This post is part of my Leadership Playbook series. Last Monday, I wrote about Crafting Effective Engineering OKRs. In this post, I continue from last week and talk about crafting effective engineering key results.

One of my key insights was that engineering teams need key results that acknowledge technical leadership as business contribution.

Technical Performance as Business Value

Instead of hiding technical improvements in “tech debt” objectives, we made them prominent:

• Achieve 95% automated test coverage for critical package management workflows
• Reduce average package install time by 40% through technical performance optimizations

This tells engineers that technical excellence is business value, not something to squeeze in when features are done.

Process Innovation as Competitive Advantage

We included key results that recognized process improvements:

• Deploy A/B testing capability and complete 5+ experiments to validate product hypotheses
• Implement continuous deployment pipeline with <30min deployment cycle time

These acknowledge that how you build software is just as important as what you build.

Team Development as Strategic Investment

Our “Build High-Performance Team” objective included:

• Complete cross-training program with 100% of team members proficient in at least 2 technical domains
• Establish knowledge sharing practices with weekly tech talks and quarterly retrospectives showing measurable improvement

This made team capability building an explicit goal, not something that happens if we have time.

The Quarterly Review Process

OKRs only drive results if you review them regularly. Our process:

Monthly Check-ins

• Progress against specific metrics
• Blockers and mitigation strategies
• Resource reallocation if needed

Mid-Quarter Adjustments

• Scope refinements based on learning
• Key result modifications if targets prove unrealistic
• New key result additions if opportunities emerge

End-of-Quarter Assessment

• Quantitative scoring (0.0 to 1.0 for each key result)
• Qualitative impact assessment
• Learning capture for next quarter

Common Engineering OKR Mistakes to Avoid

The Feature List Trap

• Bad: “Implement user authentication, add search functionality, create admin dashboard”
• Good: “Increase user engagement by 25% through improved platform usability”

The Perfectionist Trap

• Bad: “Achieve 100% test coverage and zero production bugs”
• Good: “Reduce production incidents by 50% while maintaining development velocity”

The Technology-First Trap

• Bad: “Migrate to microservices architecture”
• Good: “Improve system scalability to support 10x user growth”

The Vague Impact Trap

• Bad: “Improve developer productivity”
• Good: “Reduce feature development cycle time from 2 weeks to 1 week”

Making OKRs Work for Different Engineering Roles

For Individual Contributors

Focus on technical execution and skill development:

• “Complete advanced React training and lead 2 component library improvements”
• “Reduce API response time by 30% through performance optimization”

For Engineering Managers

Balance team development with business delivery:

• “Achieve 90% team satisfaction score while delivering all committed features”
• “Establish career development plans for 100% of team members”

For Senior/Staff Engineers

Emphasize technical leadership and organizational impact:

• “Define and implement API standards adopted by 3+ engineering teams”
• “Mentor 2 junior engineers to independent contributor level”

The Results: What Changed

Six months after implementing this OKR approach:

Team Engagement

• Engineers could clearly explain how their work connected to business goals
• Higher participation in OKR planning and review sessions
• More proactive problem-solving and solution proposals

Business Alignment

• Product and engineering priorities stayed synchronized
• Easier to make trade-off decisions when scope needed to change
• Clear success criteria reduced “are we done?” debates

The best engineering OKRs create alignment between what engineers love doing (building great systems) and what businesses need (growth and efficiency). When you get that alignment right, everything else becomes easier.

How do you structure OKRs for your engineering teams? What challenges have you faced in connecting technical work to business outcomes? Share your approaches below.