Strategy that lives in everyday work.

Concreteness and direction: OKRs made the strategy come alive

The Finnish Institute of Occupational Health (FIOH) is a public organization that researches, trains and develops working life. When the strategy needed clarity and impact, our team and the OKR model came to help.

"We wanted to build a strategy that's seen and felt in everyday work. The OKR model inspired us because it directs, makes concrete and limits what's done. We were also inspired by its measurability." Juulia Ijäs, Director

OKRs help to sharpen goals and concrete metrics. At FIOH this meant trimming a broad set of activities and focusing. Only a few major goals were brought to the front.

"Henri Sora's team challenged us in a healthy way to think about what we really want. Without them, the strategy might have contained dozens of items. It's painful to leave things out, but that's exactly what brought focus and impact." Juulia Ijäs, Director

From pilot units to a whole-organization model

The process was launched as a pilot in two FIOH units. The following year, the whole organization moved to the OKR model. Now FIOH has one shared strategy with five main objectives.

Overall feedback from staff has been positive. People particularly appreciate that work is purposeful and systematic.

"When we know and can follow who is doing what and when, advancing the strategy becomes as concrete as possible. And the work also becomes meaningful." Juulia Ijäs, Director

Concrete benefits in everyday work

The OKR model has quickly affected day-to-day ways of working. The first third of the year went into getting used to the new model, but benefits were seen within that same year.

"We managed to work on business service descriptions. We also got to important but non-urgent things. Exactly the ones that otherwise easily fall through the cracks." Juulia Ijäs, Director

The work has also been supported by the Tangible Growth system, which makes strategy goals trackable. At the end of each period a retrospective evaluates progress and surfaces observations for the management team.

Our team did not come to FIOH to stay. A consultant's job is to make themselves unnecessary. An important part of the process was to build FIOH's own internal OKR network so the work can continue without outside support.