🌟 Key Result

What are key results? ​

If the goal is the place you want to reach, then the key results are what proves you have reached that place. Key results are like selection exams, focusing on the final score (result), rather than the effort put into preparing for the exam.

It is a result. ​

Key results, as the name suggests, focus on the outcomes, which are the results obtained at the end of the period, rather than the specific tasks done.

For example, here’s a goal: 【Transform the body's condition from sub-health to health】

Therefore, your key results should demonstrate that your body's condition has transformed into health. Logically, key results must be

a necessary condition of the goal. Key results can include:

Key Result 1: Reduce weight from 70 kg to 60 kg

Key Result 2: Achieve an average sleep time of over 7 hours

Key Result 3: Run 5 kilometers at a pace of 4 minutes per kilometer, achieving at least 5 times

Key Result 4: Complete a health check-up with all indicators normal

We analyze one by one why they are all a key result:

If you reduce your weight to 60 kilograms, you are likely to encounter a plateau during the process and even rebound. However, these processes are not what the key result cares about; as long as you have reduced your weight to 60 kilograms by the end of the cycle, then you have achieved that key result.

Quantifying the average value of a cycle is another typical result value. Because you cannot derive an average value during the course of the cycle.

The essence of this key result lies in the pace limitation. With this limitation, you may do a series of strength training or even run 20 times 5 kilometers, just to have 5 times reach this pace, which means achieving this result.

Clearly, "all indicators are normal" is a result, and you may have experienced this result more than once.

💡 Use limiting words to turn specific matters into results

The reason why Key Results 3 and 4 are considered as one result is that they both include restrictions on actions. One characteristic is: you cannot tell what exactly you need to do or how many times you need to do it just from the description of the key result; rather, it does not describe a result, but a specific task.

Similar to this is: Key Result: Read 100 pages and understand.

If there is no restriction of 'understand', then it is a specific task rather than a key result— to understand, you may need to read more than once.

Quantifiable ​

It has been clearly reflected from the example above what is quantifiable — each key result has specific numbers and quantifiable methods or units.

Quantifiable numbers and units allow you to objectively and straightforwardly evaluate whether you have achieved the key results after the cycle ends:

To weigh 60 kilograms, you only need to check your weight during the cycle review to clearly understand your completion status; to achieve an average sleep duration, you only need to check the data on the sleep app you use; and whether you have completed a 5-kilometer run at a pace of 4 minutes 5 times can be determined by the data from any running tracking app you like.

Without these quantifiable numbers and units, you cannot derive the completion status of key results through specific data.

challenge ​

In the chapter introducing OKRs, we discussed the difference between OKRs and KPIs. KPIs are the most basic health indicators for measuring your performance, while OKRs represent the changes you must make to progress - changes that inevitably bring challenges, and correspondingly, without challenges, it is also difficult to make changes.

Taking the above example again, you can imagine that if you are someone who is overweight and severely lacks sleep, each key result would come with its own set of challenges. However, nothing should be excessive; alongside challenges, there must also be feasibility - the changes must be within your current capabilities.

At Vision, you can demonstrate challenge by moderately increasing the number of measurable key results and reasonably setting the weights of those key results.

💡 Tip

It is recommended to refer to the scores of four different stages and set target values for key results based on the estimated final score at the 70% stage.

Weight of key results ​

As mentioned in the chapter on cycles, at Vision, all objectives and key results need to be assigned weights. The sum of the weights of the key results under an objective equals the weight of the objective.

Since the total score for the cycle is 100 points, and the total weight is also 100, the maximum score that a key result can contribute to the cycle in the cycle review equals its weight value.

Key result attributes ​

The key results should include an initial value, a target value, and one or more current values recorded during the ongoing period.

In Vision, a record refers to documenting the current value of the key results generated in the current phase within the app during the ongoing period. At the same time, we will display the trend of the changes in the current value of the key results in the form of charts.

There are several rules to determine whether the key results have been achieved:

1. Have all recorded final values reached the target value set for the key results?

2. Have all recorded average values reached the target value set for the key results?

3. Have all recorded maximum values reached the target value set for the key results?

4. Use a custom formula to determine whether the target value set for the key results has been reached.

At the same time, users can set a minimum number of records for the key results. (For example, in the key results 2 mentioned above, the minimum number of records can be set to 20, which means that during the period, at least 20 sleep records have been documented, and the average reached 7 hours.)

Progress ​

Theoretically, a key result is an outcome, and there is no progress. However, since we need to reflect the completion of the OKR cycle to users in real time, we have designed the current progress calculation method:

Progress is derived from the ratio of the difference between the calculated value based on the set key result and the target value, to the difference between the initial value and the target value, combined with the weight.

If the above ratio is less than 0, the progress is counted as 0.

If the above ratio is greater than 1, the progress is counted as 1.

The calculation of progress ignores the limit on the number of recorded entries.