%" not "ship onboarding redesign")
- Time-bound (measurable by end of quarter)
- Stretch but achievable (60-70% confidence of hitting)

For each key result:
- The metric and target
- Current baseline
- Data source (where we measure this)
- Leading indicators (early signals we're on track or off)
- Risk: what could prevent us from hitting this?

Step 4: Stress-Test (30 minutes)

Review our OKRs for:

Alignment:
- Does each objective clearly connect to a company goal?
- Do the key results actually measure the objective? (not a proxy)
- Are there company goals we're not covering? Should we be?

Conflicts:
- Do any key results conflict with each other? (optimizing one hurts another)
- Do any require resources we don't control?
- Are any dependent on other teams' OKRs being met?

Gaps:
- Is anything important missing?
- Are we measuring what's easy instead of what matters?
- Do we have leading indicators for each KR so we don't find out we missed at quarter-end?

Achievability:
- At our current trajectory, which KRs are we likely to hit/miss?
- What needs to change for us to hit the stretch targets?

Output

• Context audit with carry-forward, drop, and new priorities
• 2-4 objectives with strategic alignment
• 2-4 key results per objective with baselines, targets, and data sources
• Alignment and conflict analysis
• Leading indicators for early tracking

Common Pitfalls

1. Too many objectives. 2-4 per team. Period. If you can't say no, your OKRs are a to-do list, not a strategy.
2. Output key results. "Ship feature X" is not a key result — it's a task. "Increase metric Y from A to B" is a key result. The feature is one possible way to get there.
3. Sandbagging targets. OKRs should be stretch goals (60-70% confidence). If you hit 100% of your KRs, they weren't ambitious enough.
4. Set and forget. Review OKR progress weekly in metrics review. Adjust tactics, not goals — unless fundamentally wrong assumptions surface.
5. No connection to daily work. If the team can't explain how their sprint work connects to a KR, the OKRs are decorative.

Related Skills

• Product Strategy & Vision — OKRs should flow from strategy
• Metrics Review — tracking OKR progress week over week
• Sprint & Release Planning — translating OKRs into sprint work
• Reference: FRAMEWORKS.md — SaaS Metrics for choosing the right KR metrics