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Personal OKRs for Success

mohitkhare.me

41–46 of 46 posts

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#41

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some things work quantitatively, some don't. I like using quantities for athletic training. If I was training for a marathon I would set numerical goals for how much I would run a week coming into it. If I am recovering from an injury that's even more the case. Lately my son and I have been learning a martial arts form that has about 80 steps in it. There is a lot new about it for us: I've never done a two-person for…

Quantitative approach aka “noob gains” stops working fairly quickly even with athletic training

"Noob gains" doesn't have anything to do with setting goals or quantitatively measuring progress. It refers to the speed at which unadapted athletes are able to progress (e.g. add weight to the bar, run farther) each workout when they first start training, compared to athletes who have been training longer, are more adapted, and progress slower.

Most professional and highly adapted athletes are extremely quantitative about their training programs, much more so at the advanced stages than in the early stages. They just progress much slower because it takes more training for their bodies to continue adapting.

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#42
post #8

Earlier quoted context omitted.

As a 46 year old I second this! Trying to run your personal life with OKRs sounds like a great way to beat yourself up. Also your spouse won’t be impressed when you tell her “My goal was to spend 46 minutes really listening to you this week and I actually achieved 52 minutes!”

You can base your KR on her satisfaction (as reported on an end-of-quarter survey) rather than on your level of activity. Try to measure the outcomes rather than the activities :)

This guy gets it.

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Some things work quantitatively, some don't. I like using quantities for athletic training. If I was training for a marathon I would set numerical goals for how much I would run a week coming into it. If I am recovering from an injury that's even more the case. Lately my son and I have been learning a martial arts form that has about 80 steps in it. There is a lot new about it for us: I've never done a two-person for…

Quantitative approach aka “noob gains” stops working fairly quickly even with athletic training

"Noob gains" just means that new quantitative measurements can take place over a short period.

Athletics is incredibly quantitative- even for the most advanced and experienced athletes.

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#44
post #7

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Our values determine our metrics.

Our true values (as human beings, not organizational values) are not measurable. I may want to become closer to my family, so I schedule more time with them. Spending time with them makes it more likely, but it may also go in the opposite direction through conflict. In paper you have accomplished your OKR, but in practice you are further away from your true goal.

OKRs don't need to be set in stone. If an easy to measure quantity (time spend with family) does not translate to reaching the aim (being closer to ones family) you can just change the plan and the OKRs. But surely spending time with your family seems like a first good step to try.

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#45
It's impressive that "OKRs" (inspired by Google in the modern business culture) are so worshipped despite being a management truncheon that helped Google go from being universally loved to being largely despised (killing products that don't meet short term growth KRs, Google+ optimizing for Engagement KRs, generally running the business to hit vanity metrics instead instead of building a quality product and having faith in users to adopt it and customers to pay for it.)

Re: Personal OKRs for Success

#46
post #10
post #6

Basecamp first launched when I was in college, and being completely unfamiliar with any project management workflow I thought: "this would be great for managing myself" so I set milestones and wrote entries for myself and project managed my life for a brief period. It makes life as boring as work. These methods are meant for teams working towards a common objective, where anything extraneous to the OKRs is considered…

> Consider: the author has set himself to read 20 books per year. Suppose this is double of his standard. What he will do to fulfill his OKR? He's not going to choose a difficult read such as Ulysses, or an existential crisis inducing book such as Crime and Punishment, he will go for what is more superficial and easier to read, because his goal is not to be transformed by what he reads, his goal is to read 20 books.…

Why would you set an Objective to hurt yourself?
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