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Driving Business Growth: The Power of OKRs
Join Natalia Gulchevskaya and Madhusudhan Nayak as they explore how OKRs drive teamwork, enhance collaboration, and align organizational goals for greater success.
In this conversation between Natalia Gulchevskaya (OKR Academy International) and Madhusudhan Nayak (CEO, Worxmate), explore how OKRs drive teamwork, collaboration, and organizational success. Natalia shares her expert insights on implementing OKRs and their impact on team alignment and communication.
Key points include:
- How OKRs align teams with company-level goals and foster cross-functional collaboration
- The importance of transparency in OKRs to identify dependencies and potential conflicts
- “Art gallery” style alignment sessions to improve team synergy
- How regular OKR check-ins and reviews drive problem-solving and progress tracking
Discover actionable insights from Natalia’s experience as a leading OKR consultant, helping organizations transform their goal-setting strategies. Don’t miss this engaging conversation!
#OKRs #Teamwork #Collaboration #Leadership #GoalSetting #BusinessFrameworks
Natalia Gulchevskaya is a seasoned business coach, PCC ICF-certified professional, and the founder of OKR Academy International. With over two decades of experience in consulting and strategy, Natalia has been instrumental in helping leading organizations successfully implement OKRs (Objectives and Key Results).
Her journey with OKRs began with a deep appreciation for how the framework mirrors the principles of coaching—creating alignment, fostering collaboration, and driving transformation across entire organizations. Her expertise lies in bridging strategy with execution, enabling companies to achieve ambitious goals while nurturing teamwork and accountability.
As a global thought leader in OKRs, Natalia continues to empower businesses with practical tools, personalized coaching, and her extensive knowledge of organizational dynamics.
Madhusudan Nayak, Co-Founder & CEO of Worxmate
Madhusudan Nayak is a seasoned expert in driving organizational growth and execution through OKRs and self-governance models. With years of experience mentoring multi-billion-dollar organizations, product companies, and government agencies across APAC, the Middle East, and Europe, Madhusudan has successfully implemented strategies that have transformed industries such as IT, SaaS, finance, retail, and manufacturing. His deep insights and practical approach empower leaders to translate strategies into measurable success, making him a leading voice in guiding businesses toward sustainable growth and innovation.
Maddy N 0:11
hi, everyone. This is Maddie again with another podcast wherein we’ll be discussing more on the OKR side, right, what is OKR, how it is helping the organizations, why so many organizations are implementing OKRs and to discuss more about it, we have invited today, Natalia.
She brings on board more than a couple of decades of experience into consulting into strategies, have been helping organizations implementing OKRs, all leading organizations implementing OKRs right so. And she’s also the founder of OKR Academy Internationals.
Welcome, Natalia.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 1:01
Yeah. Thank you. Thank you very much and hello, everyone. Yeah, I’m glad to be here. Yeah. And I would like to answer, yeah, your questions.
Maddy N 1:11
Great So, Natalia before we begin, right, if you could just give a very basic introduction about you and then we’ll jump onto you know, discussions on the OKR.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 1:22
My name is Natalia Gulchevskaya, and yeah, I was really impressed of OKRs.
Maybe about 8-9 years ago because I am a business coach and PCC ICF and when I first met my OKR system, I was impressed how much it looks like a real coaching for the whole organization. It’s a coaching mindset mindset, yeah, coaching questions.
Maddy N 1:51
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 1:55
And yeah, for me it’s a great tool for a company to grow, to prosper and to keep the very healthy culture inside the company.
Maddy N 2:06
Yeah, absolutely. Right, yes. So on the on the same line, right, definitely, you know, a lot of people, those who are not aware, they like to understand what is OKR in a very simple term, right? That is one because a lot of people what they do is they if they get to know about it, they go to Internet, they search about it, if they know someone who knows about, OKR, they try and learn from them. So we like to know from you, you know.
In a very simple language, what is OKR and why so many companies are inclined towards implementing it?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 2:39
Yeah. No, first of all, OKR, stands for objectives and key results. Yeah, two parts of the system. But OkR is not just a way of setting goals. It’s a system of strategy execution and driving changes.
And it’s today first changing business World Organization needs some frameworks that set ambitious and adaptable goals and align everyone’s efforts to achieve those.OKRs Yeah, provide the structure and two main parts of a care system are, as I said, objectives and care results, and you can think about this like a geometric metaphor. The objective is that target that you want to hit while the key results are like some excesses, coordinates showing your movement towards this target.
Maddy N 3:32
Yeah.
All right.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 3:35
Yes, they help answer the question. How do we know that we reached it?
Maddy N 3:39
Got it, got it. No, I think thanks, . Natalia, I think this makes sense, right in a very simple manner for people to understand, right, how and what? But you know, I think a lot of people when we discuss with them, right. You know they talk about while they learn about. OKR they know one of the important aspects of. OK here is to you know bring an alignment across the company right.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 3:41
Mm hmm.
Maddy N 4:04
When they start implementing it, they still find this problem of alignment across the company. So what do you what? What do you think? You know why then really, despite of implementing it, they tend to struggle with the alignment right in the organisations. And what are the initial level challenges they come across?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 4:21
Yeah, alignment is very important for each organization and OKRs provide is a very clear framework for this, because in OKRs everyone align by providing a clear process for setting and sharing goals across all levels organisation. So first of all, we define company level OKRs and then each team.
Sets their own cars that support those larger goals.
And yeah, we can see some examples. For example, in my business games that I developed, I use this game to teach teams how to set up aligned goals and it’s not very easy. But with game it’s become easier. Yeah, when you can see how so each team ask themselves how.
We as a team can.
Boost the company level of OKRs which goals we have to set up and which.
Results which milestones we have to achieve that the whole company should go ahead and it’s why we align not only with the company level of OKRs, but also yeah with each other, yeah.
Maddy N 5:43
Yeah.
Got it. I think, I think it’s a very great, great point that you’ve mentioned, right. It’s more about encouraging people to align in A and start thinking in a direction, right. And it’s also more about, you know, kind of building a mindset, right, as you rightly mentioned, you know it’s all about building a culture wherein people think people put in efforts. It is more motivated to think, you know, in achieving or, you know, towards achieving organization’s goals.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 5:55
Yeah.
Maddy N 6:12
Keeping you know this aspect in mind, right? So the organizations who are following kind of a different models, right? Other than OKRs when they transition from the existing model or framework to OKRs, What do you think what are the current you know the what challenges they face during these transitions and what is that they should keep in mind?
To you know, implement it right?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 6:41
Yeah, I very often. Yeah, I meet this challenges with yeah companies that I support.
And really transitioning to OKRs can bring some challenges.
The first challenge it’s about leadership.
And it’s as it can be a lack of support of understanding some leadership.
Maddy N 7:05
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 7:05
It’s really essential for success.
Maddy N 7:08
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 7:09
Second one.
Very important to have an internal OKR coach, so this person that helps keep the focus and discipline.
From us next, if our cars are only set from top down as an old systems and teams are not involved to create their OKRs, the system doesn’t work.
Maddy N 7:20
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 7:32
Next mistake, if you have too many objectives and Key results like 10-20 and for each team and yeah it’s too much and you couldn’t reach any of them.
Maddy N 7:41
Right. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 7:44
Another challenge? Yeah, Last but not least is like keeping car regular. Check insurance is very important and engagement.
And don’t link OKRs directly to performance review or to salary. And those issues, especially check-ins and transparency, can be managed with a special OKR software. For example one from worxmate.
Mm hmm.
Maddy N 8:09
I’ll tell you, I think it’s. I mean, I’ll just expand this part because the last point that I’ve mentioned is not linking. OKR, ask with the performance review, right. Which is more about kind of a monetary benefits or, you know, the growth part.
Why do you think they should not be doing it and what is the advantage or disadvantage? They may end up having it if they start linking it.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 8:31
If your Lincoln car directly with the payment, then people, teams, teams set up accounts by themselves and they start to send big young they start to set up not ambitious goals, but goals. They are really sure they can achieve and get their bonuses. Yeah, it’s why it’s very important.
Don’t have this direct link, but you have of course.
Promote those teams who are really successful in their OKRs indirectly. Yeah. For example, you can give them bonus even if they don’t reach their OKRs. But those cars was so ambitious and that really drives the whole company. And you can give a bonus for this team. It’s not prohibited, but you couldn’t.
Couldn’t cut the salary of people if they don’t reach OKRs.
Maddy N 9:30
Right. It’ll not increase them too. You don’t take bigger goals, right? Or take risk in terms of going extra mile. Absolutely right.
Now you know generally, and I’ve also heard from you, right. And you spoke about collaboration, right? So OKR, I’ll also push it for a collaboration, right? So how OKR are basically encourages teamwork across the organization, right? I mean, a lot of companies or organizations, those who likes to implement and they have read about it theoretically, but maybe more curious about how it impacts the team work or collaboration and helps organizations achieve the goal.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 10:06
Yeah. As I said before, we in OKR are in as a framework helps team to align with the company level goal as well as horizontally between each other. So this alignment between teams is very important, it it’s really.
Boost collaboration by encouraging open communication, removing barriers between department very often when in company level OKR we have some OKR that needs.
Cross functional collaboration. It’s very often I can meet. Yeah, and.
After a teams set up their own OKR.
They start to see each other’s OKRs, and it helps them spot some dependencies and potential conflicts.
Maddy N 10:56
Yeah, yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 10:58
And we, I and yeah we as a consultants often set aside special time for those alignment sessions.
I call them very sash, like an art gallery. Yeah. And also next, I think it’s a regular check ins and OKR reviews also provide a space for teams to talk about their progress, challenges, changes, dependencies and this process improves teamwork and helps by solving problems together. And also we can support this process by using special software and.
Maddy N 11:15
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 11:36
In this Case. Yeah, Worxmate software is very helpful.
Maddy N 11:41
Right now I think it’s a good, good point, right? And I mean, if you look at it in the same manner, right, I mean while they, you know it increases collaborations and you constantly referring about, you know doing a you know consistent check ins and review, right. Maybe you may want to like little expand on this part because you know this could be you know the one of the key SuccessFactors to implement, OK as right isn’t it? So what are your suggestions you know for any organisations those who are implementing, OKRs.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 11:44
Mm hmm.
Maddy N 12:09
What are the key factors that need to keep in mind to ensure that they realise the, you know the benefits of implementing OKRs?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 12:18
Yes, maybe I will start from bottom to top. Yes, 3 key factors. The third key factor as you mentioned, ongoing discipline and tracking progress. Regular check ins are crucial and it can be aided by special software. So software this it’s very, very helpful and it’s really one of the success factor.
Maddy N 12:23
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 12:44
Then.
Also, for this check ins and alignment, it’s very helpful.
If you set up only 1-2-3 objectives so high focus.
Maddy N 12:55
Yeah.
Right.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 12:58
But the most important success factor is a leadership involvement.
Leaders must be engaged and supportive through all the process, including check ins, so they also should use this software.
Maddy N 13:10
Right.
Right. So Natalia, you know again lot of times I’m sure you and you know others you know the consultants who generally do it and within the organizations, all OKR champions, they observe that people hesitant to do check-ins consistently if they have not made progress right.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 13:17
Yeah.
Maddy N 13:36
What? What would be your suggestions to those guys if they have not make it progress?
Do they need to do check insurance consistently or they can skip it or they need to change the frequency of check-ins?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 13:45
Yes.
Not skip. Yeah. First of all, don’t make any punishment for those people. Don’t shame them and separate people from tasks.
Maddy N 13:55
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 14:02
And.
Yeah. First of all, yeah, usually occurs. It’s not individual game, it’s a team game. And if you don’t have progress, that old team are involved and maybe there are some reasons why there are no progress. Maybe they have a lack of resources.
Maddy N 14:10
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 14:21
And they have to, for example, ask for those resources from other teams and it’s can boost also collaboration and cross functional dependencies, or maybe just elaborate this problem to the top management and maybe also ask for resources. Maybe they have to find some another way of doing.
Maddy N 14:42
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 14:47
Yeah, because if you continue to do what you have done yesterday.
You will get the result you have today. If you want another result, you have to start to change your way of doing in this way. For example, yeah when my teams meet some problems.
Maddy N 14:59
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 15:09
We get some sessions, A-Team coaching sessions and we use some tools like trees like design thinking like so we start to find how we can.
Change our implementation our yeah tasks.
Maddy N 15:27
Got it, got it. Now makes sense. Natalia, right. So you know, maybe I think it’ll be great if we could share some you know some of your, you know experiences right like a real time clear life case studies wherein you have mentored you know, some organizations and you know what sort of journey they have gone through and how it is impacted the business, right? I mean definitely it takes time to you know see the value, but if you can share some of your experiences, it’d be great.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 15:29
Hmm.
Yeah, yeah, usually, usually.
People are interested in financial outcomes. Yeah, and.
There are a lot of examples of how OKR impacted of business impact business, but usually they are not publicly shared and also usually even some companies implement a care they didn’t link. OK, we implement OKR. It’s why we have those results because those results.
Maddy N 16:17
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 16:28
I’m boosted by the teams, so yeah, teams do this. Not OKRs. OKRs is just a framework. Yeah, but yeah, I can share some just some examples that were publicly published.
Maddy N 16:35
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 16:42
For instance, one of our client, it’s a regional branch of Tom Taylor. They achieved 189% of EBITA. This is a significant financial milestone and this was a result of effective okra alignment across all departments.
Maddy N 16:52
Fantastic.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 17:00
Focusing on this, it’s lagging indicator, but they’re really aligned this focus and they achieve this. And yeah, they clearly understand that it was, yeah, their OKR impact.
Maddy N 17:16
Any specific, any specific points or you know, factor key factor that they would like to share out of this case study that has helped them in achieving this you know 189% you know kind of a result.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 17:17
And as yeah.
The as it is said, the most key success factor was alignment, alignment and cross functional collaboration and keeping in mind the main goal because it was their main goal on this period of time. So they change. Of course you can change your every quarter, but for them, for this period of time it was very important, very important.
Maddy N 17:46
Got it.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 18:03
And when you set up a OKRs, of course you’re there’s. Yeah, those EBITA was not in their OKRs as a term they set up occurs, for example, the product team set up cars how to improve their product. sales teams, how to improve their sales and yeah, some. So all department set up their own cars, but each occurs keeping in mind the mission.
Maddy N 18:30
Yeah.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 18:30
Why? For what purpose?
We’re doing this so the purpose and the shared purpose is a key success factor for achieving those yeah results.
Maddy N 18:44
Absolutely right, Natalia. Right. I think one of the important gist that what I learned from our podcast is that alignment and collaboration If these two things are done right across the organizations, you would see great result, right?
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 19:01
Yes, yes and.
Maddy N 19:01
So thanks so much.
Natalia for all your insights. Yeah. Yeah, please.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 19:04
Yeah. Can I add something? Can I add? Yeah. Because I gave only financial example. Yeah, but the benefits of OKRs go be your own financial success. It’s also drive Innovation, service improvements, adoption of new technologies, and Hayes employee well-being, so not only financial results, but OKRs can make all your cooperative culture more healthy.
Maddy N 19:11
Yes.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 19:31
And the occasional set determines the results you achieve.
Maddy N 19:32
I agree.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 19:35
So you can set up annual OKRs and you can get those results.
Maddy N 19:42
Absolutely, I agree. I think these are all some very valuable points, right, generally you know, whenever I speak to leaders, right, I also tell them that if a people do not understand, you know the purpose of the organization and if they do not understand how they are contributing towards the purpose of the organizations, there is a huge gap that exists between how people work, what sort of culture they have in the company and how they are contributing. And they are just doing it, just maybe with whatever limited knowledge they have, they are trying to do their best.
But if you give them clarity and you have them understand how they can contribute, you know, as you rightly mentioned, you know improvements in services, the innovation that they can bring to you know the into the organisations or the creativity level that you would see would be a different length.
Right. So great, Natalia. Thank you so much for your time. Thank you so much for sharing your views with us. And I’m sure it’ll be great help to people who would be listening to us.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 20:40
Thank you very much.
Maddy N 20:41
Thanks, Natalia. Bye bye. And thank you so much for your time once again.
Natalia Gulchevskaya – OKR Academy International 20:43
Bye.
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