This is part 3 in a series about GTD Horizons of Focus. Part 1 is GTD Horizons of Focus – A framework for success. Part 2 is GTD Horizons of Focus – How to get started.
In part one, I defined what GTD Horizons of Focus is all about. In part two, I showed you two examples of people and their Horizons of Focus. In this third and final part, I will tell you how I worked to find my purpose and values as defined in the 50 000ft horizon. Then, I will show you my GTD Horizons of Focus. Finally, I’ll take you into my cockpit and show you how I manage my Horizons of Focus in Todoist.
How I got started
When I started filling in my Horizons of Focus, I chose to approach this from two sides. The thing that made me want to work on my Horizons of Focus was that my motivation and drive kept fluctuating, but I couldn’t identify why.
At the time I loved my job, and I still do, but I knew that in order to continue to do that, I had to figure out how to keep motivated over time. I had to figure out what made me go to work every morning.
I work in a big company where strategic goals cascade downwards in the organization. By the time they reach me, we are looking at the 30 000ft level. The daily operations that fall in under my responsibility belong on the 20 000ft level.
My challenge is then to find out what to do in the projects at my 10 000ft level in order to deliver on the expectations at 20 000ft and the goals at 30 000ft. If I want some visions on the 40 000ft level, these would have to be somewhat related to the lower levels, if not I’m going to have to put in a lot of extra energy to fulfill them.
For me personally, I knew that I had to find the “right” way to do this so that I could fulfill my employer’s goals and my own goals at the same time.
You know that feeling you get when you volunteer to do something because you feel that you can really contribute by doing something you know that you master? This feeling is what I knew was needed in order to find a more constant motivation.
What’s your purpose in life? (Picture: Bigstock)
Find out what’s behind your best moments
I started to think about all those times when I was really happy with my results and accomplishments. Was it some correlations between a successful project or delivery at work and those times when I had helped someone or accomplished something in my spare time? What was the common denominator?
I knew that I liked to deliver high-quality work, but it was something more than that. After a while, it became clear that most of the time when I felt really good about what I had done I had delivered something that was solid, smart and lasting. Provided that I had the time and resources, I wouldn’t just patch things up; I would go in and fix the root-cause and build something that was even better than the original.
In my quest for purpose, I had also found my personal mission statement.
Delivering lasting improvements
My GTD Horizons of Focus
The GTD Horizons of Focus is a very personal thing. With the exception of the 50 000ft level, the below list is just an excerpt of my personal visions, goals, and projects. For obvious reasons, I have changed or simplified all work related items, and removed the most personal information.
Explanation of the codes in front of the different elements:
Visions (V)
Goals (G)
Areas of Focus (F) and Responsibility (R)
Project (P) and Outcomes (O)
50 000ft – Purpose, Principles, and Values:
Purpose: Delivering lasting improvements
Principles and Values: Loyal, clear, caring, positive, engaged, productive.
40 000ft – Visions:
V1: My company’s vision about big data, digitalization, and being “data smart.”
V2: Implement “my” solution for the whole company.
V3: Enjoy life, learn, network.
To achieve my visions, I have the following goals:
30 000ft – Goals:
G1V1: Something about digitalization, and being “data smart.”
G2V2: Get the rest of my company to use “my” software.
G3V2: Develop support for localized needs.
To meet these goals, I have to focus on the following areas:
20 000ft – Areas of Focus and Responsibility:
F1G1: Look for new ways to utilize metadata.
F2G2: Continuous improvement of software.
F3G2: Build a network across business areas.
F4V3: Exercise and stay healthy.
R1G2: Run “daily production.”
R2V3: Be a good husband.
10 000ft: Projects and Outcomes:
P1R1: Daily production tasks
P2F1: Use QR codes for document validation.
P3F1: Provide live statistics of document production.
O1F3: Learn about other parts of the company.
O2F3: Influence important decisions.
With GTD Horizons of Focus, you are in the captain seat with regards to the most important decisions in your life. (Picture: Stocksnap)
How I manage my GTD Horizons of Focus in Todoist
Let me be clear: Todoist is a very good tool for managing your day-to-day GTD, that is projects, actions, and contexts. Even with no particular support for weekly review, I have figured out a way to do this using a project and repeating actions.
Managing Horizons of Focus in Todoist, on the other hand, is a completely different story. It took me a year to figure out the below set-up, and it’s far from perfect.
The problem with managing your Horizons of Focus in Todoist is that you have to use projects. The only way to add a sub-project is to nest the projects inside each other. This is kind of OK for Horizons of Focus until you reach the 20 000ft level and want some separate responsibilities or focus areas.
What Todoist is missing is two things:
- Nested folders where you could set up a folder as a horizon-level and then put all visions, goals, and projects in the appropriate folder. That way you would be able to view all items in one level at the same time.
- The ability to manually set the connection between the elements in the different folders, what is known as the parent and child relationship.
Todoist: If you are reading this, contact me! I’m willing to work with you for free to get this implemented.
Back to how I’m managing this…
Horizons of Focus in Todoist projects
Since Todoist only supports four levels of projects, the only option is to have the four lower levels of your Horizons of Focus. This is not so bad, as these are the only levels in daily use and with dynamic content.
Color-code the different levels
For easy identification, I have color coded the different levels.
- Green: Visions (V)
- Red: Goals (G)
- Orange: Areas of Focus (F) and Responsibility (R)
- Gray: Project (P) and Outcomes (O)
The color-coding also makes it easy to know that you should not assign actions to anything but the gray projects.
The set-up to the left corresponds with my GTD Horizons of Focus as outlined above. All elements are numbered. The first number is the current element, the next is the parent element.
The first red dot is numbered G1V1. G1 is Goal 1. This goal is connected to V1 which is Vision 1.
Below G1V1, I have F1G1. This is the first Area of Focus under G1.
Below that is the first project under F1. The reason this is called P2F1 is that this is the second project I added. The first project is P1R1, almost at the bottom.
How to handle self-standing Areas of Focus or Areas of Responsibility
Because of the need to nest the projects in Todoist, I have started using a * to jump a level.
If you look at the element all the way at the bottom, F4V3, this has no parent goal but is tied directly to vision 3. If this was not tied to any vision, I would have used a * both at the vision level and the goal level.
How to follow-up your Horizons of Focus in Todoist
By clicking at the level you want to follow-up, you can easily see all related levels and actions.
Return on investment
The way I have my projects set up ensures that:
- All actions ties to projects with a defined result.
- All projects contribute to reaching a goal or fulfilling a responsibility.
- All goals ties to company goals and visions.
- I can report what I have done in order to deliver on the different levels.
- My manager gets an easy overview of my contributions.
- I can adjust course easily to ensure success.
- I’m sure that what I’m doing at the moment will contribute to the wanted result in the future.
That is a fascinating way to organize your GTD implementation so that you can see the horizontal alignment! It’s very clear. The English teacher in me would be bothered by having so many Todoist projects with nothing in them. I just switched to Todoist from Wunderlist, and I’ve found that sub-projects are really useful for aligning from the Areas of Focus horizon down. I’m working on some posts about it on my blog right now!
Hi Lindsay. Thank you for your feedback.
By using different colors, you can easily see which project (levels) are empty and which are real projects with actions. I would love to hear about your transition from Wunderlist and your implementation of horizons of focus.
Great explanation Bjorn and a job (not finished I know) well done!!
Love this explanation, thank you! You’ve greatly helped me start evaluating my own Horizons of Focus.
I recently reactivated my Todoist account (after trying to go the pen and paper route for a while) and recently discovered the ability to create “task that cannot be completed.” Have you used or considered these? They’re perfect for putting at the top of your projects as a description or break down sections within one project. I’m trying to remember the exact video I saw in which the presenter did this … but Carl Pullein’s series on YouTube uses this regularly (i.e.
)
At any rate, thanks again for your breakdown. I’m going to sit down and work on mine this weekend!
Whoops, forgot to include the “how” to create those tasks … for people who aren’t familiar with it. Just start your task with an asterisk (*) and a space in Todoist. To make it a better break, you can also bold the “task that cannot be completed” with double asterisks (**). For example:
* **THIS IS A SECTION**
As a task, it would be a bolded “THIS IS A SECTION” without a checkbox at the front.
Hi TeeJay,
Thanks for reading my blog. I’m aware of this functionality and have used it, both to create sections and for setting reminders on project level.
I’m setting up my system now using todoist, and I’m curious… How do you categorize things when they fall under multiple aof’s or aor’s? For example, there could be a project that is related to operations AND team morale AND might hit a personal AOF like creative expression.
Hi Michael,
Thanks for reading my blog. You did not give me much to go on, but could you split it? Learn X. (Creative expression), Use X to get team members to know each other better. (Team morale)?
Bjorn. I start with complimenting you with your blog. On the 30000 Ft level you mention that one of your goals is to have your colleagues using “your” software. Do you mean the GTD tools and methods? And if so did or will you manage to accomplish that?
For me too is it one of my goals to have colleagues use better methods to have clear mind and focus on the one thing that they are doing at that very moment. But it is hard to convince them as long as they are not willing to spend the time to start all this.
Hi Benny,
Thanks for reading my blog. The software I’m mentioning has nothing to do with GTD. I work in a multinational certification company, where I’m responsible for a software solution used for maintaining a huge number of document templates and generating documents. As of today, about 1/3 of the production volume is being generated in other systems. My goal is to get as close to 100% as possible, using “my” software.
When it comes to GTD, my goal is to get my company to include this as a part of their leadership training and to offer the basic course to all employees.
Thank you for this article. you can try using Facilethings. its great software that implement the GTD workflow completely including the horizon of focus.
Hi Shady,
Yes, Facilethings does a great job on both the Horizons of Focus and the Weekly Review. However, the lack of integrations makes it too hard for me to manage email. If I remember correctly, I was unable to do the weekly review on my Android devices, something that is a must when traveling.