The whole premise of cross-functional working aims at eradicating silos even when teams work across departments or business units. Cross-functional OKRs fosters alignment, not only across the top of the organisation, but down and sideways too. This type of team collaboration can be an excellent method of problem-solving because it brings together different perspectives different skill sets. There are many benefits of having shared OKRs across cross-functional teams. Learn how cross-functional teams work and why they could be the answer for any organisation looking to grow with agility and speed in this article. We look at the key benefits of working cross-functionally, as well as sharing some examples of cross-functional OKRs to give you an idea of what they look like in reality.
What do we mean by cross functional working?
Cross-functional teams consist of teams from different functions or departments in a business. Teams that ordinarily you wouldn’t envisage working together on day-to-day activities. An example of this is marketing, sales, product and customer success. Day to day, these teams won’t be working on together as such, however, they may be in working groups, where each member belongs to their functional team as well as the cross functional team.
Benefits of cross functional working
There are many benefits to your teams working cross-functionally; we share some of the key ones below.
Increased engagement
When you combine different teams to come together on projects, you’ll see more teamwork, more ideas being shared and a bigger connection to the wider company goals. These factors have a positive impact on engagement and overall productivity. 
Innovative idea sharing
Collaborative working brings about new insights which can lead to innovative ideas you may not have had before. Different minds communicating together, can bring better results. When people think in new ways, it helps them make smart mistakes, take better risks and spur innovation and creativity.
Foster team spirit
Working together as one team and not in silos can bring about a sense of unity. By bringing together teams from different functions, you can identify high performers and create champions for success. Transparency Shared OKRs help your organisation achieve higher results through collaboration and cooperation. With shared OKRs, each team across all departments has the same OKRs, but they work on their unique key results and initiatives to reach those goals. Best practice for creating cross-functional OKRs Team effort OKRs are a team effort – the whole premise of OKRs is that it’s a team task, those that need to be involved are involved from the get-go. There’s no use setting OKRs for people and then informing them of the OKRs without their input – this doesn’t help with motivation and engagement. 
Rally those around you who should be contributing to the OKRs and bring heads together to brainstorm. We recommend building OKR squads or OKR teams, this is a group of people that will be coming together regularly to track progress on the OKR. Use OKR software We highly recommend using OKR tracking software; this is a place to store your OKRs, make updates, track progress and share results. It’s not best practice to use spreadsheets for OKRs as this can get messy quickly, especially when working cross-functionally. A dedicated OKR system will provide transparency; you can quickly see who is working on what and when, and see progress being made (or not). It’s recommended that you update your OKRs ahead of your OKR check-ins, this alleviates any time pressure on your check-ins.
Here is some example cross-functional OKRs
Improve Customer Satisfaction:
Objective: Enhance overall customer satisfaction. Key Results:
- Achieve a Net Promoter Score (NPS) of 65 or higher
- Increase product ratings on customer feedback platforms by 20%
- Reduce customer support ticket resolution time by 15%
Enhance Employee Onboarding Experience:
Objective: We have enhanced our onboarding experience for all new employees Key Results:
- Achieve a satisfaction rating of 4.5+ in employee onboarding surveys
- Ensure 100% completion of onboarding tasks within the first 2 weeks
Decrease time to productivity for new hires by 18%
Increase Market Share Through Partnerships:
Objective: We have expanded our market share through strategic partnerships. Key Results:
- Establish partnerships with three key industry players
- Achieve a 10% growth in customer base through partner-driven marketing initiatives
- Increase revenue from partner channels by 25%
If you’re witnessing siloed working in your team and would like to talk in more detail about the the benefits of cross-functional working, we’d love to chat. Speak to our expert team.