“Implementing OKRs made us look internally to better understand gaps in our current process and what ways to elevate it to ensure a good experience for managers and associates.”—Jessica Woodall, Program Manager of the Learning & Organizational Development Program at Walmart eCommerce
In a recent webinar with the BetterWorks Program Lead Community, Jessica and Angela Christman, Senior Manager of Talent Management at Walmart eCommerce, discussed the Walmart Global eCommerce—the organization that leads all online and mobile innovation for Walmart—goal setting journey with BetterWorks and how their division is using the OKR and performance capabilities of our software to meet the company where it’s at today.
“We aren’t ready to get rid of annual reviews,” says Jessica. “But we’re seeing that if associates are clear on priorities and having consistent conversations and regular feedback from their managers, it makes annual evaluations easier and more effective.”
During the webinar, Jessica shared how BetterWorks helps Walmart enable operational excellence and best serve their customers by giving the company a more focused approach to goal setting and feedback. Below are key takeaways from the webinar:
Annual Goal Setting Wasn’t Enough
Jessica began the webinar with an overview of the company’s experience with goal setting and performance management: historically, the company set annual goals and conducted annual performance reviews.
However, goals that employees in the organization set at the beginning of year wouldn’t be the same at end of year—top priorities and company strategy changed more frequently than once a year, and annual goal setting didn’t help employees keep up with these changes. Additionally, associates and managers weren’t having regular conversations to ensure that everyone was driving “toward same North Star.”
According to Jessica, 84% of associates at Walmart eCommerce want a more regular goal check-in process and 68% hardly ever discuss career development with their managers. These were issues the company wanted to solve by using BetterWorks.
While the company initially planned to deploy BetterWorks to 1000 employees, the pilot scope increased to 3000 after the company realized a greater need for the platform. According to Jessica, the majority of the Walmart Global eCommerce population is now in BetterWorks.
“Moving from an annual goal setting process to thinking about things quarterly has been a big mind shift for our company,” says Jessica.
Enabling Operational Excellence with BetterWorks
During the webinar, Jessica shared that BetterWorks helps Walmart eCommerce enable operational excellence in three key areas:
Alignment. Using BetterWorks, managers, leaders and associates are all on the same page, having proper conversations and reviewing priorities on a frequent basis. Employees are aligned on key initiatives and goals so they can work together to ensure success.
Transparency. Walmart wants the OKR methodology to be their main goal setting framework moving forward because it enables employees to see what everyone is doing. With this greater level of transparency, employees are working on what really matters—according to Jessica, that’s three to five objectives every quarter that will make the biggest impact on customers.
Frequent check-ins. BetterWorks facilitates frequent check-ins for goals and conversations: employees at Walmart frequently check in to their goals and managers and associates have bi-weekly, monthly and quarterly check-ins with each other.
So far, it’s been an absolute pleasure working with Jessica to successfully implement BetterWorks at Walmart Global eCommerce, and we’re excited to see how the company continues its journey with OKRs!