What is COS?
Audience: End User
Page Type: Overview
Summary: COS (Company Operating System) is a multi-tenant SaaS platform focused on OKR and performance management, enabling organizations to transform their strategic goals into operations. It aims to unite all corporate layers around the same goals.
Definition
COS is an end-to-end OKR and performance platform that unites the entire organization around the same goals, from the strategy office to field teams.
- Strategic Planning: Organization blueprint, mission/vision, SWOT, Balanced Scorecard
- OKR Management: Objectives, Key Results, Initiatives
- Corporate Rhythm: Strategic cycles, approval-lock flows, periodic reviews
- Performance Monitoring: Real-time dashboards, KPI tracking, progress reports
- Access & Security: Roles & permissions, data separation per workspace, audit trail
When to Use?
✅ Use COS If:
- You want to gradually spread strategic goals to operations
- You want to standardize and discipline OKR cycles
- You want to manage the Holding → Company → Department → Team hierarchy
- You want to see progress in real-time across the entire organization and make decisions
- You want to monitor KPIs and metrics from a central location
- You want to make approval flows (resource approval, OKR approval, etc.) consistent with automation
❌ COS is Not Suitable For:
- Teams just wanting project management (see: Jira, ClickUp)
- Organizations just wanting spreadsheet reporting
- Those wanting ad-hoc, singular goal tracking (ceteris paribus)
Key Objects (Object Model)
| Object | Definition | Example |
|---|---|---|
| Workspace/Tenant | In a multi-tenant setup, each customer/company has its own workspace (tenant). | “ACME Corp” workspace |
| Organization | Holding → Company → Department → Team hierarchy. | Holding / Finance / Internal Audit |
| Strategic Cycle (Cycle) | The yearly (or multi-month) strategic planning period. | “2025 Strategic Year” |
| Mission & Vision | Why the organization exists and where it is going. | “Become market leader in 2025” |
| Resource | Budget, headcount, capacity, etc. | “50-person Engineering Team” |
| Current State | Baseline metrics describing where you are today. | “Market share: 15%” |
| SWOT | Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities, Threats. | Agile capability, legacy systems |
| Balanced Scorecard | Group metrics in 4 perspectives (Financial, Customer, Process, Learning). | BSC 2025 report |
| Strategic Theme | 3–5 year strategic focus area. | “Digital Transformation” |
| OKR | Objective (goal) + Key Results (measurable outcomes). | Obj: “Customer Satisfaction”, KR: “NPS 85+” |
| Initiative | Operational projects/actions supporting OKRs. | “Mobile App v2.0” |
| Measurement | Periodic KPI updates and trends. | Jan: NPS 72 → Feb: NPS 75 |
Strategy Journey (Phase Model)
COS structures strategic planning in four sequential phases. Each phase feeds into the next:
Context: Who are we, where are we, where do we want to go? — Org structure, products, cycle, mission & vision
Analysis: Understand internal and external reality across multiple dimensions — Current state, DMA, excellence, VRIO, PESTLE, Porter, BCG, findings
Synthesis: Extract insights from analyses — Product SWOT, SWOT & strategic themes
Execution: What will we do, how will we measure it? — BSC, OKRs, measurement & tracking
Core Concepts
Ownership
- Owner: The person accountable for an OKR/KPI.
- Contributor: A person/team contributing to the outcome.
- Approver: A user with permission to approve (typically ADMIN or STRATEGY_MANAGER role).
Cadence
- Check-in: Periodic updates entered for KPIs and key results
- OKR Cycle Close: Scoring objectives at the end of a cycle and transitioning to the next
- Dashboard monitoring: Continuous progress tracking via real-time dashboards
Measurement
- Target: The definition of success (e.g., NPS 80)
- Trend: Progress over time (e.g., Jan 72 → Feb 75 → Mar 78)
User Roles & Segments
COS does not have title-based roles like CEO or CFO. Access is determined by the user's role and the organizational unit scope they are assigned to.
| Role | Layer | Purpose | Focus Areas |
|---|---|---|---|
| ADMIN | Tenant | Workspace management, user and approval operations | Platform → Users, Tenant Settings, Approvals |
| STRATEGY_MANAGER | Tenant | Strategy office workflows | Cycle planning, analysis (VRIO/PESTLE/Porter), synthesis (Product SWOT/SWOT), themes, OKR setup |
| TEAM_LEAD | Business Unit | Unit goals and team performance | My OKR, unit OKRs, progress tracking |
| MEMBER | Business Unit | Contributing to personal and team goals | My OKR, assigned key results |
| GROUP_ADMIN | Holding | Cross-tenant access and management | All tenants view, group plan information |
| SUPER_ADMIN | Platform | COS platform management (internal team) | Admin panel, RBAC, global libraries, tenant management |
Application Menu Structure
The left sidebar is organized into the following menu groups. Visible items are filtered by the user's role and plan features:
| Menu Group | Contents |
|---|---|
| Dashboard | Main dashboard |
| Platform | Tenant settings, Users, Group management, Plan info, Integrations, API Keys, AI usage, AI provider settings |
| Context | Organization structure, Products & Services, Mission & Vision, Strategic Cycles |
| Analysis | Current State, Product Scorecard, Digital Maturity (DMA), Excellence Assessment, VRIO Resource Analysis, PESTLE, Porter's Five Forces, BCG Matrix, Findings |
| Synthesis | Product SWOT, SWOT Analysis (org-level), Strategic Themes |
| Execution | Balanced Scorecard (BSC), OKR Cycles, My OKR, OKR Control Center, DMA My Tasks, Excellence My Tasks |
| Library | Resources, KPI / IPF Library, Product KPI Library, DMA template customization, Excellence template customization |
| Reports | Strategy Reports, Performance Reports, Roadmap |
The AI Assistant is not in the sidebar — it is in the top bar (robot icon 🤖). It appears when the
ai_assistantplan feature is enabled.
Common misconceptions
❌ “COS is only an OKR tool.”
✅ COS starts with strategic planning (SWOT, BSC, Themes) and connects it to OKRs and execution.
❌ “Every goal must be an OKR.”
✅ Not every operational task should become an OKR; OKRs are best for prioritized, measurable outcomes.
❌ “Phases can be done out of order.”
✅ Phases are designed to be sequential with gating rules (e.g., resource constraints can send you back to Phase 1).
Next Step: Take a look at the Quick Tour to see the main screens of the application.