How Did Messe Muenchen India Improve Their Efficiency by Switching From Spreadsheets to Profit.co?

We engaged a consultant to help us through this process, which led us to explore various methodologies that could help us achieve hypergrowth once the pandemic subsided. The concept of OKRs caught our attention during this exploration. Initially, we were intrigued by OKRs but wondered if they would fit our complex, multi-stakeholder environment.
As we delved deeper, the benefits of OKRs became clear. We realized how this framework could align our aspirations with actionable goals, driving us closer to our objectives.”

Were you involved early in discovering the relevance of OKRs for Messe Muenchen India?

Suzaina Basheer: “I joined Messe Muenchen India right around the time when the discussion about OKRs was in its discovery phase. It was an interesting challenge to see how OKRs could add value to our unique environment.”

How did the leadership team receive OKRs at Messe Muenchen India?

Suzaina Basheer: “We experienced mixed emotions within the leadership team. There were both advocates and skeptics, which actually helped us deepen our understanding of the OKR concept. Convincing everyone to join the journey continues to be a work in progress.”

Did you begin with spreadsheets before moving to a dedicated OKR tool? How did the adoption process unfold?

Suzaina Basheer: “Before we started using Profit.co, we were working with a consulting partner to help us define our vision. Initially, we used Excel to create some raw sketches and draft our OKRs as we were still trying to grasp both the concept of OKRs and the technology behind them.

OKRs, as a methodology, offers a higher level of clarity, especially when it comes to defining dependencies and setting up workflows. We quickly realized that these elements would be much better managed in an automated system rather than on spreadsheets

The idea was always to transition to an OKR tool because it offers more agility and allows for integration with our internal systems.”

Did you evaluate other tools before choosing Profit.co?

Suzaina Basheer: “We were using another tool prior to Profit.co, and while that was great, we reached a level where we wanted something a little more evolved in OKRs itself.

When we started looking at other tools, Profit.co came up as one of the solutions. What stood out to us was that the other solutions in the mix didn’t have OKRs as their primary focus; OKRs were bundled with various other features.

What we realized about Profit.co is that it was OKR-heavy. My understanding of Profit.co is that you’ve really understood the key fix needed in an organization, and now you’re layering other solutions on top of it.”

Could you share some insights on what didn’t work initially and the reasons behind it?

Suzaina Basheer: “Sure. One of the primary reasons for the initial failures was that we were trying too hard to get it perfect. There was minimal information available at the time, and as the concept started gaining popularity, it almost became a fad—something everyone wanted to deploy without fully understanding if it was the right fit. We initially lacked the clarity needed and were caught up in trying to perfect the system before even getting started.

As we progressed, we began to understand better what we needed to do to make the methodology more valuable for us. I would also like to compliment the Profit.co team for empathizing with our situation. They understood that we were dealing with a mixed bag of people in an industry where OKRs weren’t commonly adopted. They guided us forward, making the process simple and helping us get on board more effectively. This understanding and support from the Profit.co team were crucial in helping us move past those early challenges and start seeing progress.”

You mentioned earlier about trying to be “perfect” with your OKRs. How did you change it for better adoption?

Suzaina Basheer: “Sure. When I say ‘perfect,’ I’m referring to the quality of the OKRs we were trying to craft. We were getting stuck on capturing every detail at the vision level and then fragmenting it into OKRs. We were also obsessing over the quality of the OKRs themselves, trying to ensure they were perfectly aligned with every aspect of our strategy.

Recently, we’ve shifted our approach by driving OKR adoption on two levels: the concept level and the tool level.

On the concept level, our initiatives include:

• Conducting extensive training sessions to educate the team.
• Implementing microlearning episodes to reinforce key concepts.
• Certifying our entire senior leadership team in OKRs to ensure top-down alignment and support.

On the tool level, we focused on:

• Encouraging our people to use the Profit.co platform, even if it wasn’t initially for OKRs.
• Other tool features, such as task management and performance management to familiarize the team with the platform.

This dual approach—focusing on both the concept and the tool—has significantly impacted how we adopt OKRs.”

How did you secure and leverage executive sponsorship to improve OKR adoption?

Suzaina Basheer: “One of the key factors that worked in our favor was that the topmost leadership driving the India subsidiary, which is our CEO. He is highly invested in simplifying processes and improving efficiency, so there was already a strong buy-in at the topmost level.

Our focus shifted to aligning the entire leadership team with the OKR initiative.

Here’s what we did:

• Merit-Based Discussions: We discussed the merits of adopting OKRs, emphasizing the tangible benefits and how it could transform our organization.
• Leadership Alignment: We worked on getting the entire leadership team on board by helping them understand the concept of OKRs and why it was essential for our business.
• Certification and Training: We took it further by certifying the entire leadership team on OKRs.
• Emphasizing Progress Over Perfection: The focus was not on getting it perfect but on starting and refining the process as we go.

This approach ensured the leadership team was supportive and actively involved in the adoption process, which is critical for any significant organizational change.”

How has your role as OKR captain evolved from the initial stages to now?

Suzaina Basheer explained her OKR Captain role,

• “Unlearning and Relearning: Since OKRs were new to our organization, and since we operate in a legacy industry with a long-established way of doing things, it required a lot of unlearning and relearning.
• Coaching and Mentoring: I spent significant time coaching and mentoring our teams to help them grasp the OKR methodology. We approached it step by step, breaking the concept into smaller, manageable parts.
• Pilot Projects: We used pilot projects and spotlighted early successes to help build momentum and confidence in the OKR process.
• Continuous Learning and Communication: As the program matured, my role shifted to ensuring continuous learning and communication.
• Embedding OKRs into Organizational DNA: The goal is to make OKRs part of our organizational DNA, meaning every review or strategy discussion would naturally involve our OKR tool. This consolidation not only reinforces adoption but also reduces fragmentation when different processes are spread across multiple platforms.
• Consolidation of Efforts: We also focused on consolidating efforts. We aimed to get to a stage where everything we do, from reviews to strategic planning, is centralized in one tool.”

What check-in and review frequency have you found works best for your business, and how often do these check-ins and reviews take place?

Suzaina Basheer: ” Our trade fairs for every sector, typically occur once or twice a year. So, reflecting on what is happening with our OKRs as an end goal takes time before we can fully assess it.

Given that scenario, we’ve modified our check-ins to align with each KPI. For example, increasing our customer success score is something we will only understand at the time of the trade fair because our product isn’t consumed every day; we can only evaluate that KPI when the trade fair is done.

We don’t use a one-size-fits-all approach. Instead, we’ve looked at each element of the OKR to see how it can be more relevant to our business. That’s how we’ve been fine-tuning it. So, our check-ins vary—some KPIs are reviewed weekly, some monthly, and some quarterly. We also understand that a few will need a year to see what’s happening.”

How do you use the OKR cockpit as an OKR captain, and how has it been useful for you in managing the program?

Suzaina Basheer: “We’ve been leveraging the OKR cockpit in several impactful ways to manage our OKR program effectively:

1. Adoption Monitoring: The cockpit helps us track how frequently our teams engage with the OKR tool. It provides insights into who is actively using the platform and who needs more support or encouragement.
2. Fulfillment Tracking: We use the cockpit to monitor the fulfillment of OKRs, which helps us measure how close we are to achieving our aspirational goals.
3. Quality Improvement: We can identify when OKRs are not well-written by analyzing fulfillment scores.
4. Targeted Mentorship: The cockpit enables us to cluster users into different categories—early adopters, inconsistent users, and those who haven’t engaged much.
   This segmentation allows us to tailor our mentoring efforts to address the specific needs of each group.

Overall, the OKR cockpit has been instrumental in giving us a clear picture of where we stand, helping us make informed decisions to continuously enhance our OKR program.”

How do you use tasks within Profit.co, and how has it helped drive adoption?

Suzaina Basheer: “We started using tasks with the idea of bringing people to the tool by introducing something they already understand well. Certain elements within an OKR, like tasks, are not new. Everyone has used some way to manage a to-do list, so we leveraged that familiarity.

• Using the task module, we encouraged people to move their traditional to-do lists online. This made it simpler for them to start engaging with the tool.
• Since tasks are straightforward, with action items, timelines, and accountability, it was easier for people to start using this feature.
• The way the tool is built naturally nests tasks under certain OKRs. As people completed tasks, they could see how these small actions linked to the bigger concept. This made it easier for them to understand the overall OKR framework.

By starting with something familiar, like tasks, we were able to gradually increase adoption and help the team embrace the full potential of OKRs.”

In addition to the cockpit, do you use any other features within the tool to monitor adoption and fulfillment, such as reports, dashboards, or heat maps?

Suzaina Basheer: “So, the department heatmap is one thing that we use in addition to the cockpit to try and understand which leader we might need to work with a little more. As I mentioned earlier, any new concept or behavior change usually needs to be driven from the top, and that’s typically the most successful route.

We’re also using one of the aligned features of Profit.co, the performance management tool. This tool offers the nine-box matrix, which helps us get an overview at a company level, particularly understanding where our high potentials stand.

These various factors indicate what’s happening at the organization level, both in terms of the concept and the tool adoption.”

What has been the impact of OKRs on your organization, and how long have you been working with them?

Suzaina Basheer: “We introduced the concept of OKRs in 2021. As I mentioned earlier, we faced challenges in driving adoption because we were trying to perfect the system.

By 2023, we’ve got a good grasp of how it operates and what it does. Currently, we see that there is a complete understanding of the value it offers, which was not so widespread earlier. Consolidation is one of the big metrics. It also brings transparency to stakeholders who might be part of different successful projects.

It also offers us a lot of alignment as a value because of the transparency and the ability to break down the entire vision into smaller fragments. It helps us fine-tune our roadmap of how we want to achieve something. A clear ROI—we still have a long way to go to fully identify that.”

How did you decide to implement performance management alongside OKRs, and how do you see the relationship between the two?

Suzaina Basheer: “That’s an interesting one because, throughout the concept training, and no matter what blog or video you pick on OKRs, you’ll hear one thing: ‘Do not connect this with performance management.’ We started questioning the ‘why’ of that theory. While we understand OKRs as aspirational goals, performance management is more realistic. But we saw a clear bridge between what’s realistic and what’s aspirational. If the vision isn’t aspirational, the realistic goals will always be close but never pushing the envelope.

So, we questioned the theory, we questioned the status quo that had created this divide between OKRs and performance management, and we asked, ‘Why not?’ If a person is participating in aspirational projects, that should be celebrated and be part of the performance evaluation. Of course, we were cautious that this connection shouldn’t discourage people from being aspirational just because it’s tied to performance.

We decided to defy the conventional wisdom and try it out. The idea was to align OKRs and performance management so that people don’t have to go to different places to see what they’re aligned to and how they’re performing. We integrated OKRs with other elements like goals and competencies to create a more holistic view. We broke this down into smaller fragments, ensuring that our team didn’t see this integration as something to fear.

In 2023, our entire performance management was conducted on the Profit.co platform. The Profit.co team was incredibly helpful in implementing this in a short duration. We had other tools we considered, but the idea was to keep everything in one system. We didn’t want to go into different systems, and that’s how we aligned both OKRs and performance management.”

How have you traditionally approached performance management at MMI, and how has that evolved with the introduction of OKRs?

Suzaina Basheer: “Traditionally, we’ve used performance management methodologies like balanced scorecards, MBO and SMART goals to manage how teams are performing. However, these methods focused on managing performance in buckets tuned specifically to an individual’s role and responsibilities, breaking them down into SMART elements.

With OKRs, the approach is different. It’s about what we, as an organization, want to achieve and how we can align everyone toward a single vision and purpose. This shift represents how we’ve evolved our performance management approach at MMI by integrating OKRs.”

What was the feedback on Profit.co’s performance management from employees, managers, and the people team?

Answer: “Sure. Prior to this, we weren’t using much automation at MMI for performance management. It was being handled in a very crisp manner but largely managed with Excel sheets.

At first, there was some pushback as we were driving a behavior change. However, the ability of the system to simplify what they were used to really made a difference. As our internal users, who are essentially our internal customers, began to see the value in this simplification, it became easier. Now, I think we’ve reached a point where we don’t know another way of doing it if it’s not automated. So that’s where we are.”

How do you balance aspirational goals with performance management to ensure people still aim high without fear?

Suzaina Basheer: “The way to avoid that is by ensuring that the people using this system are those who wouldn’t be fearful about dreaming big or aspiring. We understand that is our end goal. We, as a company, are very oriented to our purpose. Our purpose is primarily a North Star that we’re looking at, and we try to align everything we’re doing in our organization with that purpose. What OKRs do is allow us to see our purpose with that aspiration. But to get to that purpose, you have to make some realistic goals and be able to get there.

In OKRs, when we are using this in the system, we have an opportunity to define what’s realistic and what’s aspirational, which helps us understand and helps people understand that. We have room to play around internally with being okay if you’re dreaming big and you’re probably hitting it closer, but you’ve not achieved it all.

I think culturally, we are okay with dreaming big because we have everyone participate in, ‘Okay, how do we get there?’ And second, despite everything, if we are not getting there, we try to understand, ‘Okay, how do we do it the next time?’ versus having a repercussion.”

Regarding performance management, what aspects of the tool have you found useful and helpful?

Suzaina Basheer: “In performance management, I think one of the very helpful things is breaking the reviews down based on OKRs, goals, and competencies.

Here are the key points:

• Configurability: The module is highly configurable, allowing us to tailor it to specific needs.
• Integration with OKRs: The Performance Management module integrates seamlessly with OKRs, enabling a unified approach to managing both aspirational goals and realistic performance evaluations.
• Comprehensive Review Process: The module allows reviews to be broken down into OKRs, goals, and competencies, which helps reduce the “fear factor” associated with OKRs by balancing them with more traditional performance metrics.
• Developmental Tools: Features like the nine-box grid and developmental plans are built into the module, providing actionable insights for people growth and helping us create targeted development strategies.
• Seamless Workflow: The system offers a streamlined workflow from self-review to manager evaluations, ensuring a smooth process that enhances user experience and efficiency.

So, in terms of performance management, I think it’s relevant for any company.”

Performance management is often seen as prone to biases like recency bias. Are these concerns being addressed with OKRs integrated into your process?

Suzaina Basheer: “To a large extent, yes. I say that even for companies that might still want to keep OKRs as a methodology for chasing the aspirational goals while using another methodology like MBOs for driving performance. Even for those kinds of companies, there’s relevance because the tool allows hosting both OKRs and performance management into the system. So, yes, I believe it does help address those concerns about biases in the performance management process.”

In conclusion, Suzaina Basheer’s journey with OKRs and performance management at Messe Muenchen India offers valuable insights into the challenges and triumphs of integrating new methodologies in a legacy industry. Through a careful blend of concept understanding, tool adoption, and a commitment to continuous improvement, Suzaina and her team have successfully navigated the complexities of aligning aspirational goals with performance management.