The Handbook for Jira OKRs: 4 Methods to Configure

I’m a huge fan of OKRs, and I believe everyone can benefit from them. So I’ll try to take away the barrier of adding a new OKR software, looking into free options with one of the most common project management software — Jira.

Hacking stuff and finding new ways to use common tools is genuine within my personality type. And I can be quite inventive there. Here are some fun facts:

• I once set up the marketing automation platform (HubSpot) to capture CVs & automated emails for the recruitment team. They needed a quick solution, and that worked.
• In another situation, while competing with my sports team on rocky terrain, we faced a shortage of ropes. To improvise, I gathered all the lanyards from my teammates and ingeniously connected them into a makeshift long “rope” using carabiners.

But let’s get back to the famous Objectives & Key Results (OKR) framework. It helped Google, Intel, Microsoft, and various other companies thrive. Unfortunately, this great approach often gets lost amidst separate OKR spreadsheets, updated sporadically and inconsistently. And then people say that OKRs just don’t work for them. Wonder how to avoid it? Just put your OKR in Jira.

Why track OKRs in Jira

There are plenty of amazing materials on how to set the right OKRs, like a classic book “Measure What Matters” by John Doerr, or a free OKR Certification: Leadership and Goal Setting on Coursera. However, the trickiest part comes when you need to track and measure the progress of your OKRs, and how your day-to-day work impacts them.

So embedding the OKR framework into the project tracking software is a logical and intuitive step. Though there is no direct Jira OKR functionality, I’ve explored 4 ways to make it work. Though I tested and played with each solution myself, I want to give credit to the main source I’m relying upon — an amazing Atlassian community. It’s a great place to ask questions and get support from other professionals, and I totally recommend joining.

Before we dive deeper into the actual setup, let’s quickly cover the best practices.

OKR best practices

A couple of tips to set up for success:

1. Start your OKR implementation at your level

- Are you in a leadership team? Roll them out on a company level.
- Are you managing a department? Try OKRs first within your team.
- Are you an individual contributor? Run an OKR circle or two for yourself to get a taste, and then introduce them to the team.

2. Create 1–5 Objectives with 3–5 Key Results each

You need to stay focused, and creating too many goals is one of the most common mistakes among OKR newbies. You can't do everything at once, so learn to prioritize and limit your objectives.

3. Work in a team

You should start collaborating while outlining your OKRs, not just provide a final version. It’s a win-win: you’ll polish your goals and get the internal buy-in simultaneously.

4. Connect your Jira issues with your OKRs

Execution is everything. This way, you will see the actual progress without the manual overhead and your teammates will see the clear connection between their day-to-day work and high-level goals.

So let’s explore the available Jira-related methods and decide what works best for you.

4 Best Methods for Tracking OKRs in Jira

So, here we go. Below I provided a detailed guide on the free options and a sophisticated yet budget-friendly Jira OKR plugin from the marketplace. OKR Board for Jira is free for up to 10 Jira users. For more, it costs from $0.02 to $1.8 per user monthly, depending on the number of users.

Disclaimer — I work at Oboard.

Since this guide is pretty huge, here are the links that can navigate you to each method:

Table of Contents

METHOD 1. Discovery Project Adapted for OKRs
METHOD 2. Advanced Roadmaps for OKR Structure
METHOD 3. Configure Jira Custom Fields for the OKRs
METHOD 4. Install OKR Board App from the Atlassian marketplace

Grab a cup of coffee, and enjoy your reading ☕️

METHOD 1. Discovery Project Adapted for OKRs

If you want to measure the exact progress of your OKRs, a dedicated Jira project is a good solution. The beauty of this approach lies in two facts:

• You can easily get delivery progress tracked
• You can use calculated properties to measure the target progress versus the actual one

Let’s get started with the setup:

1. Create a new Jira project

Go to Projects → Create Project → Product Management → Product Discovery → Add Project Details → Create Project.

This is the basic demo setup you should see after creating a new Jira Discovery project.

2. Create custom fields for Key Results

Since you already have goals here, all you need are the key results.
I recommend creating 3 custom fields:

1. Key Result Target (number)
2. Key Result Progress (number)
3. KR Status, % (custom formula)

To do this, click “+” → Create New Field → Enter Name → Select Field Type → Create.

For “KR Status, %”, you will need to add a custom formula.
I set it up this way: {KR Progress} / {KR Target} * 100%

3. Create Your Objectives as Categories on the Jira Product Discovery Board

In the Summary column, click on the “Edit” sign on one of the Category items. In the right sidebar, rename the placeholder text to fit your actual goals, and add additional ones.

4. Create your Key Results as Ideas on the Jira Product Discovery Board

Click “Create an idea” → Type your Key Result Name → Press Enter.

To give everything a structure, drag & drop your Key Results from Uncategorized at the bottom of the board into correct Goals.

5. Configure OKR mapping by linking your Key Results to the Epics, Stories, and Tasks

Click on one of the key results, and go to Delivery on the right sidebar. This is the place where your strategy meets your execution.

From here, you can either click “Create a Delivery ticket” or connect an existing Jira issue via “Add a Delivery Ticket”. Once it’s done, your Key Result will be automatically measured against its delivery progress.

6. Adapt the Jira Product Discovery Board View for OKRs

Once you have your custom fields in place, let’s remove columns like Insights, Roadmap, and Documents. Instead, I recommend adding:

• Delivery Progress, which will measure if all the work is completed
• Reporter, in the role of the OKR owner
• Teams, to include departments and groups that are engaged
• Project target, which indicates the OKR cycle during which you focus on the OKR

Also, turn on the KR Status average calculation. This way, by taking into account all the KRs, the Average KR can work as the Objective progress.

This is the final view I’ve managed to get:

While this method provides pretty clear tracking, there are also some obvious drawbacks:

• No ability to create an OKR hierarchy from the company to the departments and the teams
• You cannot put an owner to an objective, which is super-important based on the methodology
• It’s hard to maintain OKR for various OKR cycles

All of these are addressed and fixed in the fourth method.
Click on the table of contents to get back to the methods list.

METHOD 2. Advanced Roadmaps for OKR Structure

While it’s less sophisticated from the reporting perspective than the previous one, it has almost zero maintenance and is one of the most widely used hacks among the Atlassian community.

Important! When you use Custom Hierarchy, you cannot set it up for one project only. It will be set up globally for all the company-managed projects across the instance. So if you’re implementing OKRs for a couple of projects instead of the whole instance, look into alternative methods.

Advanced Roadmaps enables you to add additional levels to the hierarchy. As a result, you can view all your Objectives, Key Results, and Jira Issues in a structured way.

What you will see in the end is the clear OKR Roadmap, where your epics live underneath your OKRs. Each epic, story, and task contributes to the OKR progress tracker, and there’s no need to update it manually.

You can build your OKR Roadmap with Jira Advanced Roadmaps in a couple of easy steps:

1. Create new issue types for “Objective” and “Key Result”

To do this, you need to go to Settings → Issues → Add issue type → Type Issue Name → Add it to the Default Issue Type Scheme.

2. Adjust your issue type hierarchy, so that your Objective and Key Result would be on the top.

To modify the hierarchy, select “Issue Type Hierarchy” from the left-hand menu, and add custom levels above Epic/Initiative (whatever your current top level).

Make sure that the hierarchy levels for Objectives & Key Results are shown on the top so that the epics will stay beneath and contribute to their progress.

3. Go to the “Plans” and build your Advanced Roadmap

On the sample screenshot, I’ve used Objective for the classic 3-month OKR cycle and put Key Results and related actions planned underneath.

4. Add a Custom Field for OKR Progress & OKR Target (Optional)

By default, resolving your tasks will impact the progress of your OKRs. It works great for binary OKRs like new platform implementations. You’ve either “done” or it’s still “in progress”.

However, what if you’ve got a numeric OKR? For instance, achieving a specific NPS (Net Promoter Score) among your customers. For this purpose, it’s better to have a custom field for “OKR Progress”.

To create a field, go to Settings → Issues → Custom Fields → Create Custom Field → Select a Field Type → Number Field → Type Name → Create → Default Screen → Update.

Then you need to add your fields to the Key Result default view. Go to the Project Settings → Issues → Issue Types → Key Results → Fields → Type to search all Fields → Add your custom field/fields.

Then, create the “OKR Target” field the same way so that you can compare them. Unfortunately, custom formulas are not available here, unlike in Jira Discovery (first method), so we cannot calculate the progress vs target automatically.

I recommend against using a manual Progress field for all the key results since it creates manual work and eliminates the beauty of the automatic Jira issue contribution. Just when you aim at a specific number and feel it’s truly necessary.

Overall, it’s a great and quick way to connect your Jira Issues to OKRs. Still, the OKR monitoring and reporting capabilities would be somewhat limited:

• Though different initiatives have different impacts on the end result of the Objective, in the Advanced Roadmaps, all the contributions are treated equally.
• It’s also hard to see whether your current progress in the objective is on track during the OKR cycle.

You can get these perks and more with the dedicated plugin — OKR Board for Jira by Oboard:

• You can assign a custom weight for each Jira issue, based on its impact on your goal. It will provide a realistic view of the overall progress.
• You will see a dedicated progress status per each objective, key result, and Jira issue: At Risk, Behind, or On Track. It’s assigned automatically based on your progress and the planned timeline, so you always know where you are.
• You can also build custom dashboards to report on different sets of objectives.

Click on the table of contents to get back to the methods list.

METHOD 3. Configure Jira Custom Fields for the OKRs

If you’re on Jira Standard, this is the fastest way to link your OKRs to Jira Issues. Since it’s quick to set up, it’s not a comprehensive one. It will work if you have a handful of OKRs, and all you want is to label your priority issues to make them more visible to your team.

This setup makes sense after you’ve defined your OKRs already since it will impact the structure.

1. Create “Select List (cascading)” custom fields for OKRs

The most optimal way would be a select list (cascading) with a drop-down of the OKRs you defined. Once the first list item (Objective) is selected, the related list of Key Results will pull up. This way you can easily tag the Jira Issue and later pull it into the report.

To create a field, go to Settings → Issues → Custom Fields → Create Custom Field → Select a Field Type → Select List (cascading) → Add Name (for example, OKRs Q1 2024) and description → Create.

Once the field is created, find it among the custom fields and press “Contexts and default value” to add your options for Objectives and Key Results.

First, you need to add all your parent options, which will work as Objectives.

Once all of them are in place, press “Configure” to enter the child options, which will work as Key Results.

After you submit each set of the key results, press Done.

In the end, the internal setup of the custom field may look like this:

Once the field setup is completed, associate it with screens to make your field visible. In the majority of cases, “Default Screen” will work.

2. Add “Objective” and “Key Result” to the Issue Scheme

Now you need to add your fields to the Key Result default view. Go to the Project Settings → Issue Types → Epics/Stories/Tasks → Fields → Type to search all Fields → Add your custom field/fields.

3. Add OKRs to the Jira Issues that contribute to them

While tagging your issues, do it wisely. The simpler the better.

For instance, if your whole epic contributes to the Key Result — link only the epic, to avoid overloading your future reports. Do not link each story separately. If in another case, only one task or story contributes to the OKR — tag them directly, instead of the whole epic.

4. Build a filter for your future OKR reports

Go to Filters → View all Filters → Create Filter → Choose Project/Projects → + More → Search for your OKR Field → Select the Objective for which you want a report.

This is what your filter may look like:

5. Build your OKR Dashboard in Jira

Go Dashboards → Create Dashboard → Name → Save.

You can now find it in your Dashboard. After you open it, press Edit → Search Gadgets → “Filter Results” Gadget → Add.

Now you need to select a filter we created in the previous step, the number of results (issues related to your Objective), and add Objective, Key Result, and Status columns to display.

Once selected, drag & drop columns so that OKRs are on the top. Then save and look at your report.

Then create a separate filter per each objective, so that all the key results and Jira issues will be clearly visualized under one objective. If you have too many issues underneath, you might consider using a dedicated gadget for each key result.

You can now create a dedicated Filter Results Gadget per each objective and see the progress of your Objectives and Key Results right on your Jira OKR Board.

6. Create a Confluence page for advanced visibility (Optional)

Obviously, the reporting aspect is the weakest part of the custom fields approach. In the previous step, we figured out how to track straightforward binary OKRs within this approach.

But what if we want to track a specific number of our OKR progress? Since in the current setup, OKRs are not separate entities like Jira Issues, there’s no direct way.

However, if you still want to put all the OKRs together, you can use the Confluence OKR Template in combination with Jira Issue macros.

First, you need to figure out the IDs in your custom fields.

Go to Settings → Issues → Custom fields → Search → Open your custom field → Edit details.

You will see the field ID right here. Copy it for future reference.
“OKR Q1 2024” id = 10114

To apply the OKR Template, open the Confluence template → Use Template → Select Site → Create Page. This is what the default template looks like, and I’ll show you how to adjust it.

While submitting OKRs into the template is pretty straightforward, what you want is to connect related issues and track the progress on them. So once you’ve copied the template into your confluence, you can add related macros.

While in the current Status column, click + → Jira Issues → Project/Projects → Switch to JQL.

Your query should be based on the actual Key Result you’re tracking.
For instance, in my case, it would be

cf[10114] = “Launch 2 innovative product features”
where [10114] is the custom field ID we defined earlier.

Then press Search → Insert Issues.

To save some space and have a clearer view, I recommend leaving only Summary, Assignee, and Status there. After submitting the data, the page can look like this. Publish with the necessary Privacy settings, and you’re ready to go!

If you go with the template, you may find the Atlassian OKR playbook quite handy.

So, I would put it this way. If you’re on Jira Standard, don’t want to maintain a dedicated OKR project, and you can deal with the limited OKR tracking capability — this is your way.

Click on the table of contents to get back to the methods list.

METHOD 4. Install an OKR Board App from the Atlassian marketplace

Before diving into the setup, let me quickly share the main benefits, in comparison to other methods:

• The setup is intuitive and simpler than in any of the above-mentioned
• No need to be a Jira admin to maintain your OKRs
• OKRs are easy to link from any type of Jira Issues
• Sophisticated tracking and reporting capabilities out-of-the-box
• Clear and flexible OKR structure across the company levels

The setup is very easy and more upon making decisions than doing technical stuff. This is what it looks like:

1. Install the OKR Board from the Atlassian Marketplace

Install Oboard’s OKR app via the Atlassian marketplace by clicking the “Try it free” button, in case you’re a Jira Admin. If you don’t have enough access, don’t worry — you can send the automatic app request to your Jira Admin right there.

2. Enable plugin access for the Jira Group

If you’re an admin, go to Settings → Global permissions → Scroll to the end of the page → Grant Permission → Choose “Grant Access to Oboard plugin” → Select Group → Add.

If you want to create a separate Jira group, go to Directory — Groups — Create group — Submit the group’s details — Create.

2. Configure your Workspace & OKR Intervals

First, you need to create your OKR Workspace. Go Settings → Workspaces → Create Workspace → Enter Workspace Name → Enter Key (similar to the one on Jira boards) → Confirm.

If you’re just getting started, I’d recommend maintaining a single one. You can always move your OKRs to another one later if you feel it’s overloaded.

Once you’re here in your workspace settings, consider setting up custom OKR intervals. You would have classic quarterly OKR cycles in place, but you may play around here. Quite often companies set up yearly OKRs, and for some startups, it may make sense to use shorter cycles — for example, a month.

3. Add your team

This is what strongly distinguishes the OKR board from the rest of the methods I described. It provides a clear structure and connection between the company, department, team, and individual OKRs.

Inside the app, you go to Settings → Groups→ Create Group.
You can easily recreate your whole company structure in a couple of clicks.

Once the structure is in place, you can invite your team and start working together towards your goals. You may add users one by one or in bulk by syncing with Jira groups.

4. Define your OKR levels

OKR levels are more about the choice, rather than setup. You can start rolling out OKRs for a single team or the whole company. The levels are very flexible and may be adjusted later by creating additional ones or removing the existing ones.

For instance, if I refer to the screenshot from the previous step, Product OKRs will represent the Department level, while Product Analytics will live on the team level.

5. Create Objectives and Key Results

Once you’ve done with the technical settings, you can start creating your Objectives and Key Results.

Just press Create, pick your OKR level and you’ll get into the OKR popup.

In the Objective window, you can describe your goal, choose an owner, add groups that contribute to its success, pick up an interval, set up custom dates, labels, and of course — related Key Results underneath.

For Key Results, the setup is almost the same, but you also get three options to measure your key result:

• Percent
• Binary (Incomplete/Complete)
• Number

You set up your Start and Target at the beginning, and once it’s added, you’ll have the Progress field added automatically.

Now add other objectives and key results.

6. Link Jira Issues

Here is the main reason we do this. You can now link your Jira issues to Key Results one by one with search or in bulk with JQL under the nested items.

This is what your result may look like. If 3 out of 4 Jira issues are completed, you get 75% Key Result Progress, which also contributes to the Objective Progress.

You can make it even more sophisticated by assigning custom weights for your Jira issues, Key Results, and Objectives. If you feel some of your Jira issues have a bigger impact, you can reflect it via custom weights.

7. Track your OKRs with out-of-the-box reports

You will get several reports automatically, right after you add your OKRs, link Jira Issues, and start working on them.

You can enjoy a helicopter view with the cross-project OKR Roadmap, which can collect relevant Jira issues across multiple Jira projects, even with the Standard Jira subscription.

You may explore the bottlenecks you will have on your way to OKRs with OKR Map.

You can also check the Alignment View to see all the statuses and other key data in one place.

Additionally, see “My OKR” and “Group OKR’ views to focus on those where you are an owner or your team is contributing.

8. Build Custom Reports (Optional)

You can also build reports around a set of goals by going to Dashboard → Custom Dashboard → Create Report → Enter the Main Goal → Create Report → Add Objective → Select Objective→ Add More → Select Objective → Confirm.

This is what it may look like:

If you want to share reports externally, you can download them from the reports page as a PDF or use them with our free Confluence OKR plugin. Here is an example:

In case you want to blend Oboard with your other reports on the Jira Dashboard, you can embed OKR Reports into your Jira Dashboards. Just add a gadget using Oboard — Filters and configure it.

9. Conduct regular OKR check-ins with your team

OKRs are always about teamwork, so setting up powerful goals in a powerful system is not enough. The best approach is to combine regular team meetings, devoted to OKRs, with the ongoing progress updates inside your OKR tool.

Though you already have your progress fields inside the OKRs, comments are also a valuable asset for check-ins. Sometimes you need to say more than just update a number. You can tag relevant people and share additional progress-related numbers, challenges, next steps, etc.

Here is an example:

Long story short, with Oboard you’re getting:

• Clear OKR structure
• Advanced OKR tracking and reporting capabilities
• Easy setup and low maintenance, with no need to involve Jira Admins each time.

Speaking of Oboard itself, we are a Gold Atlassian Marketplace Partner and the most popular OKR for Jira add-on in the Atlassian marketplace. OKR Board for Jira has 3,100+ installs and a 3.9 out of 4 rating — the highest on the Atlassian marketplace among OKR apps. It’s free for up to 10 Jira users, and for more, it’s quite budget-friendly, with a range from $0.02 to $1.8 per user, depending on the number of users.

In case you’re keen to find more, give it a go right from the Atlassian marketplace or schedule a demo to let us show you around.

Click on the table of contents to get back to the methods list.

Best way to track OKRs

OKRs are simple, but not easy. However, having the right tool increases the success chances. Here are the perks you’d get if decide to manage your OKRs within Jira:

• Simplicity, since you’re implementing them where you already are.
• Free or low-cost solution, depending on your requirements.
• Flexibility in terms of customization per each team’s requirements.

I would love to hear back from you about your experience with the methods I’ve tried or new suggestions and improvements from your end.

Let’s talk in the comments to this post!