GTD Horizons of Focus: Setting Up Purpose, Vision, Goals and Areas in an App

The six horizons, and the question each one answers

David Allen describes commitments as stacked altitudes, from the runway of next actions up to purpose. Each level answers a different question, and each one gives meaning to the level below it.

A useful test: every active project should be traceable to at least one area of focus, and most areas should be served by at least one goal. Projects with no home above them are the first candidates for the someday list.

Why most apps stop at areas of focus, and what it costs

Almost every task manager can express projects. A few (Things, Nirvana, OmniFocus with folders) let you group projects into areas. Very few give you goals, vision or purpose as objects you can edit, link and mark as reviewed. Todoist and TickTick leave you with labels or parent projects; OmniFocus users build perspectives and folder hierarchies; Things users keep areas and put the rest in notes.

The workaround is a document somewhere else: a page of goals in a notes app, a vision statement in a drawer. It works for a month. Then the review becomes a two-tool exercise, the document drifts out of date, and the higher horizons quietly stop influencing which projects you start and which you drop.

• Zombie projects survive. Without a link to a goal or an area, nothing in the review asks whether a project still deserves to exist.
• Goals never get a next action. A goal that is not connected to at least one project is a wish. You only notice at year end.
• The monthly review has no material. If areas, goals and vision are not in the system, the only thing left to review monthly is the same project list you already reviewed weekly.
• Two sources of truth. The moment the horizons live in another tool, one of the two is out of date, and you stop trusting both.

How The Over Achiever models the horizons

In The Over Achiever, the sidebar has a Horizons of Focus section with four entries: Purpose, Vision, Goals and Areas of Focus. They are not notes; they are objects with links between them, so the chain from purpose down to a single next action is explicit.

• Purpose and principles: one purpose statement you edit in place, plus a list of principles and values. Each can be marked as reviewed, and the app shows how long ago you last read them.
• Vision: entries that describe where you are heading, each linked to the goals that get you there.
• Goals: entries linked to one or more areas of focus, so every goal has a home.
• Areas of focus: your roles and responsibilities, each showing the goals attached to it.
• Projects carry an area of focus, and tasks belong to projects. That is the link that makes the review meaningful: from any project you can see which area it serves, and from any area you can see what is actually being done for it.

The same structure is available on iPhone, iPad, Android and the web app, on one account, synchronised in real time. You can define your areas on the large screen on Sunday and attach a project to one of them from your phone on Tuesday.

Setting up your horizons in the app, step by step

Plan about thirty minutes for the first pass. Work bottom-up: areas first, because they are the easiest to name and because goals and projects hang off them.

1. 1

   List your areas of focus

   Open Horizons of Focus → Areas of Focus and add one entry per role or responsibility: health, family, finances, your team, a product line, professional development. Aim for six to twelve. If an area has nothing you actively do for it, it may not be an area.

2. 2

   Attach every active project to an area

   Go through your project list and set the area of focus on each one. Projects that fit nowhere get a decision now: create a missing area, move the project to someday, or drop it.

3. 3

   Write your goals for the next one to two years

   Open Goals and add each result you want, phrased as an outcome ("launch the web version", "run a half-marathon", "savings cover six months"). Link each goal to the area it belongs to. Three to seven goals is plenty.

4. 4

   Give each goal at least one project

   A goal with no project has no next action. Create the first project for each goal, or link an existing one by putting it in the same area. This is where the higher horizon starts producing work on the ground.

5. 5

   Describe your vision

   Open Vision and write what work and life look like in three to five years, as if it were already true. Link the vision entries to the goals that lead there. If a goal supports no vision, ask whether it is really yours.

6. 6

   State your purpose and principles

   Open Purpose, write one or two sentences on why you do what you do, and list the principles you will not trade. Mark them reviewed. You will read them again at every monthly review.

Which review looks at which horizon

The reason to model the horizons in the same tool as your actions is the review. The Over Achiever has two guided reviews, with a step-by-step checklist you tick off, and the monthly one is built around the horizons.

The weekly review (eight steps) stays at the ground and project level: capture loose ends, empty your head, clarify the inbox to zero, review next actions, review waiting-for, review the calendar, review projects one by one so each has a next action, review someday and ideas.

The monthly review (six steps) lifts the view above the runway:

1. 1

   Review your areas of focus

   Is each area getting the attention it deserves? An area with no project for two months is either fine on its own or neglected; decide which.

2. 2

   Review your goals

   Progress made? Goals to adjust, add or archive? A goal still without a project goes to someday or gets one now.

3. 3

   Review your vision

   Still the direction you want for the next three to five years?

4. 4

   Read your purpose and principles

   Mark them reviewed, and ask whether the current project portfolio aligns with them.

5. 5

   Projects portfolio check

   Kill zombie projects, start what matters next, using what the four previous steps just told you.

6. 6

   Celebrate the month

   Completed projects and habits: acknowledge the wins before you plan the next batch.

Both reviews have a reminder you set in the app (a weekday and time for the weekly review, a day of the month for the monthly one), and the notification fires on your phone.

A worked example: four areas, three goals, one purpose

Here is how the horizons of a freelance designer might look once they are in the system. Notice that every project has an area, every goal has a project, and the vision is only two sentences.

Two projects (taxes, holiday) serve an area without serving a goal. That is normal: areas are maintained, goals are achieved. What you want to avoid is the opposite, a goal with no project underneath it.

Common mistakes when adding the higher horizons

• Too many areas. Twenty areas is a to-do list in disguise. Merge until each area is a genuine responsibility you would recognise in a job description or a life role.
• Goals written as projects. "Set up the newsletter" is a project. "1,000 subscribers who open it" is a goal. Goals describe results; projects describe deliverables.
• Reviewing purpose weekly. The weekly review is for keeping the runway clean. Reading purpose every week dilutes it; monthly is enough, and once a year rewrite it.
• Linking everything to everything. A goal linked to five areas serves none of them. One area per goal, one or two goals per vision entry, keep the chain simple enough to read at a glance.
• Skipping the celebration step. The last step of the monthly review exists for a reason: a system that only ever shows what is missing is a system you stop opening.

Frequently asked questions