Another attempt at implementing GTD horizons in Omnifocus
 

I took the document example from the end of David Allen's Making Things Work and shaped my OmniFocus document to match for each major domain I am tracking. It's working really well so far. The best part is that the context view will culminate all the purpose, principals, visions, goals and areas of focus into one list. It took some work to setup but it seems like the most reasonable implementation of the GTD horizons I've tried so far. So far, every time that I do something like this, I end up going back to the no folders, all single actions go into Miscellaneous setup. It's so much simpler when things are really busy. It seems that I can get turned off by too much organization. Especially if it takes too much time. But I've always been missing the upper horizons. Comments, criticisms, other ideas? Enjoy...

[IMG]http://img707.imageshack.us/img707/2765/horizonsprojectview.png[/IMG]


[IMG]http://img694.imageshack.us/img694/5118/horizonscontextview.png[/IMG]

This is also something I've never been able to implement.

My opinion on this... is it could be done in an outlining fashion.

The way I work with outlining is, create a project, then list all actions that I know it would take to complete the parent.

If I get to an action that isn't really an action, then I create children of it that move that parent toward completion.

In my ideal world, this is how I see horizons of focus working. It's not implementable in OmniFocus. It's not implementable because you can't complete folders, and to attempt to organize by using folders to create an outline appears maddening. I've tried this a couple times but it breaks down when I attempt to list my life purpose and principles. I create a folder for each of the visions, then a folder for the goals and objectives inside of the vision, then areas of focus, but when I get down to the project level I have so many different nests of folders that it is difficult to see all the projects easily. It's also difficult to remember what horizon I should be listing out at that folder outline level. Even having the ability to change folder colors would help. The other difficulty is to easily find horizons of focus that don't have any projects in them and are not moving forward.

Visions and life purpose may not be completable, as these are things for me to strive toward. For the 40,000 levels and down, those are completable long term goals. Putting them in a folder doesn't allow me to complete it. I know this is a small thing, but I want to be able to complete a long term goal.

In order to do this in OmniFocus, I think there would need to be some sort of outlining structure that would walk me through creating goals and life purpose. A structure that would not rely on folders, be outlineable, and have the different horizons labeled so I know what horizon I am working on.

I would like the ability to complete long term goals when I reach them. The ability to review long term goals like we do with projects so I can make sure they are on track. I envision being able to zoom in and out of those horizons, only looking at what is on each level and not seeing all the projects.

Starting with 50k, life purpose, I would only see the children of it... 40k, children. I would list out the children, then zoom in to that first child and only see the 30k, list out the children there. Then zoom into the 20k. However, this could be maddening as well. I would want to see the entire outline in case I needed to move a vision or goal around.

For example:
If I have a 50,000 level of life purposes. I take the first life purpose and then brainstorm... what would this look like in 5 years. This would be my 40,000 foot.

Then I take the first 40,000 foot level and ask, how can I move this vision closer to completion under 5 years.

This would be my 30,000 and ask, what can I do to move this forward in under 3 years. This would be my goals and objectives.

Then take that first goal and ask, what can I do to move this forward in under a year.

Then I take that first area of focus and list out what projects would it take for me to complete this. These would be my projects. Then I take the project and ask, what actionable steps do I need to do to move the project forward. These are actions.

One problem I've found with this method is GTD breaks at the 20,000 level. Allen calls this areas of focus. But when I've gone through this in the book, there seems to be a gap between areas of focus and the goals and objectives. That is to say, areas of focus don't tie into completing goals and objectives. They are more areas of responsibility, and some of those responsibilities fall outside of vision. Things like... changing the oil, and all the mundane things that we do. True, I could create a hierarchy with a vision of something like... be a responsible human or be self sufficient or just a maintenance vision or goal. However, every time I've attempted to do this, I hit a roadblock with the organizing of it all.

It's almost as if the areas of focus are outside of the goals or outside of the horizons all together. Projects are under the goals, vision and other horizons.

Completing a project should move me forward toward a goal, which should move me forward toward a Vision, which should move me toward my life purpose. Areas of focus is the red headed stepchild of things outside my life purpose.

In theory, I should be able to start at the bottom with all the things that are taking up psychic space, and then ask myself, where does this project belong in my 50,000, or any of the other levels. Then objectively look at the horizons and see what I want in my life, things that I don't want I can then say no to or just resign myself that they are things that I need to do to keep my life running. And then add visions, purpose and goals and brainstorm projects that move me toward those, working up and down the horizons.

Then again, maybe I have the answer and am just resisting using folders to implement. Thanks for stirring this up again for me. Maybe it's time for me to try it again.

Thanks for the response spiral. I see I'm not alone. Well, I was right. I have abandoned this model already. Having all of my projects organized this way is just not flexible enough for the speed that my world changes. Also, I found myself spending too much time figuring out where things are supposed to go when processing my inbox. Oh well, back to my trusted documents outside of omnifocus. Seemed like a good idea at the time. :-) Good luck to you!

I've been back and forth with this too. As I just said in another thread, I've found that this time when I've re-set up OF, I'm only putting in "true" projects (writing Successful Outcome: xxxxxxx into the note of the title). I have one SAL for maintenance type things, but that's it.(And even that isn't the big, giant list of maintenance...I keep it in OO but choose a few things to get done and put them into the SAL.)

I'm using OO for 'everything else'. So far, so good. But on what Spiral brought up about Areas of Focus being the stepchild...I've resisted the Areas of Focus label somewhat. Like you said, I don't consider it a Focus that I have all my medical info, prescription info, insurance info etc. organized and accessible. It's more an Area of [i]Responsibility[/i].

I'm still re-building my system. I have one OO document called Areas of Focus, but I don't like Medical living alongside of Photography. I think I'll either rename it to Areas of... and separate things that I consider to be responsibilities from things that I [i]choose[/i] to spend my time on (Photography, Outdoor Activities, etc.). Or I may make it into two separate lists.

Thanks for the discussion.

My apologies to any red headed stepchildren out there. It was just an expression. :)

I think it's possible to do this with folders. I have some hang-ups about not being able to complete folders and what not. Along with not being able to put a folder into an 'on hold' status. But maybe these are excuses for not wanting to think about life purpose.

What stopped me before is typing out the GTD descriptions of what the horizons are. I was then creating folders underneath those descriptions and that let to over organization. That and resisting going through the 'work' of setting up the organization and thinking about what I want to shoot for in life.

Here is a mock up of how I think this could work with the current implementation of folders. I would probably get use to the indentation of folders and may not need to put 50k in front. This is where I think folder colors could come in handy to help me organize.

One nice thing about OmniFocus is the ability to focus on a folder by double clicking or selecting and then clicking on the focus button. This would allow me to zoom in and out of horizons.

Another nice thing about using folders is... everytime I create a new project, I would need to place it into the hierarchy. I would be reminded why I'm doing the project and how it relates to the big picture.

I chose End World Hunger as a life purpose for this example. While this goal is full of hubris, it was the first thing that popped into my mind. I won't have this as a life purpose in my own focus, but encourage others if they feel led. :)

Why not shoot big for life purpose? Life purpose doesn't have to be attainable. It's a driving force that propels you through life and helps to motivate. Anyway, enough rambling... here is an example of what horizons could look like in OmniFocus.

I haven't gone through this with my own projects. My plan is to go through each project and ask myself... why am I doing this project, then create the goal, vision and life purpose. Just like GTD, I'll start from the bottom up. Then look at the life purpose, and weed out what doesn't feel right to me. Work my way top down to bottom.

The real test is to see how much overhead this adds to daily living and processing of GTD.

[QUOTE=daymnaf09;73880]Not to sound too harsh, but WHY would you even come here to try to secure interviews after all of the hard facts that have just been presented to you? Your chances of finding legal work are zero.[/QUOTE]

Did you post this in the wrong thread?

[QUOTE=SpiralOcean;73925]Did you post this in the wrong thread?[/QUOTE]
If you look at the other posts from this user, you'll see that they are all equally nonsensical, and that the homepage linked in the profile offers Russian mail order brides...so yes, they posted in the wrong thread :-)

[QUOTE=whpalmer4;73926]If you look at the other posts from this user, you'll see that they are all equally nonsensical, and that the homepage linked in the profile offers Russian mail order brides...so yes, they posted in the wrong thread :-)[/QUOTE]

Brilliant work whpalmer4! :)

Such an odd thing to do. I wonder what payoff the forum member gets from this? Posting in the forum doesn't give them any clicks unless a user goes to their homepage and orders a Russian bride. It's a strange world we live in.

I've been suspicious of this poster since their first post, but they never had any of the usual links in their signature or posting. I only saw the homepage due to a trackpad accident, to be honest :-)

To bring this back on topic, I suspect the user has a short term goal of improving their rank in search engine results by building a network of links. Perhaps that's part of a longer term goal of seeing more lonely Russian women find happiness and fulfillment.

I wonder if they are using OmniFocus to reach their goals? ;)

[QUOTE=curt.clifton;73940]Perhaps that's part of a longer term goal of seeing more lonely Russian women find happiness and fulfillment.[/QUOTE]

Very thoughtful to provide photos of the lonely Russian women one might be helping, too, gives it that personal touch :-)

Preface: Had I started this from scratch, I probably would have put it in an 'extras' forum, but since this thread already exists, here goes.

I've decided to pull my Horizons of Focus (above 10k', that is) out of OF, and put them in OO. In OF, I have each horizon established individually, e.g.:

50k'
..Purpose 1
....Optional details

40k'
..Value 1

It might be useful to set up the outline so that all level 1 items are 50k', level 2 are 40k', etc.:

Be happy (50k')
..Find a lifelong Russian soulmate wife (note: I'm just following the thread; I have respect for all peoples of the world) (40k')
....Learn Russian (30k')

... however since I often have arbitrary levels of outline detail for each horizon, I can't imagine how/if this would work. The thing that attracts me to doing it the way I have described, is that the relationships between horizons are more directly visible. I'm new to OO; perhaps I could use text style to imply horizons. How have others successfully used the outline format to containerize their horizons?

Bob

Bob,

I keep everything above 10k' in OO.

I tend to like to retain a history of my goals. For example, my five year goals evolve over time, but I want to keep a record of what my five year goals were a year ago, and two years ago, and so on. Similarly, I want to keep track of my annual and monthly goals. I find that occasionally looking back over the evolution of my goals is a useful exercise.

Because I want to keep these snapshots, I haven't used a nesting strategy like you suggest. Instead, I keep separate OO documents for different levels. In my one year goals document, I have top-level items for each year (e.g. goals for June 2010 as set in July 2009). Under that I have my various life roles. Under that I have specific goals. Similarly, in my monthly goals document, I have top-level items for each month (e.g., goals for March 2010), with roles then goals under that.

There's a fair amount of duplication with this approach, but that's easy to accomplish. (Omni ported the ⌘-D hot key for Duplicate from OF to OO.) The benefits for me are two fold. First, as mentioned, I can review the evolution of my goals. Second, I can open the appropriate document to lift my eyes as high as I need to for my current review without obsessing about higher levels. During a weekly review, I can scan over my monthly goals. I don't have to spend much energy on annual goals then, because I'm confident that my monthly goals contribute to the longer term ones.

I think your approach has merit. It provides more context and motivation than the approach I'm using. If you do decide to pursue the hierarchical approach, please report back on how it's working.

Curt,

Thanks for that, very useful.

As much as I've scoured the web, and even with some direct interactions I've had with davidco folks, I've never seen anyone use the 'one big hierarchy' approach. I'll toy with it and report back, but there may be reasons why keeping them separate is better / has less friction.

One thing is that I may have several higher level horizon items, lets say, 'Relationship with wife', 'Health', 'Be financially frugal'. At a lower level, I may have as a focus, 'Improve my cooking skills'. By cooking healthy meals, I am supporting my health, my relationship (the latter by simply cooking ;), and my financial goal (by not eating out as much). More later,

Bob

[QUOTE=curt.clifton;74190]Bob,

I keep everything above 10k' in OO.

I tend to like to retain a history of my goals. For example, my five year goals evolve over time, but I want to keep a record of what my five year goals were a year ago, and two years ago, and so on. Similarly, I want to keep track of my annual and monthly goals. I find that occasionally looking back over the evolution of my goals is a useful exercise.

Because I want to keep these snapshots, I haven't used a nesting strategy like you suggest. Instead, I keep separate OO documents for different levels. In my one year goals document, I have top-level items for each year (e.g. goals for June 2010 as set in July 2009). Under that I have my various life roles. Under that I have specific goals. Similarly, in my monthly goals document, I have top-level items for each month (e.g., goals for March 2010), with roles then goals under that.

There's a fair amount of duplication with this approach, but that's easy to accomplish. (Omni ported the ⌘-D hot key for Duplicate from OF to OO.) The benefits for me are two fold. First, as mentioned, I can review the evolution of my goals. Second, I can open the appropriate document to lift my eyes as high as I need to for my current review without obsessing about higher levels. During a weekly review, I can scan over my monthly goals. I don't have to spend much energy on annual goals then, because I'm confident that my monthly goals contribute to the longer term ones.

I think your approach has merit. It provides more context and motivation than the approach I'm using. If you do decide to pursue the hierarchical approach, please report back on how it's working.[/QUOTE]

Sorry to bring up an old thread, but I'm in the middle of setting up OO for goals and Curt's explanation gave me some ideas, but also confusing me.

Could you explain more how you keep the snapshots of your goals? If I'm reading your post I get the feeling you have each month for each year in your 1 year goal document, ie:

1 Year Goals 2012
- April 2012 (as set in april 2011)
-- Goal X
-- Goal Y
- May 2012 (as set in may 2012)
-- Goal XX
-- Goal YY

Doesn't this mean you'll have to set new 1 year goals each month? How do you prioritize goals early in the year opposite to goals later that year?

Hopefully I misunderstand your post because I would really like to understand the snapshot concept you're using.

I'm finding that OmniFocus is great for the lower Horizons..... The runway, projects, and areas of responsibilities....

I just struggled to get up to the higher levels. I guess I wasn't quite ready even though I was wanting and willing..... I had previously done it in OmniOutliner but I found myself not really looking at it as much as I should.

I remembered seeing a mindmap in the David Allen's first GTD book and decided to see if I could do one for myself.

I started doing a mindmap in in MindNode (free at the Mac App Store) because I'm a newbie at Mindmapping. I was impressed by the simplicity of MindNode and decided to purchase Mindnode Pro for $20.00 at the Mac App Store. In there, I created a jpeg image that I used as my desktop background. Whenever in doubt, I would use Expose to hide all the windows to reveal my mindmap which was my desktop background.

Later, I upgraded up to Mindjet MindManager and that's when my upper horizons started clicking for me. I haven't quite gotten up to "Purpose" but I'm sure I will someday.

Right now, I'm trying out the beta for NovaMind 5 and it is looking like the program I'll be switching to. It seems a bit more Mac Friendly. NovaMind 5 is in beta right now with an official release in the next couple of months.

I like being able to looking at my mindmap as a graphical map as well as in outline mode at the same time. it has helped provide greater clarity for me.

I never really felt like a mindmap fella until I started tinkering with it fairly recently.

I think mindmap programs are better suited for the higher Horizons of Focus whereas OmniFocus is the better tool for Runway, Projects, and Areas of Focus/Responsibilities.

I've just stumbled across Goalscape. Has anyone used it? There are hardly any reviews of it, but it looks interesting. Unfortunately I've got to do too much at the moment to start the trial period.

[url]http://www.goalscape.com[/url]

Uh, I just saw it's really expensive...

[QUOTE=buntbinär;95659]I've just stumbled across Goalscape. Has anyone used it? There are hardly any reviews of it, but it looks interesting. Unfortunately I've got to do too much at the moment to start the trial period.

[url]http://www.goalscape.com[/url]

Uh, I just saw it's really expensive...[/QUOTE]

Well, expensive is relative concept. If that US $130 gains you $1,300 worth of productivity then it is worth it.

It gets fairly hard to find "productivity" software that is dirt cheap. Look at Omnigroup's software prices and you'll get an idea. They're not cheap but they more than make up for their price with the productivity boost if used wisely.

NovaMind and Mindjet Mind Manager are at $249.00. So I guess $130 is relatively cheap if you're trying to go up the GTD Horizons.

Goalscape might be the right tool for you. At the moment, I'm using Mindjet and enjoy every penny spent. Sometimes you just gotta buy the right tools. To waterblast my roof, I have to buy a water blaster. I can't use a toothbrush to do the work....

Just watching their screen shot demos .. it looks a lot like the theory behind " life balance " from [url]www.llamagraphics.com[/url]

top goals with sub goals and all rated in relevance to the structure above it . Neither is a replacement for OF . but Life balance is 49 on the mac app store and there's a iphone version for 19 [cheaper than goal scape ]

Life Balance is billed as a " total life manager " but it and I"m guessing goal scape are good tools for managing the " higher levels " on the GTD runway .

I'm not too keen on Life Balance. I can't really gauge Life Balance but it seems like customer support is poor. After personally going through Now Software's Now X debacle, monitoring SOHO Organizer and its lack of customer support, and the moaning/groaning of Cultured Code's Things, I tend to be wary of companies that don't respond or at least have an active user forum.

I was just looking at customer reviews for Life Balance on macupdate.com and it doesn't look too good.

Goalscape sure does look nice though. But I guess I like the more freeform method that Mindmanager and NovaMind offers me.

But I am keeping Goalscape in mind if/when I find myself stuck in mind map land....

I was a life balance user for years [pre OF and it's OP predecessor ; ) they are hard to gauge ..but the customer support is actually very good , they're very passionate about their product , but also very passionate about keeping their lives in balance so they only grow so big because of lack of updates etc . tried the demo of goal scape .. made my head spin, very complicated . Life Balance is too clunky to use for every day task management [I only use it for goals ] goal scape is clunky squared : )

aaahhh.... thanks for the heads-up about Life Balance.

I guess I just discovered mind mapping after ignoring it all these years so I'm currently enjoying doing the higher horizons that way right now. I'll have a look at Goalscape and Life Balance as a Someday/Maybe project.

I used to just use OmniOutliner for that kind of stuff but it's interesting to see it from another perspective.

NovaMind 5 has a view where you can see your mind map and outline at the same time. So that's where I'm at right now.

I wil take a look at nova mind for sure .
I use Inspiration for mind maps right now and it also lets you see the mind map as an outline . Inspiration is lower level than nova mind .

[QUOTE=fedex;95270]Sorry to bring up an old thread, but I'm in the middle of setting up OO for goals and Curt's explanation gave me some ideas, but also confusing me.

Could you explain more how you keep the snapshots of your goals? If I'm reading your post I get the feeling you have each month for each year in your 1 year goal document, ie:

1 Year Goals 2012
- April 2012 (as set in april 2011)
-- Goal X
-- Goal Y
- May 2012 (as set in may 2012)
-- Goal XX
-- Goal YY

Doesn't this mean you'll have to set new 1 year goals each month? How do you prioritize goals early in the year opposite to goals later that year?

Hopefully I misunderstand your post because I would really like to understand the snapshot concept you're using.[/QUOTE]

Mattias,

Finally saw your post. Sorry for being AWOL from the forums. Life has gotten in the way lately.

I keep one document for One and Five Year Goals and one document for monthly goals. The top-level items in my One and Five Year Goals document look like this:

[CODE]
- [-] Goals set August 2010
- [-] June 2011 Specific Goals
- [-] Sharpen the Saw
- [ ] …
- [ ] Support and nurture my relationship with Lisa
- [ ] …
- [ ] Help manage our household
- [ ] …
- [-] Take time to have fun
- [ ] …
- [-] Create useful systems and propagate knowledge of computing
- [ ] …
- [ ] Build and sustain relationships with friends and family
- [ ] …
- [ ] Serve others and build a sustainable society
- [ ] …
- [ ] June 2015 Overarching Goals
- [ ] Sharpen the Saw
- [ ] …
- [ ] Support and nurture my relationship with Lisa
- [ ] …
- [ ] Take time to have fun
- [ ] …
- [ ] Help manage our household
- [ ] …
- [ ] Create useful systems and propagate knowledge of computing
- [ ] …
- [ ] Build and sustain relationships with friends and family
- [ ] …
- [ ] Serve others and build a sustainable society
- [ ] …
- [-] Goals set July 2009
- [ ] …
[/CODE]

Each year I create a new item like the one above, setting new yearly goals and refining my five year goals. Two key ideas for me are to keep the number of goals relatively small and to treat the goals as guiding principles for decision making, not as "must do" items that simply impose guilt.

I keep my monthly goals in a separate outline. I set monthly goals based on lots of inputs, including reviewing my one and five year goals. The top-level items in my monthly goals outline look like this:

[CODE]
- [-] April 2011
- [ ] Keep the Saw Sharp
- [ ] Maintained normal sleep schedule
- [ ] Trained for the Mini with dedication and enthusiasm
- [ ] Support and nurture my relationship with Lisa
- [ ] Talked regularly
- [ ] Enjoyed visit
- [ ] Help manage our household
- [ ] Fixed hot tub faucet
- [ ] Got signed lease for renting house
- [ ] Corrected crawlspace mold/humidity
- [ ] Found housing in Seattle
- [ ] Listed stuff on Craigslist
- [ ] Take time to have fun
- [ ] Got RoseTime into the app store
- [ ] Provided solid feedback on OO beta
- [ ] Create useful systems and propagate knowledge of computing
- [ ] Did not go to the office on Wednesdays!
- [ ] Drafted SE and CS descriptions and differences, with the
vision task force
- [ ] Delivered 373 in a sustainable way
- [ ] Delivered 220 in a sustainable way
- [+] Build and sustain relationships with friends and family
- [ ] Serve others and build a sustainable society
- [ ] Sang in choir for Easter
- [-] March 2011
- [ ] …
[/CODE]

I keep that document open on my desktop, hoisted to the current month, to help with decision making.

Hope that helps.

welcome back!

I've started to get into mind mapping and can already see how this can be created in MindJet!

I keep my own personal Life Map open in MindJet all the time.

I've learned that even if you just bring the window to the front once a day or even once a week, you can refresh yourself about the progress that is being made towards the one year and five year goals.

I was following the recommendation of Dr. Dini about just practicing the piano. Even if you don't intend to practice the piano today, just brush your fingers along the keys to keep your awareness of it in the back of your mind.

So, I only do an intensive review of my Life Map once a quarter, I do just open it up. I never know if some spark flashes before my eyes and I make some revision to my Life Map!