★★★★★ 4
Indicators framework done right
Format: Paperback
I have found this book really useful. I would say it could be useful also for anyone working in a large organization and dealing with the challenges, virtues and downsides of performance indicators methodologies, both for career development within the organization and for the organization's success. The book confirms the need to read Andrew Grove's (1983) High Output Management. And it reminds us that Peter Drucker's (1954) The Practice of Management is still relevant.
I would highlight several ideas promoted by the book:
First, regarding OKRs:
the benefits of the transparency of OKRs, with all OKRs visible to the entire organization, from the CEO down to the lowest level employees;
the recommendation of dual planning (annual and quarterly);
the role OKRs should have on engagement, commitment and motivation;
the importance of constructing and cascading OKRs in a meaningful way as opposed to by rote (set them and forget them), enthusiastic compliance instead of bureaucratic compliance;
the need to have two kinds of goals (committed and aspirational);
the need to encourage staff to define a portion of their OKRs, to let them develop their own objectives, a healthy proportion of alignment (top-down) and autonomy (bottom-up);
the key role of culture and the impossibility sometimes of changing it without staff renewal;
the recommendation to separate bonuses from the OKR cycle;
the flexibility to adjust or discard OKRs mid-cycle;
the real risk of big organizations at any time of having some significant percentage of people working on the wrong things;
Second, all the discussion regarding performance management, the recognized futility and sometimes demoralizing effect of annual performance reviews, is very insightful.
Other thoughts, not original from this book, but worth recalling:
ideas are easy, execution is everything;
the ideal number of direct reports to a manager should be somewhere between 7 and 20;
the most important things need to get done first or they won't get done at all;
not everything that can be counted counts and not everything that counts can be counted;
transparency and accountability are two related but clearly different concepts, the latter rather an outcome, the former totally an output;
moral suffers when people know they can't succeed.
Unfortunately, the book has its shortcomings, most of them associated with the testimonies of OKR virtues. Particularly interesting is the case of Zume Pizza, presented as a success case (and OKR as one of the critical factors of that success story). However, we know now that the company bankrupted a few years after the book was published, showing that even the most successful venture capitalist is not always right, his knack for business not always foolproof. And also showcasing that OKRs might be necessary but certainly not sufficient. At any rate, since the book is complemented by a website (https://www.whatmatters.com/) I wish the author shared there a post-mortem, assessing what happened and the relationship between OKRs and that failure.
On the other hand, the case of Bono's NGO could have been spared. Zero value added. And, maybe, also the one about the Gates Foundation. Both examples are part of the book's evangelizing, metaphor-ridden and inspirational tone, where billionaires are presented as driven only for the possibility of bringing happiness to humanity and not as real people, that take most of their decisions in the pursuit of money, power or fame.
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Reviewed in the United States on August 16, 2025
