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OKRs for Support

Jeni Balch shows how OKRs give support teams what SLAs never will: a direction, a transformation goal and a reason to be invested beyond the queue.

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with Jeni Balch, Assoc. Manager, Product Management Support at Q2

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40:26

Introduction

Support agents know exactly what tomorrow looks like: the same queue, the same SLAs, the same KPIs. That certainty is also the problem — there is nothing bigger to aim at. Jeni Balch has used OKRs to change that on several teams, including one she inherited in open crisis.

She insists OKRs are not KPIs in disguise: they are transformation goals the team chooses together, tracked with owners, confidence levels and roadblocks. Done collaboratively, they rebuild engagement and trust between agents and their manager — and Jeni shares the exact template her teams use.

What you will learn in this episode

  • The difference between OKRs and the KPIs your team already tracks

  • Running a collaborative OKR workshop your agents actually care about

  • Owners, confidence levels and roadblocks: tracking without micromanaging

  • Why hitting 70% of an ambitious goal beats 100% of a timid one

  • Common OKR failures — vague objectives, borrowed metrics — and how to avoid them

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