How to Make the OKR Slide [Useful Tips by Experts]
- Ink Narrates | The Presentation Design Agency
- 11 hours ago
- 6 min read
While working on a strategic planning presentation for a client named Jacob, he paused at one slide and asked something that catches even the sharpest teams off guard:
“What exactly should we show on the OKR slide? Just the objectives or everything?”
Our Creative Director answered without hesitation:
“Only what your team can rally behind, not what they can already recite.”
As a presentation design agency, hundreds of strategic decks pass through the studio each year—boardroom decks, investor updates, team planning sessions—and one slide consistently trips people up: the OKR slide.
It’s not the metrics. It’s not the formatting. It’s the silence after the slide goes up. Because when that slide shows up on screen, most people don’t feel fired up. They squint, they nod politely, and forget about it minutes later.
So, in this blog, let’s unpack how to make the OKR slide work harder—not just to list goals but to turn them into a moment of alignment.
Why the OKR Slide Is More Important Than It Looks
Most teams treat the OKR slide like a checkbox. Drop in some high-level objectives. Maybe a few measurable key results. Format it nicely. Move on.
That’s exactly the problem.
The OKR slide is often the first moment in a presentation where leadership tries to shift from vision to execution. It’s the bridge between “what we want” and “how we’re going to do it.” And when it falls flat—which it often does—it’s because the slide was designed like a spreadsheet, not a signal.
It’s important to remember: OKRs didn’t start as a reporting framework. They started as a belief system. A way to force focus. A way to get everyone aligned on what really matters. And most importantly, a way to create tension between where a team is and where it wants to go.
But none of that shows up on most slides.
What shows up is a list. Or worse, a data dump. One that fails to create urgency, fails to spark conversation, and fails to answer the question every smart stakeholder is silently asking:“Are these the right things to focus on right now?”
The OKR slide doesn’t just need to be clear. It needs to be convincing.
And that means building it like a story—not a form.
How to Make the OKR Slide Work Like a Story
1. Don’t Drop the OKRs In. Set Up the Stakes First.
Here’s the mistake that kills momentum fast: showing OKRs without context.
A room full of smart people doesn’t just want to know what the goals are. They want to know why those goals got picked.
What changed in the market? What’s not working anymore? What’s the biggest internal constraint right now?
The most effective OKR slides are not the first thing shown. They come after a short but sharp setup—sometimes just one slide—outlining the current reality.
Here’s what that might look like before the OKR slide appears:
“Customer retention dropped in Q3 after shipping delays impacted onboarding timelines.”
“Competitor X launched a freemium product that’s pulling early-stage pipeline away.”
“Our current sales cycle length is unsustainable for hitting the next revenue milestone.”
When the team sees that, and then sees the OKRs, it doesn’t feel like another wish list. It feels like a plan that understands the battlefield.
2. Write Objectives That Read Like Rallying Cries
Objectives are not tasks. Objectives are statements of belief.
This is the part most teams underwrite. They list vague, forgettable lines that sound like this:
“Improve user engagement.”
“Grow revenue.”
“Enhance operational efficiency.”
None of these are wrong—but none of them wake people up either. They’re too safe. Too broad. Too lifeless.
Instead, try writing objectives that actually sound like a decision was made.
“Win back disengaged users by making activation addictive.”
“Drive sales through fewer but deeper deals.”
“Turn operations into a product, not a support team.”
These are still short. But they provoke questions. They imply trade-offs. And they stick.
A great objective passes one test: Can a room full of people repeat it without looking at the slide?
3. Use Key Results to Show What “Winning” Really Means
Key results are the most misused part of any OKR slide. Teams either cram in too many, list vanity metrics, or settle for results so soft they’ll never be measured.
The golden rule here is simple: Key results don’t just measure performance—they define what success feels like.
That means every key result needs to tell a story. Not just “what” is being tracked, but what that number will prove if achieved.
For example:
❌ “Increase signups by 10 percent”
✅ “Achieve 10 percent signup growth without adding headcount”
❌ “Improve NPS to 60”
✅ “Raise NPS to 60 by Q2 to support Series B readiness narrative”
Each key result has a subtext. A “why it matters.” That’s what turns it from a stat into a signal.
Also, aim for three key results per objective. Enough to show dimension. Not so many that none get remembered.
4. Kill the Table. Use a Slide That Builds
One of the most common design choices for OKR slides is also the laziest: A grid or table with Objectives in the first column and a bunch of bullet points to the right.
It looks clean. It feels familiar. It’s also the fastest way to get people to stop reading.
Instead of dumping all OKRs at once, treat each one like a beat in the story. Use a slide (or slide sequence) that builds vertically or horizontally—revealing the Objective first, then the Key Results below it.
This approach forces the presenter to narrate each one. Which gives the audience time to absorb it. Question it. Agree with it.
Great presentations don’t just inform. They choreograph attention.
The best-designed OKR slides are often the most minimal—built with:
A single, bold Objective at the top
Three Key Results below, with small one-line rationales
Subtle iconography or visual cues for priority or timeframes
Optional: one callout metric that’s tracked weekly or monthly
The goal is not to decorate the slide. The goal is to make the strategy legible.
5. Make It Uncomfortable (In a Good Way)
There’s a trap teams fall into when building OKR slides: trying to make everyone happy.
The objectives become compromises. The key results get padded. And the whole slide ends up as a list of things everyone already assumed.
But the most respected OKR slides—the ones that actually change behavior—are the ones that make the room pause.
They highlight things that are broken. They commit to things that feel hard. They signal trade-offs that not everyone will love.
That’s where real alignment happens. Not when people agree. When people understand what’s at stake.
So as the slide gets built, pressure-test every line. Ask:
What are we not doing by choosing this objective?
Is this result hard enough that we’d feel proud hitting it?
Who’s going to lose sleep if this fails?
If the answers make people squirm a little, the slide’s probably right.
6. Anchor the Slide to a Narrative
The most underrated trick in making the OKR slide work is tying it back to a single, shared narrative.
That narrative might have been introduced earlier in the presentation. It could be a strategic shift. A market opportunity. A shift in leadership philosophy.
Whatever it is, the OKR slide shouldn’t feel like a break from the story. It should feel like the proof.
For example:
If the strategic story is about “Reclaiming Product Leadership,” then every objective should lean into innovation, user experience, or quality.
If the strategic story is about “Going Upmarket,” then key results should reflect bigger deal sizes, slower sales cycles, or more tailored support metrics.
If the story is about “Doing More With Less,” then every number should scream efficiency—not growth at any cost.
When the OKR slide becomes a mirror of the strategic story, it does more than inform. It reinforces belief.
That’s when people stop seeing it as a slide. And start seeing it as a rallying point.
7. Build It for the Room, Not the Archive
One final trap worth avoiding: building the OKR slide for the deck, not the people.
There’s often pressure to cram everything in. Every metric. Every team’s OKRs. Every version of every goal.
But most of the time, that’s a symptom of trying to archive, not align.
A good rule: Build the OKR slide to guide the live conversation. Not to become a static document. The details can live in a PDF or dashboard.
The slide itself should do one job: Create clarity in the room.
If that means splitting OKRs across two slides, do it. If that means removing low-priority goals, do it. If that means spending five minutes narrating just one objective, absolutely do it.
The best OKR slides don’t just show what to do. They make it impossible to mistake what matters most.
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