At a glance
- Client: Carwow, an online platform that has simplified car buying and selling for over 12 million users in the UK, Germany and Spain
- Industry: Technology & Automotive
- Company size: 250+ employees
- Challenge: An established OKR program that had outgrown Google Sheets and PowerPoint: dependencies between teams that nobody could see, results shared across business units, and static Quarterly Business Reviews
- Solution: WorkBoard AI, implemented by Wave Nine: training for 85 users, flexible guidance for Carwow's own approach to OKRs, and Running Business Review templates for Quarterly Business Reviews
- Results: Live Quarterly Business Reviews, monthly OKR check-ins, and greater transparency and alignment across interconnected teams, with a clear line of sight from daily tasks to strategy
The challenge: connecting strategy to execution across departments
Carwow is an online platform that has simplified car buying and selling for over 12 million users throughout the UK, Germany and Spain. The company launched its OKR program to improve alignment and visibility across the organization, connecting each team's day-to-day work with Carwow's larger strategic initiatives.
Director of Strategy Alex Powell and his team took a process-oriented approach to figuring out what they needed from OKR software. They first built their OKR processes by hand, using spreadsheets for tracking and PowerPoint for communicating updates during Quarterly Business Reviews.
The manual approach helped them identify the qualities they would need in OKR management software, because it showed the many ways those manual processes fell short. Based on what they learned, they chose WorkBoard AI as their OKR platform and Wave Nine as their implementation partner.
"One of the business challenges we faced was achieving clear visibility around what others were doing, both within and between each business unit. We needed the right tool to track what they were doing, why they were doing it, and how the work led to actual outcomes."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
Spreadsheets couldn't show the connections
Alex and his team had established a strong program with well-crafted OKRs and clear goals. They had reached the point, though, where tracking OKRs in Google Sheets and presenting them in PowerPoint slides was no longer a viable option.
Google Sheets fell short because it was difficult to visualize the relationships between OKRs and the many activities that fed into them, which spanned different teams and departments.
"It's a lovely world in which you can simply have a top-level objective, followed by secondary objectives, followed by your Key Results and the initiatives that drive your work. However, that perfect one-to-many tree isn't life, and we needed to share results across different business units."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
What does this look like in practice? Imagine owning the profit and loss for a given product line and trying to quickly see what Marketing, Operations and other teams are doing to contribute to the goal. In a Google Sheet, that is impossible to visualize.
Slides couldn't show the impact
Carwow also used PowerPoint slides to communicate OKR progress during its Quarterly Business Reviews, and that brought challenges of its own.
"Due to the more matrixed nature of our business setup, it was quite difficult for some business leaders to visualize how these efforts impacted their areas by looking at a set of PowerPoint slides."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
In short, Carwow's OKR program needed three things the manual setup couldn't give it:
- Visible dependencies: a way to see how work across Marketing, Operations and other teams feeds into a shared goal.
- More than a simple tree: results shared across business units, beyond what a one-to-many OKR hierarchy can show.
- Dynamic reviews: Quarterly Business Reviews that show leaders in a matrixed setup how efforts affect their areas.
After reviewing different OKR management platforms, Alex and his team concluded that WorkBoard AI offered the features and flexibility to address these challenges.
Achieving transparency and alignment with WorkBoard AI
Carwow worked with Jessica Stimac, Director at Wave Nine, and her team to enable its 85 users and guide the WorkBoard AI implementation. Wave Nine took the time to understand Carwow's specific business challenges and found flexible solutions that worked for Alex and his team.
"It was very useful having Wave Nine's guidance around how something should be done and what we should expect. In some cases, we took a tailored approach that defied standard OKR practices, but Jessica always helped us find a solution."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
Wave Nine supported the implementation in five ways:
- Training: Enabled Carwow's 85 users on WorkBoard AI.
- Process guidance: Guidance on how things should be done and what to expect, and a solution each time Carwow chose a tailored approach that defied standard OKR practice.
- Business reviews: Showed the team how to use Running Business Reviews to build its own templates for the Quarterly Business Review, its primary OKR ritual.
- Cross-team mapping: Helped set up WorkBoard AI to map the dependencies between work influenced by multiple teams and departments.
- Rhythm: Supported OKR rituals that drive participation and engagement across the company, including monthly OKR check-ins between quarterly reviews.
WorkBoard AI now lets Carwow map out complex contingencies between tasks that are influenced by multiple teams and departments, and the company has set up effective OKR rituals that keep participation and engagement high across the company.
"Our primary OKR ritual is our Quarterly Business Review. Rather than using PowerPoint slides, WorkBoard AI's Running Business Review tool made it easy to update the information, create our own templates, and present everything to leadership."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
The results: live reviews and a steady pulse
Running Business Reviews offer dynamic charts and graphs that show the status of OKR efforts, such as progress to plan. There is no need to wait until the end of the quarter to assess those efforts.
"WorkBoard AI and its tools provide a pulse check, and that pulse check is helpful. That said, the main value is getting teams to focus on their OKRs and keep them front-of-mind."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
Based on the analytics from their Running Business Reviews, Alex and his team identified where engagement and OKR updating fell short. To address that, Carwow added another OKR ritual, monthly check-ins, to keep attention on OKR efforts between quarterly reviews.
"Wave Nine showed us how to use WorkBoard AI's Running Business Reviews tool to develop our own templates, and it's been quite successful, allowing us to analyze our progress. It also revealed the need for monthly OKR check-ins to keep things on track."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
The results:
- Live Quarterly Business Reviews: Running Business Reviews have replaced PowerPoint, with dynamic progress-to-plan charts and no wait until the end of the quarter.
- 85 users enabled on WorkBoard AI across the company.
- Monthly OKR check-ins, added after review data showed where engagement and OKR updating fell short.
- Greater transparency and alignment across deeply interconnected teams and departments.
- A clear line of sight from daily tasks to the company's larger strategic vision.
WorkBoard AI showcase
How Carwow uses WorkBoard AI to run live business reviews and make cross-team work visible.
Business Reviews (Running Business Review)
Carwow runs its Quarterly Business Reviews as Running Business Reviews, built on its own templates. The review analytics showed where OKR updates lagged, which led Carwow to add monthly check-ins.
Benefits:
- Live progress-to-plan charts for every review
- Reusable templates that make updates and leadership presentations easy
- Early signals on engagement, before the quarter ends
Alignment
Carwow uses WorkBoard AI to map how work owned by different teams and departments contributes to shared results in its matrixed organization.
Benefits:
- Leaders see what other teams are doing for their goals
- Cross-functional contributions visible beyond a single OKR tree
- A clear line of sight from daily work to strategy
OKR Management
Carwow moved OKR tracking out of Google Sheets into WorkBoard AI, where teams track objectives, key results and initiatives in one place.
Benefits:
- One place for OKRs, with no spreadsheets to maintain
- A pulse check on progress between quarterly reviews
- Teams keep their OKRs front of mind
Key takeaways: advice from Alex Powell
Every Wave Nine case study offers insights into the challenges organizations face and the lessons they learn from their OKR and WorkBoard AI implementations. Alex has two pieces of advice for others.
"I think my number one is to develop the process that your business needs and fit the tool to your process rather than fit your process to the tool. To that end, the more you can find a tool that is flexible in its setup and not restricted in how things must be done, the better."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
Carwow developed a clear understanding of its OKR needs, and in WorkBoard AI it found a flexible solution it could adapt to its specific OKR requirements. Alex and his team stress the value of understanding OKRs clearly before choosing how to support them.
"The second piece of advice I'd give is to hire a good implementation partner to guide you through best practices."
Alex Powell, Director of Strategy, Carwow
With WorkBoard AI's flexibility and reporting capabilities, Carwow has achieved greater transparency and alignment across its deeply interconnected teams and departments. WorkBoard AI draws a clear line of sight between daily tasks and the company's larger strategic vision, which underscores the value of clear communication and strong OKR rituals.
