Operately is an open source company operating system designed for startups and growing teams that need structure to execute on goals without relying on a COO. It replaces scattered spreadsheets, Notion templates, and disjointed tools with a unified system that connects vision to daily work through automated check-ins, goal tracking, and team accountability.
Built with Elixir and React, Operately provides a full-stack solution with a self-hostable backend, real-time collaboration features, and a modular architecture. It supports deployment via Docker Compose and offers a comprehensive API for integration, making it ideal for technical teams seeking control over their operational infrastructure while maintaining proven workflows for goal execution.
What You Get
- Goals / OKRs - Track company-wide objectives with measurable targets directly linked to projects, replacing manual OKR spreadsheets with automated progress visualization.
- Project Management - Manage tasks with boards, milestones, and ownership tracking, replacing tools like Asana or Trello while keeping work tied to strategic goals.
- AI Executive Coach (Alfred) - An early-beta AI that reviews goals and projects, identifies gaps, and provides operational feedback to improve execution discipline.
- Team Spaces - Dedicated organizational homes for departments to manage goals, projects, and documents with role-based access and context-rich collaboration.
- Message Boards - Centralized, threaded discussions that replace scattered email threads and Slack channels to build shared understanding across teams.
- Execution Cadence - Automated check-ins and reminders that enforce consistent progress reviews, ensuring goals stay active and updates happen on schedule.
- Team Management - Onboard users, define roles, and manage permissions across spaces, goals, and projects to maintain structure as the company scales.
- Documents & Files - Centralized storage and organization of documents linked directly to goals and projects, eliminating fragmented file systems.
Common Use Cases
- Running a startup with remote teams - Founders use Operately to align distributed teams on OKRs and project milestones without constant meetings, using automated check-ins to maintain momentum.
- Scaling a SaaS company beyond 20 employees - Operations leads implement Operately to replace chaotic Notion wikis and Excel trackers with a structured, auditable system for goal execution.
- Managing product roadmaps with engineering teams - Product managers link quarterly goals to sprints and task boards, ensuring progress is visible and outcomes—not tasks—are measured.
- Ensuring compliance and data control - Legal and compliance teams self-host Operately to maintain full ownership of company data while enforcing access controls across departments.
Under The Hood
Architecture
- Clean separation of concerns with Elixir context modules encapsulating business logic, permissions, and data access, decoupled from HTTP handlers
- TurboConnect.Query modules enforce explicit input/output schemas and layered action pipelines for consistent API behavior
- React components leverage TypeScript interfaces and pattern matching to render state-specific UIs, with hooks abstracting routing and data flow
- Tight integration between frontend and backend via generated API clients and shared naming conventions across directories
- Dependency injection is implemented through well-defined context modules, enabling testable and modular service layers
Tech Stack
- Elixir/Phoenix backend with Ecto and PostgreSQL, powered by Mix for build automation and custom code generation tasks
- React and TypeScript frontend with Vite, Tailwind CSS, and React Router DOM, complemented by a proprietary Turboui component library
- Docker-based development environment with isolated services for database, storage, email, and monitoring tools
- Ruby-based tooling for license scanning and Elixir test suites using ExUnit, with comprehensive feature testing
- Automated code generation for pages, APIs, and migrations, with Prettier and Projections enhancing IDE navigation and consistency
Code Quality
- Extensive test coverage spanning unit, integration, and end-to-end scenarios with mocking and factory-based test data
- Robust error handling with custom error classes, structured validation, and graceful degradation in UI loaders and API responses
- Consistent naming, modular design, and strong type safety across both frontend and backend, enforced by compile-time checks
- Automated linting, CI/CD pipelines, and test helpers ensure uniform patterns and reduce regressions
- System-level feature tests include screenshot capture and external dependency mocking for reliability
What Makes It Unique
- Native activity streams that automatically generate audit trails from domain events, eliminating standalone logging systems
- Unified mutation/query architecture via TurboConnect that embeds permissions, transactionality, and audit logging into a single declarative pipeline
- Event-driven email system that generates templates directly from structured activity data, removing external templating dependencies
- Server-side page loaders that pre-fetch and validate complex nested domain models, enabling zero-initial-fetch client rendering
- Bidirectional data transformation layer between snake_case and camelCase built into the API client, ensuring seamless type-safe communication
- Extensible activity serializers that dynamically serialize diverse domain events into reusable, structured JSON payloads for consistent UI and analytics