Create Objectives, Key Results, and Initiatives with Viva Goals

Microsoft Viva Goals lets you create and document your objectives and key results to gain clarity on where to focus your team’s efforts. Initiatives help you track work toward your objectives and key results.

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Note: In this video, Initiatives are referred to as Projects.

In this article:

Create an Objective

Create a Key Result

Create an Initiative

Create an Objective

Objectives are what you want to accomplish. They are clear goals.

To create an objective:

Navigate to My OKRs, My Teams, or My Company from the side navigation.
Select +Objective from the upper right to open the New Objective panel.
Enter your objective Title in thetextbox.
In the Details section fill out the following:

Note: Information in the Details section will be set by default depending on the entity you're currently viewing, and the time period selected.

Aligned to : You can choose to align to an OKR.
Team: Assign an OKR to the organization to a team or leave unassigned.
Owner : Person(s) responsible for the goal.
When : Time period the goal will be completed during.
More Options
- Assign a delegate: Someone who can make changes on behalf of the owner.
- Permissions: Set alignment permissions for this objective.
- Tags: Assign labels to your objective.
- Add a description: Additional context for your objective.
Outcome: Outcome is measured as percentage towards 100% completion. You can also choose to add Phased targets.
Progress and Status: Specify the method for updating progress and status.
- Choose whether you want progress to Update from key results or if you want to Update manually.
- Choose whether you want status to Update based on the progress or if you want to Update manually.
- Check- in owner: Assign a person to perform check-ins for this goal.
- Add scoring guidance: Guidance for how to track progress and score this OKR.

5. Select Create to save your objective.

6. The objective you've created will appear in the list view.

Tip: To edit an objective, hover over the goal, select More action ellipses, followed by Edit.

Create a Key Result

Key results are your measurable outcomes. They should be ambitious, but achievable, and quantifiable enough to lead to objective grading.

To create a key result:

Navigate to the Objective you want to align to.
Select the Add child item > Add key result to open the New Key Result panel.
Enter your key result name in the Key result title textbox.
First, choose Add Metric to choose how your key result is measured.
- Metric Name: The title of what you'll be tracking.
- Target is to: Choose a key result type from the dropdown, followed by a target format. For some target types you can also choose to add Phased Targets.
Next, choose the method for updating progress and status. Progress: How progress is calculated for this objective. You can choose to Update manually or connect to a data source for automatic progress updates. If you want to connect to a data source, select the source and then fill in the details.

Check- in owner: Assign a person to perform check-ins for this goal. Will be set as the owner by default.
- Add scoring guidance: Guidance for how to track progress and score this OKR.
Details: These is inherited from the objective and can be edited as needed by modifying the appropriate fields.

5. Select Create to save. The key result will appear underneath your objective.

Create an Initiative

Initiatives are activities which will help achieve measurable outcomes. They are the individual activities whose execution will impact performance on the defined objectives.

Notes:

Local Initiatives : The task list is created and managed directly in Viva Goals.
Integrated Initiatives: The task list is managed via an integration with a third-party project management tool.

To add an initiative:

Navigate to the Objective or, (if your Admin has enabled it) under the Key Result you want to align to.
Select the Add sub item icon, followed by Add initiative.
Enter your initiative name in the Title textbox.
Review the Details that your initiative has inherited from the parent objective or key result and make necessary edits.
Choose how to measure the Outcome of your initiative by selecting Add Metric.
1. Give your Metric a name, and choose what kind of target you want to achieve.
To break down your initiative, select Add tasks.
1. Give your tasks each a name, a due date, and an owner.
Next, choose how to measure the Progress and Status of your initiative. You can Update manually or choose a data source for automatic progress updates.
Make sure to Save your initiative.