GTD Horizons of Focus

We do actions to support completing projects which we commit to in order to maintain areas of responsibility
at certain standards, all of that becomes directed by long terms goals which we have set in order to create
our visions for our life and work, fulfilling our purposes and expressing our core values.
We are all involved in these six horizons all the time whether we are conscious of them or not. Its what
creates quite a bit of complexity about how we organise and prioritise our day and our life. You may be
inspired in your job to complete a project which will potentially create value toward your companies vision, be
supportive of your creative expression, and give you points towards a promotion or raise, which will
eventually move you towards your lifestyle and goal, but if you stay late at work to finish the project you may
be limiting your expression with your kids, or your partner at home or jeopardising your energy by sacrificing
some sleep. It would be nice if there was some simple solution or equation that would resolve these kinds of
issues, but there is not. The best you can do is to do you best at clarifying what you are about at each of the
horizon in which you operate.
These challenges have been compounded in the last decades by giving inappropriate attention to the
importance of the more operational and mundane levels. Conceptionally, of course, your life purpose and the
company purpose should be the first and most important thing to keep in mind when thinking about what to
do. The problem is, even when those things are clear, you are equally responsible to clarify the vision of what
fulfilling that vision would look like, what objectives need to be accomplished to make the vision happen,
what projects need to be done to achieve the objectives, and ultimately what physical actions need to be
done to make any of that show up.
So, in GTD terms, it is all equally important. Actually your focus should go towards dealing with what most
has your attention, if it doesnt it will most like start to command more of your attention that it should.
So if you have an irate client who is creating a furore in and around your work, trying to ignore that and focus
on your long term goals for the company will be impaired. You probably need to fix or resolve that situation
thats in your face before you can get the mental and emotional space to think strategically.
In the GTD system we start with the most mundane and work out way up from there as the different horizons
get under control. Any horizon is fine to work on. Maybe you have just changed jobs so getting clear about
your 20000ft areas of focus now at work now just have your attention, and your should get your actions and
projects in place about that first before you can reasonably deal with filing or your long term health projects.
We can use the six horizons as a check list and simply ask yourself if there are any outstanding
commitments, open loops or just areas of attention that havent been captured and integrated into your
system yet:
* How about your next years goals, plans or budgets and your work?
* Are there any transitions with yourself and your family in the next year that you need to think about and
start dealing with?
* Are there any long term, more fanciful things it is time to do something further with in terms of career or
lifestyle?
* Should you challenge yourself about what is really important to you, about your work and life and if there is
anything you need to do about insuring things are lined up in that regard?
There are two dimensions to action management:
1. Horizontal we keep track of all the diverse activities in which you are involved
2. Vertical we manage each project we are pursuing to successful complete it

David Allen's "Horizons of Focus" model is essentially a map of the six different types of agreements that you
can have with yourself. They each have a different flavor, time horizon and impact. Clarifying what your
agreements are at these levels and reviewing them as often as you need to will help you maintain a sense of
perspective about all of the minute-by-minute choices you make about what to do and what to commit to.
Here's a quick primer on what is meant by the six different levels of the Horizons of Focus:
On the Runway
These are the agreements you have with yourself about the actual physical and visible next actions you are
committed to doing. For instance, "draft growth strategy presentation," is an example of this kind of
agreement, and it would be organized on a next action list.
10,000 FT
What relatively near-term outcomes are you committed to for which you are taking many of the next actions
on the runway? The answers to this question essentially create your project list, or 10,000 ft. "Growth
strategy for 2009 presented to management team" could be the project for the previously mentioned next
action. Projects are typically outcomes that can be completed within about a year.
20,000 FT
This level represents the the agreements you have with yourself about your responsibilities, interests and
areas of focus. You can think of it as the job description for your life and work. Typically this list is about 7-10
areas. Your commitments at 20,000 ft tend to change when your life or job changes in some meaningful way.
"Responsible for leading company strategy" might be the 20,000 ft component in our running example.
30,000 FT
These are the specific and measurable medium-term goals and objectives to which you are committed. I
think about this level as the uber-projects. In other words, you're probably going to need the completion of a
whole bunch of smaller and shorter projects at 10,000 ft to actually get to the goal at 30,000 ft. The time
horizon here tends to be about 1-2 years and it helps if the agreements at this level are as specific and
measurable as possible. For instance, "Sales volume increased by 23% by June 2010" could be the 30,000
ft agreement in our example.
40,000 FT
As you get higher in the altitude of your agreements, your longer-term aspirational agreements start showing
up. 40,000 ft is all about articulating your vision. This is where you get to invent what the ideal scenes of your
work and life will look like, sound like, and feel like. More than the previous levels, you want to stretch
yourself here toward visions that will make all the work worthwhile. You probably want to reach out at least
three years if not more for these. In our running example, creating the strategy for growth could be about
eventually getting to a vision that sounds like "Our company is recognized consistently as the leader in the
field, known for innovation and breakthrough strategy."
50,000 FT
50,000 ft represents your ultimate purpose and core values, either as an individual, or as a group. It typically
takes some time and serious introspection to arrive at a clear statement of purpose and/or core values. Let's
say the company in our running example were a medical device company. The purpose could be something
like "To improve the quality and duration of life for people with diabetes." Purposes and core values tend to
not change very often, but you can always revisit it if need be.
In these examples I've shown a one-to-one link between all of the elements at the different levels - and that's
the point. If you're agreements are not aligned up to the top, you may be spending your energy on project
and actions that really don't matter according to your higher horizons of agreements.
Consider that energy follows attention. So if you clearly articulate your agreements at these levels and give
them the appropriate amount of attention, you'll likely find that you're using your energy on the right things.
We recommend holding this model lightly as the various horizons are meant to be general guidelines, not a
rule-book. For instance, if for you, 30K and 40K feel like almost the same thing - great. Success here is more
about the intention of actually articulating and review your higher agreements - not necessarily the exact
form they take.

I would tend to see the list of projects and next actions (the 10,000 feet and runway levels) as the result of
the bottom up process. This can be, at the beginning of the implementation, the result of the mind-sweep. It
provides, in other words, an assessment of what you are actually doing: your current projects and next
actions.
At 20,000 feet, you are asked to think about what are your responsibilities and areas of focus and what
should be the projects you should be involved in to fulfil your responsibilities and areas of focus.
Monitoring the alignment between the two levels involves asking yourself whether you are really doing the
right things:
* At 20,000 feet, you could ask: Are there projects which should be on your projects lists (at 10,000 feet) but
are not. In other words, are there things you should be doing, but you are not doing.
* At 10,000 feet, you could ask: Are there projects which should not be on my list of projects as they do not fit
with my current area of responsibility or area of focus (at 20,000 feet). In other words, are there projects on
my list which I should not be involved in. Should I scrap the projects in question altogether, delegate them or
assign them to collaborators.
This is why I feel giving due attention to each and every one of the six-levels is essential.
Notes:
Horizons of Focus
50K Purpose and Core Values
40K Vision
30K Goals and Objectives
20K Areas of Responsibility
10K Projects
Runway Next Actions
There are multiple levels of how you define what your work is. Somewhat arbitrarily they to seem to fall into
about six different levels, or horizons, or conversations with yourself.
If you go top down, from 50,000 feet, for example, youve got Purpose of Life, the ultimate driver, whats your
raison detre, and core values. So thats like 50,000 feet. Whats the purpose of my life? Thats one level of
conversation to have. Whats the purpose of our church? Whats the purpose of this project? So this lofty
viewpoint is the ultimate driver of every decision, allocation of resources. Are we on purpose? Meetings that
have no purpose are not effective meetings.
If you apply this to your life, your church, or organization, you say, Well, heres the basic purpose of what we
do, then the next level is the 40,000-foot level, What would the vision look like of your purpose being
fulfilled here in the world? So thats the vision stuff. Organizationally, or even personally, three to five years
out. Where are you going? If things are going as well as they could go, whats pulling or pushing on you as
you try to express yourself out here in the world? Thats the vision of 40,000 feet.
Then we say, Okay, in order to make that vision show up, lets back it down a bit. Whats going to have to be
true 12 months or 18 months from now so that that vision will actually happen. Ah! Now were coming down
to what we would call strategic planning, or annual planning. This level is what I call 30,000 feet things
that you can actually finish or accomplish that would move you toward the bigger gain.
At 20,000 feet, its a little different spin. You say, In order to get there, Ive got all these different parts of
myself and/or my organization that I need to maintain and manage. Thats what I call 20,000 feet, which
would be areas of focus and responsibility.
For instance, if you dont take care of your body, none of this is going to happen. So some part of you needs
to maintain the physical body. You also need to maintain relationships. Ive got a marriage, Im a parent. This
would be, organizationally, your work chart: Hows P.R.? Hows marketing? Hows sales? Hows operations?
Hows finance? Hows quality control?
Hows morale? Hows the staff? Hows burnout? What are all the pieces and parts of these mechanisms that
need to be maintained at certain levels and standards? This is 20,000 feet.

Now if you have those conversations, purpose, core values, vision, where were going, heres the plan,
heres all the areas we need to maintain, you look at all that, you will have probably come up with, as most
people do, 30-100 projects about all that. Get tires on my car, start an exercise program, hire my assistant,
set up a planning session with our board. All that stuff. Thats where you start to get a lot more operational,
down to projects, 10,000 feet. More than one-step things that you can finish within a year.
Now you still dont have anything you can do with any of that. But then all that boils down to what I call the
runway. Lets look at the physical action items that need to happen about those projects: the phone calls, emails, the talk to Bill, buy nails, that stuff.
So these are the different horizons essentially of work. Now, how much is knowing your life purpose going to
help you to decide which e-mail to write first tonight? Try this: a little bit.
It does help a little bit. It will help a lot more if you know what the vision of that looks like, it will help a lot
more if you know what your short-term goals are, and it will help a lot more if youve checked all the moving
parts of what your doing and youve decided what you need to do to maintain those, and it will help a lot
more if youve defined all the projects you need to do, and it will help a whole lot more if youve gotten clear
about the 140 things you need to actually do about all that, then, you might have a choice, you might have a
chance to sit down and trust which e-mail to write first.
I dont think that you can skip any one of those conversations at any one of those horizons and still trust your
choices.
Allen uses an airplane analogy to illustrate his second major model, 6 different levels of focus, and give
perspective on tasks and commitments. These 6 levels of focus, from the bottom up, are:
1. Current actions
2. Current projects
3. Areas of responsibility
4. Yearly goals
5. 5 year vision
6. Life goals
The bottom level your current to do list is at "runway" height, and the top level Life Goals is at
50,000 feet, with the other 4 areas of focus at various heights between the two. Considering projects,
actions, open loops, and other "input" from a variety of "heights" gives one varying perspective.
Self-management is about how we manage our commitments to achieve success at various horizons of
focus in our lives. Horizons include life purpose, values, long and short-term goals, personal and professional
areas of responsibility, projects and specific actions. As the CEO of your life, youre in charge of the strategy
and tactics needed to see your horizons clearly. Keep current with frequent reviews of the six horizons of
your commitments (purposes,values, goals, areas of responsibility, projects and actions).
One of the not so often talked about principles of GTD is the idea of vertical mapping. A vertical map is
basically how your actions and projects all are part of and work towards your entire life's roles, goals,
objectives, principals and values. This Vertical Map is broken into six "horizons of focus" that are broken out
from the bottom up as follows:
Runway Actions: The next physical and/or visible actions to take on any project or outcome. these should
include calendar items, next actions on your context lists, e-mails to take action on, items to review, etc.
these are the things you should be engaging daily.
10,000 ft. Projects: These are the projects and multi-step outcomes that can be finished in a year or less.
These should be part of your weekly review and should be generating the things on the runway.
20,000 ft. Areas of Focus: These should be the areas of focus in your life and areas of responsibility in your
work. This can include a high level job description, personal lifestyle checklist, etc. This should be reviewed
monthly to ensure that your projects are properly aligned with these roles.
30,000 ft. Goals and Objectives: This can include any job or personal goals you have. Twelve to Eighteen
month out items to be reviewed yearly.
40,000 ft. Vision: These are long term three to five year goals. What would success look, sound or feel like
that far down the road? How will you know it when you get there? Write it down and review this once a year
to make sure you are on the right path.

50,000 ft. Purpose and Principles: This should be the beginning of everything. What is the purpose of the
life you wish to live? What are the driving principles and beliefs? This can take the form of your faith,
personal mission statements, personal manifestos, etc.
In other words, your actions at a daily "runway" level should be directly and vertically tied to your principals
and values at the "50,000 ft" level. To get a real sense of this, look at it from the bottom up. Once you can
see and understand how a project like "Fixing up the house for move In" fits into the overall goals of life (In
my case "Relationships: Bethany: Life Partner"). It will give you a new drive and focus on the importance of
follow through on the various associated action items in the project. How are the projects you perform at
work fitting into your job description? If the project is not fitting into that description or role then is your role
changing or is that project better delegated to someone else more appropriate? There is real power in this. It
really helps you focus and align your life along a path that gives each action meaning and context.
I brought two colleagues to the Roadmap Training. It was their first exposure to GTD. I had been using it for
a couple of years. One colleague totally bought in and uses the methodology. We are 2 of the 5 members of
the leadership team. So, we now regularly work off each other to ask questions like "what's the next action?"
etc. A breakthrough came when everyone agreed to revamp our meeting style and agendas. My colleague
suggested using the Horizons of Focus as a way to plan individual meetings as well as a sequence of many
meetings. So, we will build in an annual review at the Purpose 50K level once a year, for example. And, each
meeting starts off at a high altitude and ends at the runway level of actions. It's a significant change from
having each department report out and make what amounted to announcements. We still have a ways to go,
but that's our latest report on GTD in the workplace. Love to hear more ideas.
David has implemented and outlined a strategy about mapping both horizontally and vertically:
Horizontal (The five keys to positive engagement):
* Clearing
* Clarifying
* Organizing
* Reflecting
* Engaging
Vertical (The six horizons of focus):
* Purpose and principles
* Vision
* Goals and Objectives
* Areas of focus
* Projects
* Actions
There are six Horizons of Focus Purpose, Vision, Goals, Areas of Focus, Projects and Actions the latter
including the major sub-sections of Actions, Calendar, and Waiting-Fors. Additionally, there are usually ten to
twelve Areas of Focus for people to maintain and monitor

The Six Horizons of Focus

1. Purpose
* Ultimate intentionality
* What is the purpose?
* What is the reason for this?
* Why am I doing this?
Principles
* Are there situations with other people where we need clarity?
* What are the most important standards to maintain?
* What are the critical behaviors for success?
2. Vision
What would wild success look, sound, feel like?
Create a new treasure map?
3. Goals & Objectives
What are the key outcomes and objectives to achieve to make the vision show up?
Areas of focus
What are the key areas of responsibility in my work?
What are the key areas on which I need to keep a focus in my life?
4. Projects
Outcomes that require more than one step that can be done in a year.
What should you be looking at every week.
Project list is the most critical list for stress free productivity. David Allen
Final thing to do before you get it done. Not until all done and you have unpacked!
5. Actions
What are the next single visible actions that you have to take?
As soon as something is on your radar, becomes a project, using recurring events.
What other single step actions are there?
Play at the runway level?
Your system is only as good as what you can maintain when you are sick with the flu.
All other pieces should be kept vertically in the project plan, i.e. debate between project and sub-project.
6. Weekly review
Sit down.about an hour, end of work week, build in,
Look at your calendar, maybe look at expenses, look at all the triggers.
Sunday night
Do it whenever you can do it!
Break down, work review/home review
Actions that dont get done, but stay on the list.
Dont achieve your actions, rather achieve your projects.
Different things to look at, at different times.
What Process at What Horizon
How do you go set it up! Set up the capture system!
* In basket, junior legal pads, loose leaf systems.
* Older you get, more good ideas that you get, but no necessarily dependent on where you are and when
you get the idea.
* Set up calendar and action management system
* Set up ad hoc list functionally
* Set up functioning reference system
* Structure personal, office and home thinking/working stations.
You must know that you have captured, clarified and organized your commitments at all horizons and will
engage consciously with them as often as you need.

The Power of a Positive No:

How to Say No and Still Get to Yes by William Ury; Bantam, 2007
Yes!, No, Yes?
In GTD seminars and forum discussions, we often hear from people about the staggering number of inputs
they deal with in their busy lives. Each day seems to bring more calls, emails, meetings, paperwork, inperson interruptions, et al than the day before. The challenge in managing our agreements is clarifying how
often we are saying yes. That inevitably brings up what for many of us is a greater challenge saying no.
Theres help from William Ury, in his new book entitled, The Power of a Positive No: How to Say No and Still
Get to Yes (Bantam, 2007). You may have read his previous two books, Getting to Yes and Getting Past
No. The current book completes the trilogy, but Ury calls it the prequel to the other two, providing the
foundation for the negotiation strategies he developed in the earlier books.
According to Ury, there is an implied dilemma at the root of our difficulty with saying no. In his terms, there is
tension between exercising your power and tending to your relationship. Exercising your power, while
central to the act of saying No, may strain your relationship, whereas tending to your relationship may
weaken your power. No is a powerful word, but will that power put any of my relationships at risk?
To resolve this dilemma, Ury offers a No Oreo, in which the No is the creamy center, with a chocolate cookie
Yes on each side. In delivery, each No is preceded and followed by a Yes. This metaphorical Oreo, while not
as sweet as the real thing, is palatable to the one delivering the No and the one receiving it. It starts with a
Yes! that affirms what is of value, what our personal interests or investments are in the situation. That is
followed by a firm No to anything that does not line up with our interests and values. The second Yes is a
question or invitation to collaborate on a better way for both parties to further their mutual interests.
Urys positive No begins with a Yes. When we know what we say Yes to, that provides the framework for
delivering a positive No. In GTD terms, the Yes framework is a current list of next actions for each of our
projects, based on clearly-defined areas of responsibility, in alignment with our goals. In other words, a
positive No is a runway level action based on knowing the Yes on each of our higher horizons of focus.
Ury points out that most people say no reactively instead of proactively. His suggestion for moving from
reactive to proactive is to look forward purposefully, knowing what we value. There is an obvious
compatibility with the Natural Planning Model we teach in GTD. Focusing on a successful outcome, based on
clearly defined values, is an effective way to move into the proactive state. Beginning with purpose and
guiding principles (the higher levels of Yes) it becomes clear that sometimes the best next action is to say
No.
His technique of going to the balcony to get a higher perspective is a visual parallel to the GTD practice of
reviewing at several horizons of focus. Ury says that on the balcony, we can more easily see the level below
in the context of higher values. Of course its easier to climb to the balcony if the stairway has been cleared
by a weekly review. What Ury describes as viewing situations from the balcony is how we would describe
seeing the runway in the context of projects at 10,000 feet and areas of responsibility at 20,000 feet.
Ury illustrates his method with a wide range of examples. Some are global, such as his own work with the
United Nations to avert conflict in Venezuela; or historical, such as his description of Sadats visit to
Jerusalem in 1977. But he also provides some examples that are surprisingly personal, including one about
a relative dealing with addiction. This range of examples helps to emphasize that the skill of saying no
benefits each of us individually, and applies just as importantly in our larger group relationships.
The Power of a Positive No is from one angle a manual for business negotiations. From another angle its a
self-help book for those of us who need more practice saying no. Either way, its a valuable tool for improving
our GTD skills.

Three-Dimensional Self Management

For many years I have been teaching about the horizontal and vertical aspects of productivity. Horizontal
represents the ability to quiet distractions and maintain a complete and total inventory of things to do across
the whole spectrum of our day-to-day engagements. For instance, when you have a phone and time, you
have available every call you need and want to make and your head is clear enough to make them.
Basically, youre feeling OK about what youre not doing, because your available list of options is complete.
Vertical represents the ability to view what youre doing from the appropriate horizon and to shift your focus
as required. You analyze your strategic plan in one moment, answer e-mails in the next, reconnect with your
core values when you need to, review all your projects weekly, tweak your lifestyle visions with your partner
creatively and proactively.
Youre facile in your ability to frame which kind of thinking you need to be doing, about what, and when. Its
about both control and perspective. And if self management can be interpreted as how well our actions
match our priorities, or simply how good our choices are about what were doing, then we must have equal
capability in each of these dimensions to be at our best.
Can you have one without the other - control without perspective, or vision without control? Ultimately, no. If
youre out of control, its almost impossible to maintain appropriate perspective. And if you cant see things
from the right altitude, youll lose control at some point. But relatively speaking, yes there can be an
imbalance.
On a matrix of control vs. perspective, there are four quadrants: low control and low perspective, high control
and low perspective, low control and high perspective, high perspective and high control. Each of these is at
least a little familiar to all of us as a state we may find ourselves in.
1. Low control, low perspective = the Reactor. Driven by latest and loudest, working simply to relieve the
most obvious and immediate pressures and pains.
2. High control, low perspective = the Micro Manager. Obsessed with containing and ordering detail,
neglecting the Why question and the bigger-picture realities. Constrained with inordinate structure and lack
of flexibility.
3. Low control, high perspective = the Crazy Maker. Fabulous ideas, by the minute, unrealistically
overcommitting focus and resources. Lack of appropriate structures and systems.
4. High control, high perspective = Master and Commander. Keeping the eye on the prize with attention to
critical detail, holding steady with a firm but flexible hand.
Which one describes you, today, right now? Are you reading this essay to avoid getting more control or
perspective, or because you have them?
Im in and out of each one of these configurations, several times a day. I may start out having gotten it all
together, sailing ahead as the captain of my ship. I then get a crazy idea, make one phone call, and turn my
world upside down. I get overcome by the new problems or possibilities and Im crashing on rocky shoals. In
my excitement or nervousness I then decide to prune another tiny branch off a maple tree outside my office
(can I get control of something, please!?) No matter. The key is not forever staying at optimum perspective
and control its having a good GPS system and knowing how to right the vessel and get back on course
when it wavers and when I get around to getting it together again. This was the inspiration for my latest
version of our public seminar, and why its called The RoadMap to chart the currents of the waters of
control and perspective (and the lack thereof), so we can more easily identify where we are and what kind of
activity and focus will have the most value for us, at any moment. Most peoples initial positive experience
with the Getting Things Done method is centered around the getting-control aspect making sense and
getting a handle on all the stuff coming at us and clogging up our brains and our lives. Rightly so, because
you must pay attention to the level that most has your attention, first. But once we have things relatively
stable, there must be an equal focus on the right focus. We need to know and trust why we are subscribing
to that magazine in the in-basket, not just that we can park it in Read/Review. Is it something thats getting us
to where were going, mapping to whats really important to us now, or just momentum from an old inspiration
that needs updating, and should be canceled? Getting Things Done (GTD) is about making sense of and
managing multiple priorities, with the best models for rapidly gaining control and perspective critical for self
management.

But hey, whats the third dimension? Ah, its acknowledging and consciously engaging with that which
constantly pulls us, guides us, and impels us toward creativity and coherence. Its the recognition and
participation with something that promotes perspective and control, almost magically, and yet trancends
them. Its the thing that, in the worst and best of circumstances and when it often makes no sense, gives us
the experience of acceptance, surrender, intuition, courage, and forgiveness. Its our heart.
The salvation of this human world lies nowhere else than in the human heart, in the human power to reflect,
in human meekness and in human responsibility. Vaclav Havel