ActioGlobal is driving the transformation of

IDNEO

through OKR to realize focus, alignment and impact by transforming their HR team
into the role-model for the future of the organization.

Idneo is a global engineering company providing technological product development, validation and manufacturing services to customers around the world.

Multidisciplinary teams specializing in automotive, medical devices and industrial products meet the needs of their customers by creating innovative products and services through technology.

ActioGlobal has supported them in the implementation of the agile OKR system in the HR team. Our OKR consultants have enabled the Idneo HR team to understand very well the culture of alignment and impact they are seeking for their organization in the immediate future, paving the road for a new way of working for which they will be the role-model.

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Eva Gol, Head of Culture & Customer Success at ActioGlobal, talks with Artur Opi, People & Organization Director at IDNEO, who explains how to boost an organization through the OKR program co-created with ActioGlobal® for their HR team.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

Artur, Idneo has this great "slogan" that attracts attention: Innovation starts with people.

This phrase shows that organizations have changed and humans are no longer considered as "resources" and there is a growing awareness that the ability to deliver value in an organization lies with people. Fortunately, this change in perspective has resulted in HR teams like Idneo's taking on a particular relevance, with a much more transformative and people-centric function that makes HR a strategic pillar within organizations.

A few months ago, aware of this new role of the HR team, you discussed with ActioGlobal the intention of creating a high performance way of working based on OKR HR and an agile mindset.

Why was it that you thought the HR team was the right one to drive a future business transformation at Idneo by acting as a role-model to the entire organization?

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

I am a firm “believer” (from my own experience) in HR teams driving change in the company. I am lucky that this view is shared at Idneo and that we, the People Team, work according to this vision.

Idneo's People Team has a deep knowledge of our business (operations, projects, clients, profiles), of the organization and our people. This knowledge enables us to work together with the business, meet objectives, improve key results, and be a reliable partner.

Moreover, one of the advantages of the OKR model is that OKRs can be tailored to meet the needs of organizations, departments, or industries of any size, and, yes, why not, of individuals.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

Do I understand you right that from your point of view the HR team is not only the ideal team to "model" a new culture, but also to "lead" a new way of thinking for the organization?

Together with ActioGlobal, what objectives have you set for the OKR Human Resources Initiative?

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

We set two main objectives:

The team to work on Focus and Impact.

To be able to respond in an agile way to the real challenges of the company and to make our performance have an actual impact on people and the organization, this being mirrored by the company´s key results.

To change ourselves to become the drivers of change.

With the OKR strategy , the People Team can inspire the organization, dynamize and develop people and even hire great professionals, because remember this: A company up to date in terms of its culture and way of working multiplies what we call "employer brand" and facilitates the attraction of talent to the company.

Starting from there, the first thing was for the People Team to understand very well what it might mean to work with a new OKR-based system in their daily routine. What practices would be used? What for? How? Would their daily work get easier or even more difficult?

The first thought was therefore to be the subject of this change ourselves and to convey objectives and agility to the People Team through OKR, as an organism by itself. Being part of the evolution ourselves will enable us to better empathize with all the Idneo team in the future making them better understand the focus on value, customers and innovation.

Therefore, there was a twofold, non-exclusive objective: Get employees to learn and use OKR as well as to become a high-impact example for the entire organization.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

This makes perfect sense, because Human Resources professionals have a wide range of responsibilities, from enhancing employer brand, as you mentioned, to improving employee engagement and motivation, managing performance, streamlining hiring as well as making onboarding a stage both of great technical and human value. It goes without saying that improving all of this has a significant impact on the company. However, it may be difficult to decide where to start and how to measure success.

In a team with such wide-ranging, people-centric responsibilities, were you able to define clear objectives and key results?

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

But yes, of course, one of the biggest challenges with an OKR HR system is to set the right objectives, but the ActioGlobal team, as an OKR consulting firm, guided us on how to achieve them, in a didactically elaborate, but yet demanding way and gave us extremely valuable tools for this process.

As for me, the important thing about OKR is that they enable you to:

Clarify what you want to focus on, what "winning" actually means for the team, what the really important objectives are. After all, we are always busy with a lot of things to do, but are they truly the things we should be doing?

Inspire each other with challenging targets and set a common direction. Know where we are heading to as a team, set our sights on this and act with the ambition needed to reach this very target.

Follow the progress of the team by setting measurable objectives. I can tell you, this is fundamental. OKR allows you to quantify, measure and time.

And something very revealing for me, to introduce the impact concept in the team's day-to-day work. Something that seems like a "no-brainer" but is not at all common.

We do a lot of things at People, and understanding what is having an impact and what isn't, regularly and based on data, has been one of the distinguishing elements.

As I already said before, one of the advantages of OKR is that they can be tailored to meet the needs of organizations, departments, or industries of any size, and, yes, why not personally, of individuals. This has the immediate consequence of giving us the leverage to propose projects, concepts and organizational structures that enable business agility, optimize communication and collaboration between teams as well as enable the value flow. From this angle, it's about preparing and being the drivers and "sherpas" of the change we want to see and implement in the company.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

Artur, what strikes me in particular is the constant measuring of progress... Doesn't this constant measuring of results put too much pressure on the team? Don't the team members get dismayed by it as if it were a kind of micromanagement?

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

Certainly, the team must define how to organize its routines and measure progress regularly (ideally once a week) and then, at the end of the period (in our case a quarter), do a retrospective to assess progress and learning.

From a leadership standpoint, two things are important:

01.

To know how to convey very well that the objectives and key results are not a reporting tool, but a collaborative tool to set targets and give meaning to the work of the team in the daily routine, to ensure that we achieve the common objectives in the long term, and that we are a team that makes an Impact.

02.

To generate the right conditions and environment, and provide the necessary tools to the team so that they can self-organize, empower themselves, and exploit their full potential, individually and collectively.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

And how did you make sure you were aiming for the right objectives?

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

It is also a process. The difference between the first OKRs we defined and the current ones is dramatic. The evolution has been very important, and it has been the result of the team's work as well as the maturing of the process, in which we have been very well accompanied by ActioGlobal.

In our case, the OKRs we defined were ambitious and it is true that they required focusing and commitment to achieve them. But that's where the key lies: The ambition as a team. Objectives should not cause any fear, because they are not set in stone but can iterate depending on the results of self-organizing teams or new customer needs.

Remember that at Idneo all our teams develop innovative products and services for our customers, so it is essential that all members of the organization have the chance to experiment and learn quickly from mistakes. OKR helps you think big and have the courage to go for it, perfectly aligned in an environment of psychological safety. That's why I wanted to push the OKR system in Human Resources.

I believe that any people development manager should work towards developing a culture where the whole team shares ideas, experiences and learnings. I wanted the People Team to be able to feel and live the change to tell the whole team that OKR HR is really going to propel us forward and it can be a positive change for everyone.

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

….A permanent state of reinvention? 😉

Artur Opi
People & Organization Director · IDNEO

Forever!

Eva Gol
Head of Culture & Customer Success · ActioGlobal®

Artur, a pleasure to learn from you. I hope that soon we can talk about the challenges we have ahead of us in HR with New Work, about all that is yet to come and how we can meet it. Thank you and all the Idneo team.

THE TEAM'S OPINION FROM THEIR EXPERIENCE

Marta Martínez Anaya HR BP Manager IDNEO

Marta aligns the company's strategy with that of the Human Resources department. As part of the HR team, she works to make people the most valuable asset of Idneo, helping to ensure that each of them can develop to their full potential.

Undoubtedly, the OKR system is leading us to a process of evolution and change as a team. From the experience of having been working with the system for some time now, I would say that it is essential to understand it, and above all to live it, as a progressing process. In our case, especially in the beginning, it was a major challenge: disrupting mindsets, setting new rhythms, creating a different kind of conversations... It is a process that requires meshing, adjusting, aligning, internalizing and learning (something very exciting, by the way).

It is a journey that is taking us as a team to a new place.

It is getting us much more team focused, promoting the common purpose and vision of the whole. Something that I believe is fundamental for any HR team: having a global vision of the business and the organization.

It leads to criteria, ‘value-added’ conversations, and reinforces a sense of shared responsibility. "What can we do (more) to impact our outcomes and objectives (and thus the organization)? Are we achieving our objectives?" ... become recurring considerations that drive creativity, disruption, team alignment, and also discussion and interchange.

In a way, it naturalizes nonconformism and creates space for more ambitious aspirations and proposals. In our case, for example, it is very evident that the word "impact" has taken on a different dimension within the team. The term is on everyone's lips.

Achieving it is a maxim. So when one of the lines of action needs to be corrected or redirected, it is put on the table. And with regards to the latter, something very important is emerging (which the system itself promotes because it is part of its meaning): you learn to live it positively, as a necessary change, and not from the tension of "OMG! We made a mistake".

It's a very real feeling that permeates you and makes you feel like you're learning and preparing to be agile in a challenging, changing environment that strives to evolve and innovate. Idneo is a very dynamic company and our technological environment is continuously changing, forcing us to also continuously reinvent ourselves. Therefore, it is crucial for a team like ours to influence and drive change in an agile way (and this is what our team, People, firmly believes in).

It is a pleasure to see that the objectives we defined in the first stage of the process, and especially the reflections, conversations, level of participation, etc. that took place then, no longer have anything in common with the current objectives. It is very motivating to see the change and to anticipate that, in all likelihood, it is a road for the better. We walk it with confidence.

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