The 10 best OKR tools – in direct comparison
The aim of OKR is to publish all goals in the form of objectives and key results company-wide and thus make them transparent for every employee. Companies with OKR templates or OKR templates, for example on Microsoft Excel or Google Sheets, quickly reach their limits. This can be remedied by OKR tools, which are already helpful for 5 to 20 employees – important for 100 to 200 employees and critical for success from 1000 employees.
The market for OKR tools and the differences in the individual solutions is difficult to survey even for professionals. In recent years – not least due to the hype surrounding OKR – more and more providers have entered the market. In addition, the solutions are being further developed at breakneck speed.
There is no general answer as to which OKR tool is the right one for your company. Each OKR software has its advantages and disadvantages. So it has to be decided individually which specific OKR solution is the right one for your company.
“Keep it simple” is the main idea – you should take the help of an intuitive OKR tool that has the scope of performance you need for your business.
8 good reasons to use OKR tools:
By using OKR – Objectives and Key Results – you create more focus, coordination, commitment, motivation and transparency throughout your company. The introduction of OKR has already helped many international, but also German companies to achieve more growth and efficiency. But why an OKR tool?
A tool that supports the easy entry and updating as well as the management of OKRs makes the use of OKR easier and thus increases the motivation in the use of OKR. OKR tools give managers an overview of their teams and the entire company, important goals that the teams have set themselves and where the teams currently stand.
By using OKR – Objectives and Key Results – you create more focus, coordination, commitment, motivation and transparency throughout your company. The introduction of OKR has already helped many international, but also German companies to achieve more growth and efficiency. But why an OKR tool?
A tool that supports the easy entry and updating as well as the management of OKRs makes the use of OKR easier and thus increases the motivation in the use of OKR. OKR tools give managers an overview of their teams and the entire company, important goals that the teams have set themselves and where the teams currently stand.
An OKR software solution helps to simplify and, above all, standardize the OKR process. For a successful and sustainable implementation of the OKR method, the ritualization of OKR, the integration of OKR into the everyday life of teams and employees is important.
Here are 8 good reasons to use OKR tools:
Support when entering OKR sets:
From fast entry to helpful entry assistants – KPI databases support the formulation of measurable key results.
Poll:
Workflows and the integration of communication tools, such as MS Teams Chat and Slack, help to align departments and teams in their OKR sets.
Transparency:
Various views – from tables to network diagrams – as well as a full-text search allow full transparency and provide insight into the goals of all teams throughout the company.
Graphical visualization of the OKR process:
The progress of key results in terms of metrics, score and confidence level becomes really tangible through diagrams.
Reminder for update or check-ins:
OKR tools remind the teams to regularly update the key results – this ensures that they are up to date.
Automatic update:
the data connection of IT systems allow the automatic maintenance of key results. Here, metrics from third-party systems are taken over in real time, such as Jira, Microsoft (Office 365, Azure, Power BI), Google (Sheets, GSuite, Gmail, Tasks, Analytics), Salesforce, Zendesk, Hubspot, Trello, Asana, Github, Zapier, and many more.
Overview:
Dashboards and evaluations provide managers and teams with an overview. Evaluations of a methodical nature support OKR coaches in carrying out their work.
Privacy and security:
OKRs are very sensitive data. Sending OKR templates as email attachments can cause a lot of damage. GDPR-compliant OKR tools with data encryption, backup and disaster recovery support are the better alternative.
How to find the best OKR tool
When choosing an OKR tool, there are the following considerations to keep in mind to ensure you are making the best possible choice:
- user friendliness
- user interface
- Data integration opportunities
- Available communication integrations
- Possible authentication integrations
- analyzes and reports
- Privacy and Security
- setup costs and prices
- references
For more details, see our article: How to Find the Best OKR Tool.
OKR Tool free – is there an OKR tool for free?
There are several commercial OKR tools. Many companies ask themselves whether there are also free OKR tools.
- We distinguish between the following types of “free”:
- Free for a limited number of users
- Free for a limited time
- Free as open source software
You can find more details on this in our article OKR Tools free .
OKR Tools German
When choosing the OKR tool, also make sure that the languages you use in your company are supported. In German companies, these are mostly German and English. Not every OKR tool supports German.
It is important that you make it as easy as possible for your employees to use the OKR tool – even the lack of support for their native language can create hurdles.
The language of the OKR tool provider can also be decisive when negotiating, setting up and instructing. The following providers are based in Germany or German-speaking Switzerland:
- Haufe OKR: St. Gallen, Switzerland
- Mooncamp, Cologne
- Workpath, Munich
OKR online tool / web tool
OKR tools are offered as SaaS (Software as a Service). The software is operated by the respective provider (in a public or private cloud), for the use of which an internet-enabled device with an internet connection is required and access to the software functionality is realized via a web browser, possibly a mobile app.
The user/service recipient pays a usage fee for use and operation, which includes all service costs (development, operation, maintenance work and
software updates) included.
- OKR tools can also be integrated with other applications to make them easier to use, for example:
- OKR Microsoft Teams Tools – allow the operation of OKR tools directly from MS Teams
- Objectives and Key Results Tools Slack – allow the operation of OKR tools directly from Slack Commands
OKR Jira Tools – allow the operation of OKR tools directly from Atlassian Jira
Open source OKR tools
There are also some open source projects that provide OKR tools in source code for free. Most open source variants only have a small scope of services compared to commercial products.
In addition, in contrast to commercial tools, the software must be installed and operated on an Internet server. This does not apply to solutions that are offered as cloud or software-as-a-service (SaaS) solutions.
Here is a list of current Open Source OKR Tool projects:
