The most common complaint I hear from leaders who have been running OKRs for more than two quarters is this: "We write good OKRs but we still end up doing everything."
That's not an OKR problem. It's a prioritisation problem that OKRs haven't fixed yet.
OKRs are, at their core, a prioritisation framework—but only if they're used to force real trade-offs. Used as a planning template, they document everything the team wants to do. Used as a prioritisation mechanism, they force the team to choose what matters most and what will get less attention as a result.
I once worked with a leadership team that produced a set of OKRs they were genuinely proud of. Well-written Objectives. Outcome-focused Key Results. Clear ownership.
Two weeks into the quarter, I asked what they'd stopped doing to protect those OKRs.
Silence.
They hadn't stopped anything. They'd added OKRs on top of an already full workload and trusted that ambition would somehow create capacity. It doesn't. Prioritisation isn't about what you add. It's about what you protect—and what you put down.
Why OKRs alone don't create prioritisation
OKRs create focus only if the process of setting them includes a genuine conversation about what won't get full attention. Most planning sessions focus on what to pursue. Almost none focus on what to deprioritise, what to pause, or what to stop.
The result is a list of OKRs that sits alongside—rather than replacing—the existing workload. By week six, teams are behind on everything because nothing was actually protected. This is a classic symptom of what happens when OKRs don't force real trade-offs.
Your framework isn't failing; your discipline is. OKRs are just the tool. Their effectiveness depends entirely on using them to make hard choices, not just document aspirations.
Using OKRs to force the trade-off conversation
The trade-off conversation should happen before OKRs are finalised. It is the core of the OKR-setting mindset that prioritisation requires. I use three questions to force it.
These questions are uncomfortable. They're supposed to be. If the answers are easy, the prioritisation isn't real.
Question 1: What current work will get less attention?
"If you achieve these OKRs, what work that the team is currently doing will have received less attention? Name it specifically."
This forces specificity. "We'll be more focused" is a platitude. Asking a team to name the specific project, report, or routine task that will be moved to the back burner makes the trade-off tangible and real.
Question 2: Which OKRs would you keep if you could only keep half?
"Which of these OKRs would you keep if you could only keep half of them? Why?"
This is a forcing function to reveal what truly matters. When a team insists they have six "critical" objectives, this question cuts through politics and wishful thinking. The ones they fight to keep are the real strategy. The others are often nice-to-haves.
Question 3: What do you need leadership to deprioritise?
"What would you need leadership to deprioritise or decide, to protect the time these OKRs require?"
This elevates the conversation from team-level execution to organisational alignment. It surfaces hidden dependencies, cross-functional blockers, and situations where leadership says one thing but their actions signal another. This empowers teams to ask for the air cover they need and holds leadership accountable for protecting focus.
The number problem—too many OKRs means no prioritisation
A company with six Objectives hasn't set priorities. It's set aspirations. The number of Objectives a team or organisation can genuinely pursue in a quarter is smaller than most leaders believe—2–3 company-level Objectives is already stretching most organisations. Each additional Objective dilutes the ones that came before it.
If a leadership team struggles to limit to three Objectives, the real problem is usually that they haven't agreed on strategy, and OKRs are being used to paper over the disagreement. Every function wants its priorities included. Nothing gets cut. The OKR list grows until it reflects everyone's agenda rather than the company's direction.
This is a primary example of how unclear priorities cause execution to break down.
A leadership team that can't agree on three priorities hasn't finished its strategy work. The hard choices about what matters most belong in your planning sessions.
Making trade-offs explicit in the OKR structure
Once OKRs are agreed, the trade-offs should be documented alongside them—not just assumed.
What is this team explicitly deprioritising this quarter? What projects are being paused? What BAU work will be maintained at a lower level of investment?
Making these explicit prevents the gradual creep of deprioritised work back into the week. This is exactly where trade-off decisions belong in the quarterly cycle.
Example Trade-Off and De-Prioritisation Log
Here’s a simple template for documenting what you’ve chosen not to do. It brings clarity and helps leadership hold the line.
| Strategic Priority (OKR) | Work to Deprioritise | Projects to Pause | BAU Work to Maintain (Lower Investment) |
|---|---|---|---|
| O: Launch v2 of our core product to drive enterprise adoption | New feature requests for v1 outside of critical bug fixes | "Project Nightingale" (Exploratory R&D) | Fortnightly v1 performance reporting (move to monthly) |
| O: Increase customer retention by 15% | Outbound lead generation campaigns | "Refresh" of marketing website homepage | Social media community engagement (reduce from daily to 3x weekly) |
| O: Achieve ISO 27001 certification | Minor platform UI enhancements | Internal dashboard overhaul | Non-essential internal tooling updates |
This log isn't just a list; it’s your shield. When someone asks, "Can we just squeeze this in?" you point to this document and ask, "Which of our agreed priorities should we sacrifice?"
Prioritisation during the quarter—when new things arrive
The most common way OKRs fail mid-quarter is not dramatic—it's incremental. A new priority arrives from leadership. A key customer needs urgent attention. A product incident creates weeks of firefighting.
Each event is individually reasonable. Cumulatively, they consume the quarter. The OKR is still there at week ten, unchanged, while the work around it has completely changed.
The discipline that protects against this: before anything new is added, name what comes off. Not suggested—agreed.
If the new work is genuinely more important than an existing OKR, update the OKR. Don't let the formal OKR list become disconnected from where the team is actually spending its time.
Using the OKR review cadence to maintain prioritisation
Prioritisation is not a one-time planning event. It’s a continuous discipline.
During the Learning & Insights phase, the bi-weekly Key Results Review should include a standing question: "Is there anything new that requires us to reprioritise? And if so, what are we explicitly moving down?"
This keeps the prioritisation conversation alive across the quarter. It gives your team the language and permission to protect focus when the inevitable surprises arrive.
By maintaining prioritisation discipline across the quarter, you ensure your OKRs remain a true reflection of your strategy, not just a plan that got left behind.