A KRA isn’t just about increasing productivity—it’s about giving your team clarity on what winning looks like in their roles. When everyone knows what success means, communication improves, accountability strengthens, and the results follow.
Without a proper KRA in place, chances are your team is operating reactively, not proactively. You need a tool that fosters ownership, boosts accountability, and delivers the results you expect—without constant oversight or micromanagement.
As a business leader, you want every hire to deliver real value. But until your team fully understands and takes ownership of their roles, consistent success will remain out of reach.
Ready to start seeing real results?
What’s a KRA?
A KRA defines and clarifies what success looks like in any job role.
It’s NOT a list of tasks or a job description.
Rather, a KRA documents the key result a team member is expected to achieve as a result of the tasks and work they perform.
- A good KRA documents how the job role aligns with the Mission, Vision, and Strategy of the business.
- Whatever is expected must be in writing, reviewed, agreed upon, and signed by both the team member and the leader so there’s no confusion when something isn’t getting done.
What do TEAM MEMBERS experience without a KRA?
- Wasted time and efforts
- Lack of communication
- Fog of confusion
- Lack of clarity
- Frustration
What do LEADERS experience when there are no KRAs?
- Lack of communication
- Lack of accountability
- Missed expectations
- Wasted resources
- Wasted money!
How To Develop a KRA:
If you’ve never created KRAs, here’s a step-by-step process we teach to all of our business coaching clients.
Step 1: Align and Cost Justify The Role
A. Answer these questions:
Will the role create more revenue than it costs to employ?
If not, will the role remove tasks from another team member or leader so they can focus on creating more revenue than the role costs to employ?
B. Create a summary of how this role aligns with and accomplishes the organization’s StratPlan (aka. business strategy).
C. Answer this question:
Does the role align with the organizational Mission?
If the role aligns with the organizational Mission (purpose for existence) and StratPlan (how we get to vision), then cost-justify the role.
Not every role has to cost-justify immediately, but every role should cost-justify eventually.
Step 2: Clarify Responsibilities of The Role
D. Create a detailed job description of all the tasks and responsibilities required in the role, then break the job description into the greatest Areas of Focus.
Here are examples of Areas of Focus:
Accounting roles:
Accounts Receivable
Accounts Payable
Payroll
Reports
Marketing roles:
Lead Generation
Strategy
Branding
Content Creation
Social Media
Email Marketing
Graphics
Sales Pages
Website
Analytics
Optimization
Sales roles:
Strategy
Outbound
Inbound
Prospecting
Appointment Setting
Lead Conversion
Referral Generation
E. List the most important Areas of Focus for the KRA you are working on.
F. List the tasks and responsibilities by highest priority within each Area of Focus.
Step 3: List The Key Result Areas
G. List all of the Key Result Areas that if executed on, will mean success for the team member and the Area of Focus. Start with the highest priority Key Results.
Here is a Key Result Area contrasted with a Key Performance Indicator and Job Description to give your further clarity on developing your list of Key Result Areas:
Job description: ”Execute social media”
KRA: ”Increase audience engagement”
KPI: ”Grow Facebook following by 30%”
Step 4: Set The Role up for Success
H. Once you have completed the list of Key Result for the most important area, ask these questions:
If all of the Key Result on this list were executed properly, is this role a success?
(If not, what’s missing?)
Are there any Key Result listed that aren’t necessary for success?
Continue this process until all Areas of Focus are completed.
I. To the best of your ability, evaluate the completed KRAs to ensure you have set up the team member for success in the role.
Step 5: Include a Growth Plan
J. When possible, include a plan for each team member to grow in their role.
Every growth plan should also be included in the accountability process and measured.
Interested in more? Here are some related articles:
Hi Chris, thanks for going over KRA. I just started my 4th year in my business and I have put the KRA’s in place. The most frustrating part is that every time I finally get people in place, something happens and I get sucked back into production instead of working on sales and marketing. It’s discouraging. Any wisdom you can offer? Thanks! The cookie lady, Duluth. MN
Hey Cookie Lady!
I’m assuming that’s because you lose someone and have to replace them? If the issue is a revolving door, I would focus on the why.
If it’s wages, then what’s being lost in the process by having to rehire all the time. Could you pay more for a more solid person who will stay?
If it’s growth in the business, what are we not anticipating and filling roles to be prepared? We need to budget people as well as money so we don’t fall behind.
Whatever it is, (It’s difficult without sitting down and getting more info) focus on WHY it’s happening and come up with a plan to be ahead of the game.
I hope this makes sense.
Hi Chris, yes it does. Thank you.
KRA’s are one of the things I’m working toward writing and implementing. However, after seeing your samples I realize that the
job descriptions I’ve worked up may be too detailed and more
a KRA. Which explains why I was having
difficulty wrapping my mind around how I would make the KRA’s. So, I think I’ll take a
little broader look at the job descriptions and see about making some
adjustments.
hahaha…did that work out?
Yes? Unfortunately I’m still on the “in progress stage.” This got pushed to my back burner just a bit. However, it is back on the front burner now. We actually discussed it during our team meeting Tuesday. I gave everyone a “draft” of the job descriptions and asked for feedback on the descriptions as well as what they think would be good KRA’s. Looking forward to getting some ideas back.
I would love for you to comment here on how it goes for folks to see. Thanks James!
How would you adapt this for coaches and athletes? I can draw some parallels, but wanted to get your take or other peoples’ ideas on this one.
Hey Frank, I will answer this as well on an upcoming podcast!
Thanks Chris — this is great information as I have my goals, now I need to define where I want to be — I will use your 5 tips every month to re-evaluate
I love it! How has that been going?
I’m planning on doing a KRA for myself in my solopreneurship. I know that this will help me to focus on what needs to be done. I may even develop a couple different KRAs, one for each aspect of the business. Then, when it comes time to hire, I have some things lined out already to help me during the hiring process.
Great idea, Joshua!
Kind of spin-off of Michael Gerber’s E-Myth idea of building a complete org chart even though your name goes in all the boxes at first.
Thanks, Ken. I haven’t read that yet, but I’ll add it to my list!
Joshua Rivers
Fantastic idea Josh! That’s exactly what it’s for.
Chris, this is great info. After hearing you talk about KRA’s so often this is the clarity I needed to take action on creating them for my team and I. Thank you.
My pleasure Leo!
Chris, can you possibly post some sample KRA’s to give folks some idea of their depth and focus? Sometimes it’s easier to do new things like this if we can kind of copy the rhythm, with our own information.
There should be a link in the middle of this post that takes you to the KRAs. Thanks Debra!
Chris, two questions for you and the CLoTribe:
1) How do you incorporate company values into KRA’s?
Would you have “Be Friendly, Agile, and Innovative in all aspects of your work” as a KRA or would you reference them as part of the Position Summary above the list of KRAs?
2) How do you use the KRAs during the dreaded annual performance review?
Do you take notes on the KRA sheet during the meeting or create a separate Evaluation From listing the KRAs and commenting/evaluating performance of each?
Thanks!
I’ll be answering this on an upcoming podcast Ken!
Cool! Definitely looking forward to it. Thanks, Chris!
Chris –
What would a KRA for the President of a company look like?
hi my position is high school administrative officer, since i am just a detailed employee in my present school i was assigned at the registrar office doing the following: receives request for tor or f137 and release the same, i also review the information encoded then i bring it to the principal for signature. i also answer queries of stakeholders on matters related to school credentials and advised them for any legal matters i.e. what to do to correct name in the birth certificate, secure second copy of diploma, cav of schools document, i also screen transacting people before they can proceed to the principal. based on the following pls. help me formulate kra, we have this new assessment tool being implemented this semester. Here are the following column titles: MFOs KRA, Objectives, timeline, weight per kra, performance indicators (quality, efficiency, timeless), actual results ratings and last column score. thank you aida
i am Quality Assurance in Ceramics Company, How KRA can help my work? thankz.
Thanks for the sample KRA charts. I can see how this would be valuable & help me to be more effective with my time. I’m looking forward to trying this out!
Hi Chris, I am a technical leader of our company. our boss asking me to make a KRA and KPI, could you help me or email me a sample of KRA and KPI?
Hi Judy! I work with Chris. You can get KRA samples above. Are you just making a KRA for you or is this something you’re doing across the company?
Good afternoon Chris
I was just appointed to the post of front office supervisor and was asked to get my KRA ready but it’s all new for me and am lost. Could you please help me
Hi Mel! I work on Chris’ team. Sign up above to get the KRA Samples and you’ll also receive lots of helpful resources to help create your KRA. Congrats on your new job!