đ We are 3,333+ now in the newsletter. Thanks for sticking around!
Friday, a few weeks ago.
We just had a crazy week with lots of workshops with coworkers from outside the city.
Yet I felt very unaccomplished.
I looked at my metrics to know why.
Yes, my metrics.
Because I track things.
â In this post, youâll learn:
How to write crisp Objectives.
How to break them down into measurable milestones you control.
How to create stretch situations out of your comfort zone.
What I found after looking at my metrics that Friday.
1. The three opinions about metrics.
đș Carpe Diem.
I donât track or plan anything. Life is to live it.
You are going blind. You donât even have your hands on the wheel, someone else will direct your life for you.
đ Numbers, numbers everywhere
I track everything in my life. I got access to the most absurd data.
You are wasting time on things without value.
đ§âđŒSomeone who subscribes to Strategize Your Career
I track what I want to make progress on.
You are smart. You strategize only what matters, focusing your efforts on the actions that bring the most results.
2. Metrics and OKRs
A metric is just data. An indication. Itâs not good or bad by itself.
We interpret it based on a target value.
I like using OKRs as a structured process of setting these target values:
The Objective (O) is what sets a direction for your life and career. Itâs aggressive, yet realistic.
The Key Results (KR) are the milestones for completion.
A rule of thumb is to make triads of [metric, target value, date of completion] for KRs.
Objective: Expand the reach and quality of my newsletter
KR1: âRead and take notes on 10 books by the end of the quarterâ
KR2: âPublish 2 collaborative posts by the end of the quarterâ
KR3: âInteract with 10 posts every week, for 10 out of 12 weeksâ
Notice here:
The objective starts with a verb with clear intention. Itâs not âtry toâ, âhelpâ, or âparticipateâ.
Each KR sets a target for a metric. I can know if I completed 100%, 50% or 0%. Never treat your metrics as something binary. 99% and 0% are both ânot completedâ, but they are not the same.
There are 2 maxims you have to respect to make this work:
Make sure the completion of all KRs of the objective completes the objective. If it doesnât, find the proper KRs or adjust the objective.
Make sure itâs clear when the KR is completed. It shouldnât be up to opinion.
3. How to find what to track
đ Identify what matters.
You donât have to ask deep life questions (although it could help).
Simply imagine yourself one year from now. In which areas do you imagine yourself better?
There are things you wonât consider improving. If they are fine as they are, donât try to set objectives
Donât try to set all objectives for the same quarter. And those in the same quarter, have different deadlines. They arenât going to complete themselves magically on the last day.
đ Define some objectives youâll commit to complete 100%
Itâs realistic to run 20k if last quarter you ran 15k. Itâs not if you come from an injury and canât run at all.
But donât put it too easy. Define something that needs you to change something in your day-to-day schedule.
The entire purpose of setting objectives is to drive change for the better. If things are fine as they are, donât track this area.
Treat this as a commitment at work. If you donât deliver, youâll run a post-mortem to identify the root cause(s).
đ€ Define some objective you arenât sure you can meet 100%
Something you may not even know how to achieve, but you have an idea about how to start.
This is an aspiration, something thatâs aligned with your life and career direction.
Donât worry about not completing it. 70% of it will be a success already.
đ Define Key Results for each of them, with good metrics.
KRs are a proxy in the end. Make sure each 1% progress in the KR is contributing to the Objective.
For metrics, the ideal is to have what Iâm going to call an âoutput metric under your controlâ.
For example:
âPublish 2 collaborative postsâ is an output (2 posts published), yet itâs under my control (I am the one doing the action of publishing).
âHaving 10k newsletter followersâ is an output outside of my control. I am not following, I am the one followed. Other people do the action.
If you canât find good output metrics where you control the actions, then make it a combination of input and output metrics
Input metrics are 100% in your control. But they are oriented to your activity, and unclear if they contribute to the goal
âSpend 7 hours engaging with other creatorsâ content every weekâ. I could just grind hours, yet make no progress in the followers I get.
Even if using both balances them, I encourage you to make the effort to find a controlled output metric. OKRs canât be set in a single day.
âInteract with 10 posts every weekâ is a much better KR than the hours spent.
4. Get intel on your new data
đ§ Audit the metrics to observe behavior over time.
Youâll get an idea of what causes the metric to go up or down.
You must do it yourself because my insights are different than yours.
I found time-blocking in my calendar that I lost a lot of time in the morning. I was not clear on what to start.
When I put the hardest task first, I procrastinated even more. People say âEat your frog the first thing in the morningâ, but I need some warm-up first.
đš Create alarms around your metrics
Besides your OKRs, you can set some thresholds for the metrics you track.
When breaching the theshold, trigger some automated action to realize about it.
At some point, I spent 10 weeks in a row without a single day taking a full-day break. I noticed the weariness and once I saw this metric, I understood.
Another useful alarm is setting a maximum time per day for applications on your phone. Itâll log you out immediately upon reaching that time. I use it for those apps that can glue me in infinite recommendations.
đŻ Conclusion
After that week of workshops, I ran my little script to pull data from the calendar and calculate the time spent per area during the week.
My result was 2 hours of work on the sprint.
I understood why I felt unaccomplished and slow.
An entire week in the outside world went by. But only 2 hours passed for the my tasks.
A metric gave me a better understanding of an emotion.
And I could create some guardrails to maintain the metric healthier. I scheduled a block of work early morning for the next weeks.
đïžÂ Resources
đ Weekly Applause
How Canva Supports Real-Time Collaboration for 135 Million Monthly Users by
. This post introduced me to RSocket, the main technology that powers real-time collaboration in Canva. The best way to learn something new is to find itâs practical useTaking Decisions in Engineering Teams by
. Same way that you canât improve what you canât measure, you canât improve what you canât name. This post broadened my vocabulary in decision making and provides great tools to try.7 ways to stand out as an intern by
. These tips apply as an intern, new hire, transferring teams or just starting to work on a new project.
I am in the process of defining OKRs for a project. Your post came in great timing. Thank you đȘ
Hah I completely missed this post, great one! đ