Why we created an alternative to OKRs

If you’re having problems with OKRs (objectives & key results), then you’re in the right place. After using this system for years at the company I founded, Classy (acquired by GoFundMe), I wrote this post about the major pitfalls we found with the system. OKRs not only broke down as we scaled, they actually held us back in a variety of ways.

This is a follow up post that describes the alternative goal system we created in response to the pain we experienced with OKRs. We didn’t set out to reinvent the wheel (I had plenty of other things to be focused on!). But we felt our hand was forced – we needed an alternative to OKRs.

For context, we started out using OKRs when we were a tiny team of only ten people. There were problems from the start, but the system started breaking down around 25 to 50 people and got worse as we scaled. When you get big enough to start forming proper functional teams, the risk of misalignment increases 10-fold.

Because of the problems we had with OKRs, we created a different goal system called WhyGos (“why-goes”), as in:

• Why – why this goal is a priority
• Goal – what we are trying to achieve
• Outcome – how we measure success

WhyGos patched the holes left by OKRs and helped us scale into the hundreds of millions. After we sold to GoFundMe, I started advising and teaching WhyGos to other startups. In a few short years, the WhyGo goal setting system is now used by hundreds of early stage and growth stage companies around the world. 

This article provides an overview of the WhyGo goal setting system and its similarities and differences to OKRs. My hope is that after reading this article you can easily implement WhyGos at your own company. So, let’s dive in… 

The major issue with OKRs

As I boiled it down in the OKR pitfall article: 

OKRs provide too much flexibility and too little guidance. This “looseness” creates dangerous organizational complexity that creeps in over time. Eventually, the very system that’s supposed to create organizational focus, does the complete opposite. It breeds misalignment and administrative overhead that costs more than its worth. 

If you’re familiar with OKRs, you might also be familiar with John Doerr’s book, Measure What Matters. Prior to the book, there was essentially zero guidance on how to best implement OKRs. But even after the book was published, there were too many unanswered questions. Doerr’s version of OKRs is a bit of a “choose your own adventure” that gets complicated quickly, even contradictory in areas. And this ambiguity leads to lots of trial and error that wastes time and erodes efficiency for most companies. 

If any of this sounds familiar to you, I think you’ll find WhyGos a very refreshing alternative… 

WhyGo Goal Setting System Basics 

WhyGos take the good parts from OKRs (and other goal frameworks), cut out the bad parts, and add in a little new. They will feel familiar, but (hopefully) better. 

The main similarity between WhyGos and OKRs is the structure of an individual goal. In both methods there is a Goal and related Outcomes (or as OKRs call it, an Objective & Key Results). The goal is what we’re trying to achieve, and the measurable outcome(s) define whether we successfully meet the goal or not. 

But the WhyGos add one important component to increase context and clarity – the why statement. This helps explain (in a few short sentences) why this goal was prioritized in the first place and how it ties into the broader strategy. 

WhyGos should represent the very top organizational priorities, not every little thing the company might do throughout the year. The system follows a 3×3 structure to force organizational clarity & focus. This means that the company can only have three (or less) WhyGos, and each individual WhyGo can only have three (or less) outcomes. This limits “goal sprawl” like you see in so many companies that are using OKRs. 

Here’s how you would write a WhyGo: 

Goal: List the goal in ten words or less.

Why?: Explain why you chose this goal as a top priority. Three sentences or less.

Outcomes:

• List the first measurable outcome. 
• List the second measurable outcome. 
• List the third measurable outcome. 

Now let’s run through an example. Suppose that we’re running a B2B company that mostly services small and medium sized customers. But as part of our strategy, we plan to launch into the enterprise market this year and start servicing larger customers. Here’s what a WhyGo might look like for this priority:

Our goal clearly and succinctly tells us what we are trying to achieve this year – launching into the Enterprise market. The three outcomes define what success looks like so you can determine, with 100% certainty, whether or not you achieved the goal at the end of the year. There should be no ambiguity. If all three outcomes are achieved, then the goal should be achieved. 

WhyGo Time Period & Cascading 

WhyGos are set annually across your fiscal year (typically Jan – Dec). The outcomes for these goals are then broken into quarterly and monthly targets to help you keep pace (usually tracked on a company dashboard). 

We establish WhyGos at the company level first, then at the team and individual levels. This is somewhat similar to OKRs, where the WhyGos cascade throughout the organization. Here’s how it works:

1. Company-Level WhyGos – These define your top 3 priorities for the year. They anchor everything. Every team and person in the company should understand them.
   
2. Team-Level WhyGos – These connect department strategy to company priorities. Each functional team (Product, Marketing, etc.) defines its top 3 goals (or less) for the year. Team-level WhyGos aren’t always necessary though, see below.
   
3. Individual-Level WhyGos – These bring clarity to each person’s role. What are their top 3 goals, and how do these align to the team’s and company’s? Why did they choose these priorities? How do they measure success? 

But not every company needs all three levels on Day 1. Here’s a quick guide:

• Teams of 10 or fewer: Focus on company-level WhyGos to keep things simple. Individual-level WhyGos are optional.
• Teams of 10–25: Add individual-level WhyGos. Each person should know what they’re working on and why.
• Teams of 25+: Use all three levels—company, team, and individual. This gives you structure without killing flexibility. But if you want to keep things simpler, or you have a flat org structure, you can forgo team-level WhyGos longer. 

Notice that the WhyGo system ensures companies only implement what they actually need at their current stage of growth. This helps the organization avoid too much structure, too soon.

WhyGo defining features (and OKR differences) 

As we talked about in the last section, WhyGos have a similar goal structure to OKRs ( with the addition of the ‘why’ statement). But that’s really where the similarities end. 

The biggest difference between the two is how the systems actually work in practice. OKRs give you vague guidance and complex ideas that are hard to implement. WhyGos give you clear, simple instructions you can actually follow. That clarity makes a huge difference when you’re trying to run a fast-moving company.

Here are the key components of the WhyGo goal system, and the major differences versus OKRs: 

I. Three (or less) goals and three (or less) outcomes

With the WhyGo system, every team, at every level, gets no more than 3 goals per year. Each goal can have up to 3 measurable outcomes. That’s it. This forces brutal prioritization—which is exactly what a good goal system should do. WhyGos are NOT meant to capture every little thing you work on during the year. That’s a task list, not prioritization. 

On the other hand, most OKR rollouts fail because people add too many objectives and too many key results. Teams usually end up with 5-10 objectives and 20-50 key results. This is insanely difficult to manage. And, certainly not a list of true priorities. 

WhyGos force you to choose. What matters most this year? What can actually move the needle? And just as important—what are you willing to say no to?

II. Annual goals, no quarterly reset 

OKRs restart from scratch every quarter. Sounds agile, but in reality it’s an administrative nightmare. Creating quarterly OKRs means four goal-creation cycles per year at every level of the organization. 

With the WhyGo system, you set annual goals, then break the outcomes into quarterly and monthly milestones to keep track of progress. If you’re on track with your milestones, you’re on track with your annual WhyGo. It’s that simple. No reinvention of the goal every quarter. 

And, since WhyGos focus on what you are trying to achieve, and not how, teams and individuals have a lot of freedom to adjust their tactics throughout the year if things aren’t working. So you get the best of both worlds. Stable goals without the intense administrative cost of recreating the wheel quarterly. And, freedom underneath each WhyGo to remain adaptable to change. 

III. Challenging but realistic goals

The OKR system tells you to set goals that are literally unachievable. Somewhere around 70% is considered a success. This is meant to stretch people, but all it does is confuse them. 

With WhyGos, on the other hand, we set challenging but realistic goals. Each goal can be accomplished in a 12-month period and we aim for 100% completion of each goal. 

Then how do you avoid sandbagging (i.e.making goals too easy)? WhyGos require sign off at each level. For example:

1. Company level WhyGos are reviewed and signed off by the Board of Directors.
2. Team-level WhyGos are reviewed and signed off by the CEO. 
3. Individual WhyGos are reviewed and signed off by the person’s manager.

Everyone is accountable to someone. This eliminates sand bagging and aligns the WhyGo owner with the manager from day one. I call this review & approval process the “handshake”. 

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IV. Why statement ties to strategy

Unlike OKRs, every WhyGo starts with a simple but powerful question: Why is this goal a top 3 priority?

Before anyone signs off on the goal, they have to write a short ‘why’ statement—two or three sentences that explain the strategic thinking behind the goal. Not a slogan. Not a pitch. Just a clear rationale that connects the goal to the bigger picture strategy and vision. 

This single step does a lot of heavy lifting. It forces the goal-setter to pause and think: Is this really the most important thing right now? It also provides context to the broader team, so they don’t sit around wondering (or arguing) why this was a priority in the first place! 

Sounds small, but this one addition ends up being a really big deal. From our earlier example, here’s the ‘why’ statement:

Why: We’ve attracted a lot of interest from Enterprise companies and we’re finally in a position to offer a great product & experience to this segment. We also expect it to be the most profitable segment for the company over the next several years.

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V. Goals align to the outcomes above 

This is going to sound crazy. But in the OKR system, goals are supposed to flow top-down, bottom-up, sideways, and diagonally. You are encouraged to both “cascade” down and “ladder” up and across. It’s a choose-your-own-adventure approach. And while that flexibility might sound attractive, in practice, it’s anything but. 

WhyGos take a more focused approach. Every goal—whether it’s at the team or individual level—must tie directly to one or more outcomes at the level above it. No exceptions. Since there are no WhyGos above the company level, the CEO must ensure that the company-level WhyGos align to the medium and long-term strategy & vision. 

Here’s an example for “RallyCo” a (fictional) digital platform empowering organizers to mobilize political action: 

When the manager is signing off on the WhyGos below them, they should be reviewing for alignment before they assess difficulty level. If the WhyGo isn’t aligned to the outcomes above it, it doesn’t matter how difficult it is. 

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VI. Simple grading scale 

OKRs come with different kinds of goals. Some are meant to be unachievable, where hitting ~70% is considered a win. And some must be 100% achieved. On top of this, there’s a confusing scoring system—raw scores, personal scores, weighted averages. It’s like a calculus class for no good reason. 

With WhyGos, we throw away all the complexity and keep it stupid simple. At the end of every week, month and quarter we track progress with this simple grading scale:

• On pace to achieve 100% of goal: 🟢
• Slightly off-pace, within 20%: 🟡
• Off-pace, more than 20%: 🔴

Then, at the end of year, you give a final grade to each WhyGo with the same scale: 

• Fully achieved 100% of goal: 🟢
• Slight miss, achieved 80-100%: 🟡
• Large miss, achieved under 80%: 🔴

That’s it. Simple, honest and easy to apply across the company. 

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VII. Connected to compensation 

OKR purists will say that goals shouldn’t be tied to compensation – so people stretch themselves. But that never made sense to me. If goals are supposed to represent someone’s most important work, why would you reward them on something totally different? Seems like a morale killer to me. 

With WhyGos you can, and should, tie achievement directly to compensation. My preference is tying the WhyGos into a company-wide bonus plan. But you can also use the WhyGos as a proxy for merit increases, promotions, even stock grants. At bare minimum though, you should incorporate how seriously a person takes the WhyGo process into these compensation decisions. 

There’s no fixed way that’s best for all companies. But unlike OKRs, WhyGos should be connected to compensation in some way shape or form. 

How to implement WhyGos at your company

At this point you should have a sense of howWhyGos present an alternative to OKRs. But how do you actually roll them out across your company each year? Here’s a rough timeline that lays it out for you (note: this chart assumes you are on a calendar year). 

1. Draft Company-Level WhyGos – CEO drafts company-level WhyGos for the upcoming year, with most of the initial focus on the three goals and the three why statements. A lot of the initial work is deciding what the top 3 priorities should be for the year, not on how to measure them (yet).
   
   
2. Leadership Review & Finalize – Once you have a first draft, it’s time to share with your leadership team for feedback. Typically, I do this by sharing a Google Doc sometime in November. They would add questions and comments directly to the doc. Then we’d have a leadership offsite to review as a group and spend a substantial portion of that time finalizing the outcomes and generating buy-in. 
   
   
3. Draft Team Level WhyGos – Once the company-level WhyGos are near final, you can have each team leader start drafting the team-level WhyGos. If you don’t have team-level WhyGos, you can skip right to the individual ones. Either way, a lot of the focus should be on aligning them to the company-level WhyGos (specifically the company level outcomes). How can their WhyGos move the needle on one or more company outcomes?
   
   
4. Ensure alignment with financial plan – I draft my annual financial plan around the same time as the WhyGos – and the two must be in harmony. For example, you don’t want your WhyGos (company priorities) not supported, or under-resourced by the financial plan. I’ve seen this happen too often and it’s a bad place to be. The CEO, with the Board’s support, needs to make sure that the financial plan supports the priorities laid out by the WhyGos.
   
   
5. Launch at Annual Company Kick-Off – The annual company kick-off is an extended all-hands meeting where you launch the plan for the upcoming year. I usually host mine in mid January and walk the full company through the vision, strategy and annual company level WhyGos. Then I have each team leader walk everyone through their respective WhyGos as well. This gives the entire company a phenomenal sense for the annual priorities and how each team is planning to support those priorities.
   
   
6. Finalize Individual WhyGos – After company kick-off, each individual should be meeting with their manager to review and approve their individual WhyGos. You can start this process before the company kickoff, but I usually set a deadline for completion by the end of January. Again, the reviewer must a) ensure alignment to one or more outcomes at the level above, and b) ensure each is challenging but realistic.
   

So, to summarize, the WhyGo creation cycle typically starts in October and ends in January. Then of course, you track your progress throughout the year to stay on course! 

I typically recommend three publicly displayed dashboards (company, team, and individual). These dashboards are updated weekly and help keep track of progress against WhyGos at the various levels of your organization. If your team is on the smaller side, you can combine all three into a single dashboard. Larger teams like to have separate dashboards for each team (which includes the individuals on that team). Then these roll up to the company dashboard that’s accessible to everyone. 

WhyGos & the Northstar Operating System (OS)

WhyGos are part of a broader business operating system I developed called the Northstar OS. You can certainly use WhyGos without implementing the entire Northstar, but here’s a quick overview and way to learn more… 

I created the Northstar Operating System (OS) to help scale my company from low digit millions to $100M+. Now I teach it to hundreds of other founders through my community and leadership program, Highland.

The Northstar OS is designed to help your company scale by creating: 

1. Absolute operating clarity, 
2. A reliable operating rhythm,
3. The right operating mindset across the team. 

The Northstar OS is tailored by team size. Smaller teams require less structure, and larger teams require a bit more structure. Either way, the Northstar OS helps you set the foundation for scale without compromising speed or quality. This adaptable design is a fundamental difference between Northstar OS and other business systems – which make it a great fit for ambitious entrepreneurs and operators that adopt a growth mindset. 

Highland members get full access to the Northstar OS and more. If you are interested in something like this, just reach out and we’ll connect. 

In the meantime, I hope you found this article valuable and have gained some insight into how WhyGos can help your team stay focused and kick some ass! 

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