OKRs for All

Conclusion

Let's say you're trying to build the perfect OKR. Your objective is aspirational and lofty: Build the tallest building in the world.

This is the goal they set for the Empire State Building. The Empire State Building, impressively, was finished 12 days early and came in at $20 million under budget.

Another example of a perfect OKR is the one for the Golden Gate Bridge. The objective: Build the longest suspension bridge in the world. And, like the Empire State Building, the Golden Gate Bridge came in ahead of schedule and $1.3 million under budget.

Unfortunately, those are the exceptions. There's a long history of poor planning that spans major projects like this across the globe. Let's look at a couple of examples, like the Quebec Bridge.

The Quebec Bridge was budgeted for $6 million and ended up costing $23 million. It took 30 years to build and collapsed twice during the process.

The Sydney Opera House was budgeted for $7 million and came in at over $100 million. It was also 10 years late.

The James Webb telescope saw a similar fate, racking up a 1900% cost overrun. The telescope finished well behind schedule when it launched at the end of 2021.

My favorite example is the Second Avenue subway system in New York City. Originally, the system was budgeted at $99 million. It's now at $17 billion! Just a slight difference. It was proposed in 1929 and set to finish in 2029—100 years late.

In The Oxford Handbook of Megaproject Management by Bent Flyvbjerg, “the iron law ...