Frequently Asked Questions

No-BS OKRs strip away the corporate jargon and overcomplicated frameworks that make traditional OKRs feel inaccessible. The No-BS approach focuses on practical implementation: clear objectives that actually mean something to your team, measurable key results that track real progress, and a cadence that works for your organization—not a one-size-fits-all quarterly cycle. Traditional OKRs often get bogged down in scoring systems and alignment cascades. No-BS OKRs keep the focus on what matters: getting clear on what you're trying to achieve and how you'll know when you've achieved it.

Less than you think. Most organizations try to track too many objectives at once, which dilutes focus and makes everything feel equally (un)important. For most teams, 3-5 objectives per cycle is the sweet spot. Each objective should have 2-4 key results. If you're new to OKRs, start even smaller—maybe just 1-2 objectives—until you build the muscle memory for setting and tracking goals effectively. The goal is focus, not comprehensive coverage of everything you do.

Outcomes, always. This is one of the most common mistakes in OKR implementation. Activities are things you do; outcomes are the results of those activities. Your key results should measure whether you achieved what you set out to achieve, not whether you completed a checklist of tasks. For example, 'Launch new onboarding program' is an activity. 'Reduce new employee time-to-productivity from 90 days to 60 days' is an outcome. The second tells you whether your work actually made a difference.

This is a nuanced question, and the answer depends on your organizational culture. The short version: be careful. When OKRs are directly tied to compensation, people tend to sandbag—setting easily achievable goals to guarantee their bonus. This defeats the purpose of OKRs as a tool for ambitious goal-setting. That said, completely divorcing OKRs from performance conversations can make them feel irrelevant. The No-BS approach: use OKRs as input to performance conversations, not as the sole determinant. Evaluate how people approached their goals, what they learned, and how they contributed—not just whether they hit arbitrary numbers.

Being 'in the red' means you're significantly behind on achieving a key result. And here's the counterintuitive truth: if you're never in the red, you're probably not being ambitious enough. OKRs are meant to stretch you. Hitting 100% on every objective suggests you're playing it too safe. A healthy OKR culture expects some red—it's a signal that you're pushing boundaries and learning. What matters is what you do when you see red: Do you course-correct? Do you learn something valuable? Do you communicate transparently about what's working and what isn't?

This is where people often get stuck, but every type of work has measurable outcomes—you just have to get creative about what you measure. For creative work, consider: client satisfaction scores, revision cycles, time from brief to delivery, or portfolio metrics. For product development, look at: user adoption rates, feature usage, bug reports, or customer feedback themes. The key is distinguishing between measuring the work itself (which can feel reductive) and measuring the impact of the work (which is always possible). Ask: 'If this creative/product work is successful, what would be different? What would we observe?' That's your key result.

Thinkydoers are people who combine strategic thinking with practical execution—they're not just idea people, and they're not just task-completers. They think deeply AND get things done. I focus on Thinkydoers because they're often underserved by traditional consulting and coaching. They don't need someone to tell them what to do (they can figure that out). They need a thinking partner who can help them clarify their strategic direction and then actually implement it. Thinkydoers are also my people—I am one, and I understand the unique challenges of being someone who operates at both the strategic and tactical levels.

I work with organizations of all sizes—from startups finding their footing to established enterprises transforming their approach to strategy and goals. What my clients have in common isn't size or industry; it's a commitment to getting better at how they work. They're tired of goal-setting theater and want something that actually moves the needle. I've worked with tech companies, nonprofits, professional services firms, creative agencies, and everything in between. If you're serious about improving how your organization sets and achieves goals, we should talk.

The Connected Strategic One-Sheet is a tool I developed to help organizations see their entire strategic picture on a single page. It connects your mission, vision, strategic priorities, and OKRs in a visual format that makes the relationships between them clear. Why is it important? Because most organizations have strategy documents that live in a drawer (or a forgotten Google Drive folder). The One-Sheet is designed to be a living document—something you can reference in meetings, share with new team members, and actually use to make decisions. It's strategy that fits on one page because if it doesn't fit on one page, it's too complicated to execute.

The Rebelutionary mindset is about challenging the status quo—not for the sake of being contrarian, but because you see a better way. It's the mindset of someone who asks 'why do we do it this way?' and isn't satisfied with 'because we've always done it this way.' For OKRs, this mindset is essential because effective goal-setting requires honesty about what's working and what isn't. You have to be willing to name the elephants in the room, push back on goals that are really just busywork dressed up in OKR language, and advocate for objectives that might make people uncomfortable because they demand real change.

Start small and simple. Don't try to roll out OKRs across your entire organization at once. Pick one team or one project and experiment. Read a book or two (I recommend my book 'You Are A Strategist' for the No-BS approach, or 'Measure What Matters' for the classic introduction). Set your first objective around something you genuinely care about—not something that sounds impressive. Give yourself permission to be bad at it for the first cycle or two. And consider working with a coach (hi!) who can help you avoid common pitfalls and build the habits that make OKRs actually work.

Absolutely. In fact, I'd argue that personal OKRs are a great way to build your goal-setting muscles before trying to influence organizational change. You can use OKRs for career development, side projects, personal growth—anything where you want to get clear on what you're working toward and how you'll measure progress. The practice of setting and tracking personal OKRs will also make you more effective at advocating for better goal-setting practices in your organization. You'll be able to speak from experience, not just theory.