NEWS: Since recording this video Notion added the feature to enable a template with an embedded (linked) database to filter by itself as part of the template design, removing the need to manually change the filter after applying the template. Instructions on this new feature are here: twitter.com/NotionHQ/status/1257794305520885760
Hey August...still working thru the system. Working up the alignment zone now and got to this next level with Goals. Got the two DB's setup and really amazed at the links between the two and how those interact with projects especially. Very powerful relations. Was just working thru the page templates and saw this comment. Don't fully understand how this implements. Is there a better video explanation out there somewhere? Have you done one?
my mind is blown every day watching this series. i have rewatched the first 20 or so at least twice each (i kept trying to make each page or section as you went over it, but i really needed to start with the guiding principles and work my way back down to action items). at work, i'm just an individual contributor, but i've been trying for more than THREE YEARS to launch a nonprofit and a few related programs for it to operate. today, i finally have every level in place, and i feel so light and ready. i did make some tweaks to the setup (i couldn't wrap my brain around how pillars would work in a pyramid and couldn't entirely understand the differences between pillars and value goals, so mine is a sunburst diagram like this www.aculocity.com/labs/sunburst-chart or this support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-a-sunburst-chart-in-office-4a127977-62cd-4c11-b8c7-65b84a358e0c, with the core being my guiding principles and then each ring emanating from and supporting the core being the goals, goal outcomes, projects, and action items.) but i just could not be happier about my new system and filtering through my various task lists to see what makes the cut (i.e., what aligns with a project). plus i feel like a wizard after implementing that filter on the template (and figuring out how to create the template). you're the wizard! and so generous to give us all this. thank you!
@@LisaBernard Amazing Lisa, fantastic! Congrats on all your progress and hard work. Always feel free to customize and modify. However the Pillars confusion is my fault, I explained it badly -- will be doing a new Pillars video soon to correct the record. Short summary is Pillars are NOT aspirations, Value Goals are entirely your aspirations. Pillars are merely an organizational breakdown of your entire life into categories that cover every section of your life, such that every aspect of your life will fit into one or another Pillar. More on that soon.
@@augustbradley i am not surprised that you had such a gracious response :) you are excellent at explaining! i'm back to watch the next group in the series, on the reviews. my system is set up and operating, and i love it! i'm still learning, but so glad i'm making this switch. looking forward to more of your videos and newsletters. thank you!
The combination of Notion, your incrediibly powerful training videos, coupled with your excellent systems is finally allowing me to create a Life Management System that previously I could only dream about! Your ground-breaking work is very much appreciated.
Thank you Stephen! Means so much to me to hear this. I completely know what you mean, I went through the same process of discover and empowerment through Notion system design. Cool to have a community here committed to this kind off growth.
I'm not familiar with coding or all the features of Notion, so it took me a bit of research to figure out how to recreate the "Progress" bar used in the "goal outcomes" table. Here's the formula I found: slice("▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓", 0, round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + slice("░░░░░░░░░░", 0, round((1 - prop("Completed") / prop("Goal")) * 10)) + " " + format(round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 100)) + "%"
Hello! I'm sorry it didn't worked for me I don't really understand why. I clicked on properties I've created a new Formula and then I clicked on the column under it and I tried to copy paste it. Was it wrong ?
You are literally a genius!! How could you integrate all these things together sooo smoothly and cogent? I am so impressed and I cannot express my gratitude more. You completely changed my perspective on Notion and on life. I am your big fan from now on.
Thanks Liang! Awesome to hear this was helpful. I love thinking through and designing this stuff, then try it on myself and with clients to find what works best. Lots of trial and error to get here, but totally worth it!
Having these two separate yet connected goal databases is a life-changing concept to me. Now I have both my rational and emotional self taken care of. Thank you, August, for the insight on achieving goals!
As usual, a solid outing. I find myself pausing the video, adding to my current LOS and moving things around as they come up. Although I can't wait for you to have gone through everything, it's great that you have gone into detail on each section to build up the system! Thank you.
Thanks so much Amy, really appreciate this feedback. I can't wait until I have gone through everything too, I have exciting ideas for what to do next. But first we must cover the system! Thanks for your support.
@@teryyy5052 and @Amy Holms, I do this as well :). @August : your videos are indeed packed with very very valuable insights, I can't thank you enough for the positive changes watching them has brought to my own system !
6 hrs into these series, I wanna say that I'm amazed. I'm one of those people who wants to be in control of everything of their life and I've tried so many ways already. I've been using notion for about half a year now and I'd thought I was using all the features and the second video in this series proved me wrong and I realized how amateur I was. I had no idea what i'd been missing! thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom ...
**Video Summary** 0:00 Intro This episode will cover goals, specifically the 2 goals databases, how they relate to each other, and how they fit in the middle of the alignment zone. 0:24 Goal Alignment It's very important that your system has the high and low levels very clearly interlinked and aligned. At the same time, you need to have clear prioritizations in terms of what matters most in terms of the goals you are pursuing and how to measure and evaluate whether you're progressing on them. The way you accomplish your goals is to establish projects which move you towards your goals. Projects are made up of tasks which are the individual units of work that advance you towards completing the projects. Goals are in service of your values and your aspirations and the things you want to become in your life. 2:18 View of the alignment zone dashboard. The previous video covered the project's database. 3:00 In the goal pipeline are the toggles for the 2 goals databases covered briefly in the alignment zone dashboard. Value goals These represent things you value, that you want or hope for that are important to you but are not really measurable. August found that if you just start to list your goals they usually don't come out as things that are very measurable and if they're too specific, they feel very transactional and cold. e.g. I want a thriving business. Goal Outcomes These are the very specific things that are measurable and trackable. As you evaluate whether you are moving toward or away from your goals, you know whether you've accomplished them because they are specific, measurable, and quantifiable. Eg. I want to create and launch 3 products for my business. A relation between each goal outcome and value goal is created. Having this 2 step process makes the goals more meaningful and engaging while also creating actionable outcomes. Value goals might have multiple goal outcomes that are added constantly as each is achieved. They will last much longer until you no longer value them. Goal outcomes check off to a different status once completed. The system OKR (Outcomes and Key Results) works quite similarly to this, you can change your terminology as you please. 8:55 Database Setups Since the goal outcomes are measurable we have a progress bar similar to the one seen in the projects database. If you just make a subjective judgment on the progress of many goals that might be difficult to quantify you can keep a reasonable eye on what's getting done. These metrics are only applicable to goal outcomes with the status 'underway ' 10:00 Each goal outcome has a status (as do the value goals) Underway Paused For goal outcomes that started, but were stopped. Waiting For goal outcomes that are waiting to be started when you have the time. You can assess when to change the status of these in the cycle reviews. Off Track Complete 11:30 Goal outcomes have a Term to help sort by grouping. 3 months 3-6 months 6-12 months Over a year They are also assigned downwards to projects, in most cases. Sometimes you just have a series of tasks or a habit. In most cases, you achieve a goal outcome by coming up with a project and working on them. In some instances, you just have a series of tasks or a habit (e.g. august wants to read and summarize 20 leading books in his field, the daily reading hour is a habit in his habits database) Every single goal outcome must have a project or a habit/routine. 12:50 peek into habits database. 13:45 Value Goals Workspaces Example: building extraordinary knowledge in field Status Priority Challenges (what you might need to overcome to complete it) Category Goal Outcomes 14:40 Workspace Questions Why this value goal? How will you achieve this? Create the goal outcomes that are going to get you there. The workspaces in value goals aren't used very often in comparison to the projects. 15:51 Goal Outcomes Workspaces The workspaces in the goal outcomes are used quite frequently sometimes. Often you will have many projects to get to a specific goal outcome. You don't want all the knowledge in a project to be locked away when the project is completed. The pertinent knowledge which may be valuable across multiple projects should be aggregated in the goal outcome workspace. 16:20 e.g. Create and launch 3 products. Questions: Why this goal outcome? How will you achieve this? Steps: Projects A table to help us see which projects will help us achieve the goal outcome. Each project is linked to action items which are all linked to tasks. Each project can easily be clicked into to check the tasks that need to be done with some additional info. 19:00 This entire space is created using a template The template includes filtering by goal outcome 19:30 20:11 Closing Thoughts This is all about being very specific and deliberate, making sure the tasks that you're doing day-to-day are connected to the higher-level aspirations of your life. This is the mid-level connective tissue. After looking at the project's database in the previous video, the goals in this video the next will look at the pillars and the pillar supports, then the cycle reviews will come after that. By having the databases in this pyramid hierarchy it's very easy to do a periodic assessment to keep things on track.
Your education and wisdom transcends the Notion tool (even though you're a guru of that!!). What you emit is a philosophy which is as inspiring as it is crystal clear. You are an empitomy of someone who has reached deep down inside and sought a bunch of clarity which you have contemplated, organised and then implemented through this Notion system (and I am sure in all areas of your life). You are a truly inspiring human as much as you are good at Notion. The way you speak and explain is a projection of the clarity, confidence and structure you hold in your mind. I am truly grateful that you have shared this with us!
I have continued to study the PPV. This morning, in response to a question about continuous improvement, I introduced a management team in one of our factories to the concept of Value Goals and Goal Outcomes.
Hello Mr. Bradley, thank you for your series on Notion and it has helped me organize my studies, my hobbies and my life :) Please keep doing what you do!
Thanks! Awesome to hear this was helpful. Lots more to come, working on some cool new things for the channel and the community growing around it. Glad you've joined us!
@August I'm making my way through this unbelievably, immersive experience. Each video gives me so much energy and motivation. For years I have struggled to pin down my true values and hence the sail of my ship changes direction, resulting in my mind and actions being pulled in multiple directions. This can be frustrating and time confusing to get back into the flow zone. I have one confusion at the current moment. I am struggling to differentiate between goals and projects. I have created non specific, wide value goals such as being a competent, compassionate doctor and develop financial security & growth, however the goals from these just end up being projects. I would very much appreciate a deeper exploration of these fundamental principles so I can make a easily understood, achievable system.
I'm just starting out mid to late December 2020, preparing for the new year. I started out trying to input all my current stuff to the system ie my current to do's & projects & goals but they're messy & hard to connect & making them mesh is hard but I'm finally at the point where I'm able to start planning from the top down & I can't wait. It's going to make everything so much easier.
I absolutely love your videos! I’ve been adapting these principles into my own personal system within Notion and I cannot thank you enough for showing us how to relate actionable items into a bigger purpose. I’ve just graduated college and find myself needing “structure” to sculpt my life and guide it towards a better destination during this unsettling era. While I’ve got a fewer fluffier names for my databases I have never been so inspired to put my desire to become a better human into action. Thank you August! I can’t wait to support more of your work 😊
Thanks! Means a lot to me to hear this. Very happy that it's been valuable to you. I wish I had started using something like this shortly after college, my life would have been much more effective :) Took me a while to get here, so happy to share it with others on their journeys. Lots more to come!
I’ve watched this video a few times now but seemed to miss the bridge aspect of this from actionable to higher level. One play on words that I appreciated as this is the bridge. Value Goals - Goal Outcomes have goals as the bridge between these realities.
I just wanted to say thank you for all the work you’ve put in to these videos and all the knowledge you are sharing. I look forward to your videos every week and I can already see measurable improvements in what I am able to accomplish.
I am really enjoying this process. The system you've developped is helping me organizing my thoughts, idea's and moving forward with my projects! :) I am staring to get the hang of the thought process of the system and excited to know this just the beginning. Looking forward to learn more! Thank you August! :)
Awesome to hear this Evert, means a lot to know it's impacting people's lives. Congrats on your progress. The system implementation itself creates a lot of self leaning.
Hi August, I wanted to say a huge thank you for your videos and your system and the details in explaining the interlinking of it. I'm totally new to Notion and found it searching for a place to bring my content calendar online which also would tie "everything together". You have opened my eyes to what is possible with Notion and I have spent the last week watching and learning. I can't wait for all your new content to come online. And would really like to know more about your beginners' course if you are putting one together. You are the most productive Rabbit whole I ever found myself in learning about a very needed system I didn't know anything about before coming across your videos.
Thanks Silka! Awesome to hear this was helpful. I am developing a beginners course and a community platform. The course is probably a couple months away, hope to have the community launching in a few weeks. Lots more to come. Glad you've joined us!
Greetings from México, August, i’d enjoy all your videos since the beggining. On the other hand, i’m consultant in quality management systems and i always was looking video with this grade of high organization. Sorry about my english but i want to say thank you for you ideas and support.
Hi August! Just wanted to start off by saying I came across your videos while researching how to use Notion to organize university notes, and I am absolutely enthralled by your comprehensive use of Notion. I am currently slowly going through all your videos to set up my version of the life operating system, and I am very glad I came across this gem :) your clear explanation of incentives and detailed navigation of your dashboard allowed me to really understand your decision-making behind your life OS, and makes for a very understandable and engaging series :D this series is something I didn't know I absolutely needed With that said, I am currently struggling to decide whether I should have all my projects have a goal outcome. I can assign all of my projects to specific value goals. However, almost all of my goal outcomes have only one project, so isn't it a bit of a waste of time to create a goal outcome for every single project that I make? Should I just link my projects to value goals directly? If possible, I would like your opinion about this. Thank you!
Thank you for the work that you are doing. I am slowly but surely making my way through these videos. Something I struggle with is seeing exactly where you have each page stored. For instance, I have been unable to find out where your default databases live. I am hoping it all becomes clear by the end of the series. I have really enjoyed understanding what Notion can do for me.
Hi Sean, thanks for the feedback and I'm very happy this has been valuable. I have shown glimpses into the database asset storage, and will cover it more thoroughly in the PPV overview videos coming in about 2 weeks. But to give you an answer now, ALL of my databases are stores in one of the three primary organizational folders: Pillars, Pipelines or Vaults. The action oriented ones like Action Items (tasks), Projects, Goal Outcomes, Content Pipeline are all under "Pipelines". Information and Knowledge storage is in the Vaults, so that includes databases such as Books Vault, Media Vault, Knowledge lab vault. The Pillars and Pillar support vaults (such as Habits & Routines) are in the Pillars folder. And the time-based databases (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual) are all in the Cycle Review folders because they are cycles that have specific review intervals. Dashboards are typically in the Dashboards folder of course. I will explain all more thoroughly in the PPV video in a couple weeks (right after we finish the Vault videos).
@@augustbradley Thank you so much for your response! This is great and I really appreciate it. You should really think about a Patreon! I'd love to support you!
@@MrSwetz1 Thanks Sean. I'll be launching a membership community at a low price in the next few weeks. Want to give more value with a product offering like that than just asking for money on Patreon. Then will follow that up with some courses.
Hi August. Great job you are doing here sharing Life designing. A Question! Why cannot we combine Goal Outcome and Project database to remove one layer of extra data base between Value Goals and Task database ?
coming back here after ending the serie, such an awesome one ! how do you share workspaces / pages or project with coworkers and still keep your system without doubling the items/projects/goals ?
Hey August! I was wondering if you could help me with differentiating between goal outcomes and projects? Conceptually I understand that projects should be the stepping stones to your goal outcome, but I am having a hard time either making my goal outcomes too narrow (too much like a project) or too broad (like a value goal). As a result, I have found a lot of redundancy when assigning tasks straight to projects, and projects straight to value goals. Maybe it would help if you could provide another example. Anyone, feel free to help me out on this! Aside from my confusion, thank you so much for producing such information-rich content. I am not kidding when I say that you have saved me so much stress and mental anguish from having a lack of alignment and direction when it comes to making a task-management system. I hope you know you are reaching your goal of impacting a greater community!
Thanks Braden, really appreciate your feedback and support! It really means a lot to me to hear this. Goal Outcomes should be bigger and more ambitions, beyond what a single project can achieve. I suggest you set bigger longer reaches for the Goal Outcomes if you are having trouble distinguishing them from projects. Set goals that will take a year or two or three, and make your project aiming for a 1 to 3 month time frame. Goal Outcomes are higher level than Projects. Projects are designed to move you toward the Goal Outcomes, you could have several Projects needed to get you all the way to the goal outcomes (or could be just 1). Projects are an undertaking (what you are actually doing/executing), Goal Outcomes are, well, an outcome -- a measurable end result. I have videos on each to help clarify.
@@augustbradley Hey August! I know a lot of this system is based on GTD, but in GTD projects are anything that require more than one consecutive task. I've been having some difficulty, like Braden, understanding where & how to draw the line between projects and goal outcomes. This is my understanding, is it accurate?: Projects - Conceptually meaningful chunk of tasks that deliver value once completed. Goal outcomes - basically SMART goals - Measurable goal posts that are easy to come up with projects to try and hit those goalposts. Awesome videos, thanks for sharing this with us!
@@lucasdellabella1270 PPV is not based on GTD, it as an alternative that solves what I see as many of the problems with GTD and a more modern approach that better leverages modern tools (particularly Notion). GTD was never capable of so much of this since it was created for less capable tools (with a limited framework of what is possible). GTD defines "Projects" way too small, that clutters your workflow with far too many Projects - that then never get done. This is one reason so many fail to stick with GTD. It's better to have a higher hurdle for what qiualitfies as a project, then give more attention and deeper check-ins on the few more highly prioritized projects (with a dashboard giving you a full overview of everything related to the project). Goal Outcomes are higher level than Projects. Projects are designed to move you toward the Goal Outcomes, you could have several Projects needed to get you all the way to the goal outcomes (or could be just one). Projects are an undertaking (what you are actually doing/executing). Goal Outcomes are, well, an outcome - a measurable end result. Hope that helps!
@@augustbradley Awesome, thanks for clearing up my misunderstanding. Makes total sense. It seems that your task chains are the middle ground between "not worthy of being a project" and "too complicated for a single task". Thank you so much for the response!
Have you even tried breaking goals down into shorter time frames? Such as a yearly goal broken down per quarter. Would love to hear your thoughts on it.
Awesome, just as usual. August, as an IT guy with a database creation and management background I've faced a problem in Notion. Let's consider the following example. We have three related DBs with two consecutive relations (Goal Outcome -> Value Goal -> Pillar). Using these two relations I would like to construct one relation (Goal Outcome -> Pillar) to avoid redundancy with having a separate relation (Goal Outcome -> Pillar), which may easily contradict the Pillar from the respective Value Goal. The example above can be extended in a way to get a Pillar for each Action Item automatically from superior databases through corresponding relations. I think this feature would make the design of the entire system much nicer and efficient. I thought it can be done through rollups, but I haven't succeeded. I'm pretty sure you faced this kind of problem as well. What's your "philosophy" in this matter? Thank you!✌
You're right ProExcept, it can be done through rollups, I've managed to do it both ways (upstream and downstream ie in the pillar DB get the tasks associated to the goals values / goal outcomes / projects and in the task DB get the pillar to show up). I'd be happy to help if you need a hand in configuring the rollups. You can send me an email if you'd like :) Edit : I managed to make something work that's not exactly what you want, @ProExcept, sorry, I got carried away by my enthusiasm 🙄 !
@@sandrinem.-z.6115 Thank you. Imagine, this morning before I saw your reply I've suddenly realize how to make it done properly) Energy follows thought! Thanks for the response, I hope it will help people. Have a good day!
@@sandrinem.-z.6115 Well, it seems like I need help anyway because I've faced one more problem. I've sent an email to you. I much appreciate your help.
I have a feeling that August didn't make templates for these as after all the videos in the series this is a good time to start practising to make our own databases and these aren't too hard to create especially when @Sarah Cho pasted the code for the progress bar code: slice("▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓", 0, round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + slice("░░░░░░░░░░", 0, round((1 - prop("Completed") / prop("Goal")) * 10)) + " " + format(round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 100)) + "%"
Hi August, if you do see this comment, i am curious to know why the categories in the value goal DB don't match with the pillar groups. Thank you for your amazing content.
Dear August, Thank you again for sharing freely this whole system, it gave me a real fresh start in my life management. After a few months of implementation, I still face difficulties with having simultaneously the value goals and goal outcomes. Do you still maintain both in your current system on the day to day basis? I understand the difference between the measurable aspect and the broader value but it leads me often to rephrase the same goal in two different manners. Would greatly appreciate your thoughts and experience about this specific point. Thank you
Hello @augustbradley What can I say that hasnt been said before. Thank you so much for creating and sharing this system with such excellent videos and supporting material. I've reached video 17/37 from the Focus and alignment system and slowly implementing the system in Notion. Hopefully soon I will master it all. At the same time, I also pray Notion continues to exist as a tool for years to come as the implementation of PPV is so dependent on it.
Thank you so much for this, August! It is of extraordinary help! Just a small question, any reason why 'Pillars' are not attached to Value Goals intentionally? I don't see the Pillar column in Value goals.
August, I love your system! I notice you classify everything throughout your system as a category of business, family, or growth/health. How would you fit volunteering into your system? Would your volunteering goals, projects, pillars, and tasks fit within one of those three categories or would you add a fourth category?
It's a good question! I, similarly, have creativity as something that I want to include, but not everything within that is for profit. I went with "Endeavour" over business, to include work/business, but also other things that don't quite fit.
Hi August. I would love to hear more about how you integrate your book readings/summarisations with the rest of your OS to internalise them. I recall you mention in a previous video the mindset & identity sculpting where you put significant things you have come across. However, I want to know if you have a system for better internalising 20 books. This can be a lot of content, even when summarised!
Another great video! I'm curious if you align the quarter assigned to a Goal Outcome with when it starts, when you plan to work toward it, or the target completion date. I'm also intrigued by your Priority assignment for Goal Outcomes and how those work (since they appear to just be a number). Finally, how does the "Always" Priority under Value Goals differ from the five ordinal priorities? Thanks August!
Good questions Geoff! Quarter is aligned in my approach with when I plan to do and complete it, so it could be over more than one quarter. There's room for personal preference here. Priority in Goal Outcomes is a minor issue, just an option if you want to sort the list manually by ranking them, I don't usually bother with this, not essential. The "Always" Value Goal priority is a way of grouping similar-status items together. The priority setting is entirely for sorting purposes, and some things (such as family) aren't really deserving of a priority ranking, they are perpetual. So I have Always to designate that, and to have them grouped together in the sorting. Great questions.
@@augustbradley Very much appreciated. You are one of the most generous people I've ever come across and are truly an inspiration. I just started your series a few days ago and did my first weekly review last night, and I was proud to enter you in my Gratitude field for this week.
Hi, great videos and specially, great concepts you use to track daily activities to get your life dreams into reality. Thank you so much. I was wondering if you are planning to show how to build the Goals data bases. I am having some problems to understand the relationships once you put them in a New line in the Goal outcome or value goals. Thanks
Hi August, thanks so much for all of this amazing content! Quick question -> I'm a little confused how the "quarter" database interacts with the various other databases. Do you cover this in an upcoming video by any chance?
Hi August, in GTD exist the 20.000 feet special level which is role and responsibilities. I can't see anything which looks like that in your O.S. (I've seen pillars video too). Where and when do you manage that to trigger your system? Value give you drivers to your goals, R&R give you another kind of drivers. Thanks
Hi Patrice, good question. Roles & Responsibilities would fit within the Pillars, and then any changes or advancements (aspirations) would be executed through Value Goals/Goal Outcomes/Projects. If there are no specific objectives for change and maintenance or organic growth is what;s desired, it would be maintained or advanced through "Habits & Routines" (which has it's own database and is tracked fro progress in the Data Tracking database). During Monthly and Quarterly reviews, they are examined and refined as necessary. That seems to me to thoroughly cover it, though I would be interested to hear your thoughts if you feel something is being missed. While I have a great deal of respect for GTD and use some elements of it in my system, I think it does over-complicate some things and adds unnecessary complexity in instances. Always a balance.
Hi august! You mentioned that all goal outcomes must have projects, but can it be possible that a goal outcome has only tasks? Say for example I have a 2 week school break now, and hence more time to do more exercises. I thus set a goal to ‘Run 30km in this 2 weeks’ and ‘Climb for 10hours in this 2 weeks”. However I cant seem to think of a link to a specific project for each, as I can simply link action items directly to each goal outcome, for example ‘6km run on 22june’ which I would have put in my action database and linked to the goal.
The running objective you gave as an example sounds more like a Project than a Goal Outcome. Outcomes are desired end results, Projects are more process-oriented. The Goal Outcome would d be a bigger end-result, such as reach a specific weight level or get your running speed up to a certain pace. The goal of running 30k per week is a project to get to the goal outcome of improving your speed or loosing weight or something like that. Makes sense? If a Goal Outcome can be achieved in a couple tasks, then it's not a big enough reach -- aim for something bigger and higher that takes more work to get there.
If I would replicate your setup, where would I put the Value Goals and Goal Outcomes databases? Under Pillers or Pipelines? For the Value Goals I can image that it falls under Pillers, while Goal Outcomes would be better suited within Pipelines. I'm curious where you placed them. Thanks!
Where do do these databases live in the left hand panel? I am also trying to figure out how to organize all of these databases/pages in the left hand panel. This would also include all of the pages for each category listed under each pillar in the command center
Can Value goals have projects attached? Or habits & routines? or does that simply mean you didn't specify the specific goal outcome to the value goal, connecting the projects / Habits & routines to the value goals. In Other words: do all projects / habits&routines have a goal outcome or does it make sense to have some projects / habits&routines directly related to value goals, without goal outcomes in between?
Lol 2 year after. But Personally if the value goal doesn't have precise and measurable goals that I want to achieve in that moment (maybe I just want a "maintenance” of that value goal in that moment), then I will link habits and routines for example at that specific value goal )
I keep seeing the relation to quarters but I haven't yet found the quarter database in your videos. Would you be willing to point me in the right direction?
"Goal Outcomes" are one step above "Projects" in the pyramid. For example, in the video, he talked about "building a thriving business" as one of his "Value Goals." To make it clearer and more actionable, the "Goal Outcomes" is "create and launch 3 new products." But that's still very high-level. So the next step is to break it down into "Projects." For example, each new product is one "Project." And under each "Project," August will have specific, more granular tasks. Hope this helps.
@@small_strides Thank you for the explanation, as I have the same problem understanding the real difference between Projects and Goal Outcomes. But I still have problems when I try to use the system and fill all the fields in the various tables/pages. Let's just say that I'm trying to use Notion PPV... to create Notion PPV! So, my Value Goal here is "Optimal Self-Organization", and examples of tasks are like "Watch that video of August Bradley", "Build that Project database" etcetera. At this point, I'm stuck: what connects my tasks to my Value Goal? I've created a project called "Build Notion Life OS - PPV", but then what is the Goal Outcome that links the Project to my Value Goal? Or maybe should I set my "Build Notion Life OS - PPV" as a Goal Outcome and let it without underlying projects? If you (or others) would like to help me understanding this point, I would be extremely grateful! Thank you in advance!
@@melchiah4925 Let me attempt an answer. Firstly, if you're just starting out using his system, don't worry too much about the Value Goals/Goal Outcomes categorisation. David Allen's advice in Getting Things Done is to have a solid grasp of day-to-day execution, and then these higher-level stuff will come eventually. Focus on building the Action Zone and Projects Dashboards (and probably a habit tracker too). Once you are familiar with the system and can see results, then you can expand and start thinking about the Value Goals/Goal Outcomes. According to August, Value Goals are less quantifiable, whereas Goal Outcomes are. For example, taking your Value Goal, a possible Goal Outcome is "Not having to work on weekends" or "leave the office at 6pm sharp on 2 days a week." Let's say your Value Goal is to be a wealthy person, then possible Goal Outcomes could be "see my investment grow 10% yoy," or "save 30% of monthly income." Hope this helps. :)
Hello August! Recently I found Notion and it was just a matter of time until I found your channel. I was looking for some ways to increase my productivity while quarentined and got all jobs postponed, since I work with video creation. I have to say that your channel is awesome and I really resonated with your content. I was researching PARA structures inside Notion but your method looks better and is more mindful, now I'm in the process of creating something like your system. I'm eager to see your Client space, Vaults and the way you store content and references/notes within your areas/pilars. Also, do you use google drive? I'm still trying to figure a way to use them together.
That's great Popy, really happy you found us here. And I agree, PARA is too limited for Notion. Those additional sections are coming in the series, working my way systemically through the system 🙂. I use Google drive and Dropbox, but at this point there are no integrations, that is coming in Notion but not sure how long.
@@augustbradley Awesome, August! Thanks again for your effort and the value you're bringing to us. I just finished implementing what I called the 1st phase of your system. Eagerly waiting for those sections and how you review your cycles. I'm new to the review thing and after reading a lot of minimalism and productivity content in the past days I think this is the step that I'm missing and will benefit a lot form.
@@augustbradley I was just watching your Notion Office Hours live with MP and I was able to extract most of things that were still confusing me from there. Still need to understand some things but I believe I have everything that I need to kickstart and try your awesome system.
Thanks August - your system really resonates with me. Enjoying linking up the various levels. It was interesting when you changed the way you were showing the task status. I was already doing something similar. I am interested in what you do with your client projects.... I have a number of Project databases defined by Client type (or the work within that client type) and then a personal project database. At present I am showing these as separate toggled Projects within the Execution Pipeline - I cannot see a way of having them in one database. [They were all over on the left-hand side of the flow chart as a list of databases feeding in]. I can then link to these databases (just makes, for instance, the Task database quite wide as it has 5 different columns for the different Linked Project databases (each task only linked to one project database) would be interested in your thoughts. Exceptional as always - really looking forward to find out the detail of how you do the reviews/cycles as the glimpses from the other videos whetted the appetite!
Hi Gary, thanks so much for the feedback, it's awesome to hear this. Means a lot to me that it's working so well for you. I will get to the client database at some point in the series, until then here's a little info about my approach: The client database is not just a duplicate/replica of the Projects database, it is doing all that and more. If a client is "Active" then essentially whatever we're engaged on together at that time is an "active" project (the entire Client entry in the database is, to me, a big high-priority project if it's active). Then depending on how big the scope of the project is, we could have sub-projects broken out in our shared client workspace or even in a sub-table embedded within. Each client engagement has a workspace just like in the Projects DB pages, but they are shared with the client so we are both working in it. It has different DB field properties than the Projects DB, and is often more of a dashboard with more sub-pages and shared resource organization. I'll do a future video on it.
August Bradley : Notion Productivity thanks August. Thanks for taking the time to give an in-depth response. Yes my work DBs have different fields depending on the type of work etc. E.g Accounts work DB / Payroll DB etc as the work within these is similar I can have the clients who I am doing that work on within each of those DB. I have a Client DB which has the links to the other work DB that relate to that client and therefore within their Client DB page is a dashboard for that client with all the linked projects and within that the linked tasks etc.. Then in the Action Zone under projects I have filtered each Work DB for Active ones eg “Active Accounts” under a toggle. I also have “Accounts to get in” under a separate toggle. It is working for me. None of this is linked with the actual client - it is just a way of me keeping track of my workflow. I am doing a weekly review but less so monthly or quarterly - they are more just an extension of the weekly review (which is duplication) so I am really looking forward to your video on the review/cycles to see how I can leverage these. I am working through my Goals and Goal outcomes at the moment. Have always had goals, but they have been more Value Goals with little measurability (very loosely linked to some of my projects - more mentally rather than actually). So producing Goal Outcomes linked to the Value goals and projects and pillars is amazing. Look forward to letting you know in a few months/ a year how that has progressed my Goals .. Thanks again.
I'll be honest, I rushed over this and quickly built the framework. But I missed the crucial distinction between Value Goals and Value Outcomes; my Value Goals were less idealistic and more outcome orientated, which created a confusing system that I sadly neglected because I felt intimated. For example, rather than having a catch-all for fitness, I had several separate goals that would've all sat under an "exceptional Fitness" umbrella. It made the system feel spread to thinly, and I began paying less attention to individual goals and giving less of a defining role in the system. So my advice to avoid the same mistake is: listen to August. Keep it simple, embrace Systems thinking and don't let two database become interchangable.
Hello August, First, thank you very, very much for all the work you've done and the teaching you're offering us on this platform. I am starting in Notion and would like to implement your system. I have seen every video up to this one (for now) but i'm still struggling for one thing : Implementation. You detail a lot (a very well) how everything is structured, the logic behind it and the backbone of the system; but I still don't really know where to start in Notion. Do I start by creating a bunch of pages, then link other pages to them ? Which page do I start with ? Do I create one database at a time ? As a beginner in Notion I'm still a bit confused about how to really create this. I subscribed to your newsletter and downloaded the templates but it's still unclear for me. Is it possible to do a video of the process of creating these things in Notion now that we know the purpose of it ? Again, thank you very much for your hard work, a very friendly hug from France ! (sorry my english is not perfect) Theodore
Hey August, I'm very close to finishing to completing my own goal outcome and value goals database! The only obstacle I have left to get through is how to make the progress bar. Are you going to make a tutorial on how to make these things anytime soon?
Congrats on your progress Samuel! For the progress bar, just copy/paste the formula from here for the style you like: www.notion.so/Progress-Bar-b908b8a1e4804ca5a6ababb313b216bc
Hi August. Great video again. It’s awesome the way this system links the higher aspirations to lowest level tasks, and makes sense. However it feels harder to do bottom up. What if, for example, one is ‘given a project’ which can’t be refused - there may not be a measurable goal outcome in existence. What are your thoughts on this kind of situation? Many thanks
@@DavidEsp1 yes good one! I had also considered something very similar - like ‘carry out my job function to the best of my ability’ - it could be a good (valid) catch-all for a number of projects. It could be enhanced further by making it measurable like ‘complete accepted projects in original time frame’, or some other marker. Perhaps the latter is the goal outcome, and the former the value goal….. Many thanks for your reply. 👍🏻
August thanks for your videos, I'm a total Notion newbie and I'm still getting the hang of it. I already subscribed to your newsletter and duplicated the templates. Is there a Template for Goals, pillars and alignment zone? Sorry if this is too obvious I am just starting with notion.
Thanks Emilio! No, I haven't created that one and that dashboard does not lend itself to a template because it has so many different interlinking databases. Interlinking databases break when downloaded as a stand-alone template. Some of the Notion pros are talking with Notion about improving this. Thanks!
Thanks for your reply. I started clicking around (best way to learn) and I think, I have built something similar. I have watched all your videos, and really thank you for giving away this information for free. It is better than most courses I've seen. May I suggest a paid course when you really go into detail for building it just like you did with the Command Center? Newbies would really appreciate it. I had to figure out how to program the formulas for the progress bar and checkbox and other stuff digging into your templates. But a follow along for each page would be an awesome course.
Ah, Now I get the missing piece of the puzzle. I was confused between Daily Tracking and Habits & Routines database. But Now I see How your Habits are serving to your Goal Outcomes. Can you elaborate why you have created two databases i.e. (Daily Tracking and Habits & Routines). Do they serve different purpose?
Nice Abdulluh! You outline your intentions and game plan in the "Habits & Routines" database -- that just sets the intentions and allows other databases to link (set relations) to those activities. Then in the "Daily Data Tracking" database you set up habit tracking check-boxes or data-inputs to track your actual activity every day. Then you review how well you are doing at implementing your habits and routines by reviewing the Data Tracking table view. See where you need to improve, and step it up! Hope that helps!
Thank you for this video, I was able to gain some clarity around my own goals through watching your process. Perhaps I missed this, but do you align your Value Goals and Goal Outcomes to Pillars? And if not, why? I see the need to align things to ensure that your goals are actually fitting into one of your "compartments" to ensure that you are focused on the "right" things.
Thanks Rachel! Yes, definitely - Value Goals are aligned with Pillars and now I have a rollup in the Goal Outcomes to automatically pull the Pillars assigned to each Valuer Goal directly into the Goal Outcomes as well. My next video will likely touch on this as I show some updates in the system using Rollups.
I'm a little hazy on the difference between goal outcomes and projects. Are goal outcomes simply a kind of super-project? Curious to hear if anyone is using a similar approach but using fewer DBs somehow.
@@momoy3370 I have thought about this a lot since posting, and I've landed on this: PROJECTS: Things to do that have multiple steps. Projects are simply collections of tasks. They could be named similarly, with a verb (or should otherwise have an obvious end point). Once the tasks are done, the project is done. OUTCOMES: Things to achieve. Outcomes are specific and easily identifiable as done or not, BUT the path to get to them is not necessarily clear or totally in my control. One or more PROJECTS will represent my strategy for approaching them - in other words, outcomes are answers to the question "Why do this project?" They could also be called "achievements", "goals", "epic quests", "super projects" or "key results" (in the OKR framework). Hope that makes sense!
Where do you put your databases? I don’t see them on your sidebar and I’m trying to work out somewhere out of the way to put these so I only access them when required.
Like Amy, I find myself looking forward to when you have gone over everything, but still want to get it all set up now! Question, would it be possible to get screenshots of each of your pages including what fields are included? I'm approaching this as a framework that I can (will) modify, but would like to have a clear picture as I start. Thanks!
Let me think about what kind of documentation I can put together, I'm facing a massive shortage of hours-per-day between client work and video production. A great problem to have, but nevertheless the shortage is a factor for anything new. Good idea though, thinking it through. I have a solution in the works to all this, but involves some software development and implementation so won;t be immediate.
@Dan Allen, one of my coaches used to say, "You can get there slow, for free or you get there fast. And speed costs". Like you, I want it all now! I'd suggest (as I have) to hire August to coach you on the section you need help on. Reach out to him privately. His rates (which I won't disclose here) are VERY reasonable for private coaching. I was shocked it wasn't 3-4x that. I suspect it's more a question of whether he has time in his schedule for more 1-on-1 consulting.
Nice job! Question for you August: What's the difference between Life Pillars and Value Goals then? It seems odd to me that Pillars and Value Goals both lead to Goal Outcomes. Shouldn't be Pillars -> Value Goals -> Goal Outcomes?
Value Goals are things you would like to accomplish/achieve - your aspirations. Pillars are an organizational structure, covering all aspects of your life. I will clarify this in an updated Pillars video coming soon.
Hi August. It's sometimes unclear to me what Goal Outcomes should be. For example, I have a value goal to expand my software portfolio. Should I have a goal outcome to create three apps, or a separate goal outcome for each app to create. For the first one, I would then have a project per app. For the second I could have more projects per app, and accumulate my resources in the goal outcomes instead. Any advice on what you think is best?
Hi peter. i'm also into the dev field and here is my inputs for growing my portfolio. First of all, i have a value goal with work/business category that say: "An exceptional software engineering skill", that's my big goal, what i want to be. From that, i have several Goal Outcomes. One of them is: "Portfolio: Build three apps". I can mesure progress and move forward my value goal step by step. An app is a project for me, and i have a lot of tasks and notes from them.
August, a question: The Value Goals are clearly connected with the Pillars, but in the table in the video I don't see the Pillar field, just the category. Has the Pillar field been hidden in the table, or is it a conscious choice to tie the Value Goals only to the Pillar category? Thank you!
I think August replied somewhere in the comments about this. I think it's because it's reflexive. Whatever Outcomes are connected to Values is assigned the Pillar. If you related the Values to Pillars, I think it would consume all areas of your Pillars within the Category. Whatever Category references all Pillars related to the category. Idk if the wording is right or not, but I think it would be redundant in the end.
I did get another questions about this, and am confused by it. The Pillars are connected to the Value Goals and always have been. Sometimes the field/column is off to the side of the view and you have to scroll over to see it. But yes, Pillars and Value Goals are connected by relations as one would expect. If the view in the video did not show that, it was an incomplete view. Hope that helps!
Hi August and thanks for great content! I have been following your tutorials and trying to mimic your system but have some thoughts on how to implement the Progress Bar in a useful/practical way in the Goal Outcome and Project Databases. From what I can see these two bars doesn't relate to each other with any automated tricks but are updated manually in the Goal Outcome? I've seen you automate this in the Project database with rollups with tasks but not with projects as rollups in the Goal Outcome database. Do you choose the # Goal in the Goal Outcome to be the number of projects/or set a value of 10/20? I have some online courses I am doing and would like to link these to the Goal Outcome Database. In the Course Database I have a progress bar and it would be nice for this to be shown in the Goal Outcome view also, or does it over complicate things? How do you go about keeping track of your courses if they relate to a Goal Outcome?
Starting at [9:00], Bradley explains why he chooses not to automate the progress tracking of Goal Outcomes. He arbitrarily sets the value to 20 and subjectively deducts from it as he works towards it. He feels that counting the number of existing Projects will mislead you.
Did you know that if you are 'Filtering By (New Template)' in the template, the table DBs in your new project will auto populate as soon as you name it?
Yes, of course. That feature was added after the date this video was published. It was largely added because of my many videos asking for this capability :)
NEWS: Since recording this video Notion added the feature to enable a template with an embedded (linked) database to filter by itself as part of the template design, removing the need to manually change the filter after applying the template. Instructions on this new feature are here: twitter.com/NotionHQ/status/1257794305520885760
Hey August...still working thru the system. Working up the alignment zone now and got to this next level with Goals. Got the two DB's setup and really amazed at the links between the two and how those interact with projects especially. Very powerful relations. Was just working thru the page templates and saw this comment. Don't fully understand how this implements. Is there a better video explanation out there somewhere? Have you done one?
never mind....finally see how it works. pretty cool!
my mind is blown every day watching this series. i have rewatched the first 20 or so at least twice each (i kept trying to make each page or section as you went over it, but i really needed to start with the guiding principles and work my way back down to action items). at work, i'm just an individual contributor, but i've been trying for more than THREE YEARS to launch a nonprofit and a few related programs for it to operate. today, i finally have every level in place, and i feel so light and ready. i did make some tweaks to the setup (i couldn't wrap my brain around how pillars would work in a pyramid and couldn't entirely understand the differences between pillars and value goals, so mine is a sunburst diagram like this www.aculocity.com/labs/sunburst-chart or this support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/create-a-sunburst-chart-in-office-4a127977-62cd-4c11-b8c7-65b84a358e0c, with the core being my guiding principles and then each ring emanating from and supporting the core being the goals, goal outcomes, projects, and action items.) but i just could not be happier about my new system and filtering through my various task lists to see what makes the cut (i.e., what aligns with a project). plus i feel like a wizard after implementing that filter on the template (and figuring out how to create the template). you're the wizard! and so generous to give us all this. thank you!
@@LisaBernard Amazing Lisa, fantastic! Congrats on all your progress and hard work. Always feel free to customize and modify. However the Pillars confusion is my fault, I explained it badly -- will be doing a new Pillars video soon to correct the record. Short summary is Pillars are NOT aspirations, Value Goals are entirely your aspirations. Pillars are merely an organizational breakdown of your entire life into categories that cover every section of your life, such that every aspect of your life will fit into one or another Pillar. More on that soon.
@@augustbradley i am not surprised that you had such a gracious response :) you are excellent at explaining! i'm back to watch the next group in the series, on the reviews. my system is set up and operating, and i love it! i'm still learning, but so glad i'm making this switch. looking forward to more of your videos and newsletters. thank you!
The combination of Notion, your incrediibly powerful training videos, coupled with your excellent systems is finally allowing me to create a Life Management System that previously I could only dream about! Your ground-breaking work is very much appreciated.
Thank you Stephen! Means so much to me to hear this. I completely know what you mean, I went through the same process of discover and empowerment through Notion system design. Cool to have a community here committed to this kind off growth.
I'm not familiar with coding or all the features of Notion, so it took me a bit of research to figure out how to recreate the "Progress" bar used in the "goal outcomes" table. Here's the formula I found:
slice("▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓", 0, round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + slice("░░░░░░░░░░", 0, round((1 - prop("Completed") / prop("Goal")) * 10)) + " " + format(round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 100)) + "%"
Worked like a charm. Thank you!
Helped a lot, thanks!
Hello! I'm sorry it didn't worked for me I don't really understand why. I clicked on properties I've created a new Formula and then I clicked on the column under it and I tried to copy paste it. Was it wrong ?
@@laurinedufau2271 me too, it it did not work for me. idrk why. And, do you have a new formula?
Here is the proper format:
format(slice("▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓", 0, floor(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + format(slice("░░░░░░░░░░", 0, ceil(10 - prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + " " + format(round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 100)) + (empty(prop("Completed")) ? "0%" : "%")))
Timestamps Index
0:00 Intro
0:24 Goal Alignment
8:55 Database Setups
13:45 Value Goals Workspaces
15:51 Goal Outcomes Workspaces
20:11 Closing Thoughts
You are literally a genius!! How could you integrate all these things together sooo smoothly and cogent? I am so impressed and I cannot express my gratitude more. You completely changed my perspective on Notion and on life. I am your big fan from now on.
Thanks Liang! Awesome to hear this was helpful. I love thinking through and designing this stuff, then try it on myself and with clients to find what works best. Lots of trial and error to get here, but totally worth it!
Meaningful: yes!
Valuable: yes!
Implement: yes!
Having these two separate yet connected goal databases is a life-changing concept to me. Now I have both my rational and emotional self taken care of. Thank you, August, for the insight on achieving goals!
It is the best realization of the task management that I have seen so far
I'm super happy to hear that! Sorry about the slow reply, someone I missed this. Thanks for the feedback.
Love the way you word your Value Goals. I value "Fitness", but you value "Exceptional Fitness". I think I need to reassess my value goals!
As usual, a solid outing. I find myself pausing the video, adding to my current LOS and moving things around as they come up. Although I can't wait for you to have gone through everything, it's great that you have gone into detail on each section to build up the system! Thank you.
Thanks so much Amy, really appreciate this feedback. I can't wait until I have gone through everything too, I have exciting ideas for what to do next. But first we must cover the system! Thanks for your support.
I do the same after work and end up with a playback well past-1hr each time lol. Great work!
@@teryyy5052 Agreed, I think it takes me almost double!
@@teryyy5052 and @Amy Holms, I do this as well :). @August : your videos are indeed packed with very very valuable insights, I can't thank you enough for the positive changes watching them has brought to my own system !
6 hrs into these series, I wanna say that I'm amazed. I'm one of those people who wants to be in control of everything of their life and I've tried so many ways already. I've been using notion for about half a year now and I'd thought I was using all the features and the second video in this series proved me wrong and I realized how amateur I was. I had no idea what i'd been missing! thank you for sharing your knowledge and wisdom ...
**Video Summary**
0:00 Intro
This episode will cover goals, specifically the 2 goals databases, how they relate to each other, and how they fit in the middle of the alignment zone.
0:24 Goal Alignment
It's very important that your system has the high and low levels very clearly interlinked and aligned.
At the same time, you need to have clear prioritizations in terms of what matters most in terms of the goals you are pursuing and how to measure and evaluate whether you're progressing on them.
The way you accomplish your goals is to establish projects which move you towards your goals.
Projects are made up of tasks which are the individual units of work that advance you towards completing the projects.
Goals are in service of your values and your aspirations and the things you want to become in your life.
2:18 View of the alignment zone dashboard.
The previous video covered the project's database.
3:00 In the goal pipeline are the toggles for the 2 goals databases covered briefly in the alignment zone dashboard.
Value goals
These represent things you value, that you want or hope for that are important to you but are not really measurable.
August found that if you just start to list your goals they usually don't come out as things that are very measurable and if they're too specific, they feel very transactional and cold.
e.g. I want a thriving business.
Goal Outcomes
These are the very specific things that are measurable and trackable.
As you evaluate whether you are moving toward or away from your goals, you know whether you've accomplished them because they are specific, measurable, and quantifiable.
Eg. I want to create and launch 3 products for my business.
A relation between each goal outcome and value goal is created.
Having this 2 step process makes the goals more meaningful and engaging while also creating actionable outcomes.
Value goals might have multiple goal outcomes that are added constantly as each is achieved.
They will last much longer until you no longer value them.
Goal outcomes check off to a different status once completed.
The system OKR (Outcomes and Key Results) works quite similarly to this, you can change your terminology as you please.
8:55 Database Setups
Since the goal outcomes are measurable we have a progress bar similar to the one seen in the projects database.
If you just make a subjective judgment on the progress of many goals that might be difficult to quantify you can keep a reasonable eye on what's getting done.
These metrics are only applicable to goal outcomes with the status 'underway '
10:00 Each goal outcome has a status (as do the value goals)
Underway
Paused
For goal outcomes that started, but were stopped.
Waiting
For goal outcomes that are waiting to be started when you have the time.
You can assess when to change the status of these in the cycle reviews.
Off Track
Complete
11:30 Goal outcomes have a Term to help sort by grouping.
3 months
3-6 months
6-12 months
Over a year
They are also assigned downwards to projects, in most cases. Sometimes you just have a series of tasks or a habit.
In most cases, you achieve a goal outcome by coming up with a project and working on them.
In some instances, you just have a series of tasks or a habit (e.g. august wants to read and summarize 20 leading books in his field, the daily reading hour is a habit in his habits database)
Every single goal outcome must have a project or a habit/routine.
12:50 peek into habits database.
13:45 Value Goals Workspaces
Example: building extraordinary knowledge in field
Status
Priority
Challenges (what you might need to overcome to complete it)
Category
Goal Outcomes
14:40 Workspace
Questions
Why this value goal?
How will you achieve this?
Create the goal outcomes that are going to get you there.
The workspaces in value goals aren't used very often in comparison to the projects.
15:51 Goal Outcomes Workspaces
The workspaces in the goal outcomes are used quite frequently sometimes.
Often you will have many projects to get to a specific goal outcome.
You don't want all the knowledge in a project to be locked away when the project is completed.
The pertinent knowledge which may be valuable across multiple projects should be aggregated in the goal outcome workspace.
16:20 e.g. Create and launch 3 products.
Questions:
Why this goal outcome?
How will you achieve this? Steps:
Projects
A table to help us see which projects will help us achieve the goal outcome.
Each project is linked to action items which are all linked to tasks.
Each project can easily be clicked into to check the tasks that need to be done with some additional info.
19:00 This entire space is created using a template
The template includes filtering by goal outcome 19:30
20:11 Closing Thoughts
This is all about being very specific and deliberate, making sure the tasks that you're doing day-to-day are connected to the higher-level aspirations of your life.
This is the mid-level connective tissue.
After looking at the project's database in the previous video, the goals in this video the next will look at the pillars and the pillar supports, then the cycle reviews will come after that.
By having the databases in this pyramid hierarchy it's very easy to do a periodic assessment to keep things on track.
Thank you Marc!
I've watched this at least 5 times, I keep learning something new! This is so packed with good stuff.
Great to hear it's been valuable to you Jacob!
@@augustbradleyvery Inspirational,!
Your education and wisdom transcends the Notion tool (even though you're a guru of that!!). What you emit is a philosophy which is as inspiring as it is crystal clear. You are an empitomy of someone who has reached deep down inside and sought a bunch of clarity which you have contemplated, organised and then implemented through this Notion system (and I am sure in all areas of your life). You are a truly inspiring human as much as you are good at Notion. The way you speak and explain is a projection of the clarity, confidence and structure you hold in your mind. I am truly grateful that you have shared this with us!
THIS IS IT!!!! I had used OKRs before but felt for my personal system something was really missin. VALUE GOALS. Thank you so much August, I need this.
Glad it was helpful!
I have continued to study the PPV. This morning, in response to a question about continuous improvement, I introduced a management team in one of our factories to the concept of Value Goals and Goal Outcomes.
Hello Mr. Bradley, thank you for your series on Notion and it has helped me organize my studies, my hobbies and my life :) Please keep doing what you do!
Thanks! Awesome to hear this was helpful. Lots more to come, working on some cool new things for the channel and the community growing around it. Glad you've joined us!
@August I'm making my way through this unbelievably, immersive experience. Each video gives me so much energy and motivation. For years I have struggled to pin down my true values and hence the sail of my ship changes direction, resulting in my mind and actions being pulled in multiple directions. This can be frustrating and time confusing to get back into the flow zone.
I have one confusion at the current moment. I am struggling to differentiate between goals and projects. I have created non specific, wide value goals such as being a competent, compassionate doctor and develop financial security & growth, however the goals from these just end up being projects. I would very much appreciate a deeper exploration of these fundamental principles so I can make a easily understood, achievable system.
Have you ever figured this out :)?
I'm just starting out mid to late December 2020, preparing for the new year. I started out trying to input all my current stuff to the system ie my current to do's & projects & goals but they're messy & hard to connect & making them mesh is hard but I'm finally at the point where I'm able to start planning from the top down & I can't wait. It's going to make everything so much easier.
I had been struggling to set goals until I met August on YT a few days ago. Best and most clear method of goal setting I've ever seen.
Thank you Bradley for providing clarity in a world that so desperately requires it.
watching all the videos in order and creating a similar system. its simply amazing!
Awesome Shrey, keep up the great work!
I absolutely love your videos! I’ve been adapting these principles into my own personal system within Notion and I cannot thank you enough for showing us how to relate actionable items into a bigger purpose. I’ve just graduated college and find myself needing “structure” to sculpt my life and guide it towards a better destination during this unsettling era. While I’ve got a fewer fluffier names for my databases I have never been so inspired to put my desire to become a better human into action. Thank you August! I can’t wait to support more of your work 😊
Thanks! Means a lot to me to hear this. Very happy that it's been valuable to you. I wish I had started using something like this shortly after college, my life would have been much more effective :) Took me a while to get here, so happy to share it with others on their journeys. Lots more to come!
thank you August! I am deeply grateful for your work! Thank you for pushing us no just to make a system but to be a better person. :)
man you're gonna save my life. I'll be forever in debt
I’ve watched this video a few times now but seemed to miss the bridge aspect of this from actionable to higher level.
One play on words that I appreciated as this is the bridge. Value Goals - Goal Outcomes have goals as the bridge between these realities.
I just wanted to say thank you for all the work you’ve put in to these videos and all the knowledge you are sharing. I look forward to your videos every week and I can already see measurable improvements in what I am able to accomplish.
Thanks Bella! Means a lot to me to hear this. Very happy that it's been valuable to you. Lots more to come!
I am really enjoying this process. The system you've developped is helping me organizing my thoughts, idea's and moving forward with my projects! :) I am staring to get the hang of the thought process of the system and excited to know this just the beginning. Looking forward to learn more! Thank you August! :)
Awesome to hear this Evert, means a lot to know it's impacting people's lives. Congrats on your progress. The system implementation itself creates a lot of self leaning.
Hi August, I wanted to say a huge thank you for your videos and your system and the details in explaining the interlinking of it. I'm totally new to Notion and found it searching for a place to bring my content calendar online which also would tie "everything together". You have opened my eyes to what is possible with Notion and I have spent the last week watching and learning. I can't wait for all your new content to come online. And would really like to know more about your beginners' course if you are putting one together. You are the most productive Rabbit whole I ever found myself in learning about a very needed system I didn't know anything about before coming across your videos.
Thanks Silka! Awesome to hear this was helpful. I am developing a beginners course and a community platform. The course is probably a couple months away, hope to have the community launching in a few weeks. Lots more to come. Glad you've joined us!
@@augustbradley ... until then I will keep watching and implementing as II go along.
thanks a lot! I have no doubt I will achieve my goals if I successfully implement this system
Greetings from México, August, i’d enjoy all your videos since the beggining. On the other hand, i’m consultant in quality management systems and i always was looking video with this grade of high organization. Sorry about my english but i want to say thank you for you ideas and support.
The quality, the information, the way everything is explained is just incredible. Thank you for your work, it has helped me a lot!
Hi August! Just wanted to start off by saying I came across your videos while researching how to use Notion to organize university notes, and I am absolutely enthralled by your comprehensive use of Notion. I am currently slowly going through all your videos to set up my version of the life operating system, and I am very glad I came across this gem :) your clear explanation of incentives and detailed navigation of your dashboard allowed me to really understand your decision-making behind your life OS, and makes for a very understandable and engaging series :D this series is something I didn't know I absolutely needed
With that said, I am currently struggling to decide whether I should have all my projects have a goal outcome. I can assign all of my projects to specific value goals. However, almost all of my goal outcomes have only one project, so isn't it a bit of a waste of time to create a goal outcome for every single project that I make? Should I just link my projects to value goals directly? If possible, I would like your opinion about this. Thank you!
Another amazing video August! Another piece of my Notion system has been vastly upgraded thanks to you!
These lessons are gold, sir...thank you very much!!
Glad you like them Jasin!
WWWWOOOOAAAHHH ... Absolutely fantastic.
This is a very good video, August. I've watched a couple of times, saved it and will need to come back to digest.
Thanks Tony! Means a lot to me that it has been valuable to you. Lots more to come, I'm glad you've joined us.
Thank you for the work that you are doing. I am slowly but surely making my way through these videos. Something I struggle with is seeing exactly where you have each page stored. For instance, I have been unable to find out where your default databases live. I am hoping it all becomes clear by the end of the series. I have really enjoyed understanding what Notion can do for me.
Hi Sean, thanks for the feedback and I'm very happy this has been valuable. I have shown glimpses into the database asset storage, and will cover it more thoroughly in the PPV overview videos coming in about 2 weeks. But to give you an answer now, ALL of my databases are stores in one of the three primary organizational folders: Pillars, Pipelines or Vaults. The action oriented ones like Action Items (tasks), Projects, Goal Outcomes, Content Pipeline are all under "Pipelines". Information and Knowledge storage is in the Vaults, so that includes databases such as Books Vault, Media Vault, Knowledge lab vault. The Pillars and Pillar support vaults (such as Habits & Routines) are in the Pillars folder. And the time-based databases (daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly, annual) are all in the Cycle Review folders because they are cycles that have specific review intervals. Dashboards are typically in the Dashboards folder of course. I will explain all more thoroughly in the PPV video in a couple weeks (right after we finish the Vault videos).
@@augustbradley Thank you so much for your response! This is great and I really appreciate it. You should really think about a Patreon! I'd love to support you!
@@MrSwetz1 Thanks Sean. I'll be launching a membership community at a low price in the next few weeks. Want to give more value with a product offering like that than just asking for money on Patreon. Then will follow that up with some courses.
Thank you for the great content as always. I am building my System following yours and am eagerly waiting for the next one :)
Awesome Oyuna! Thanks fr the feedback, and good to know this system is working for you, More to come for sure!
@@augustbradley Thank you for your hard work
Hi August. Great job you are doing here sharing Life designing. A Question! Why cannot we combine Goal Outcome and Project database to remove one layer of extra data base between Value Goals and Task database ?
coming back here after ending the serie, such an awesome one ! how do you share workspaces / pages or project with coworkers and still keep your system without doubling the items/projects/goals ?
Hey August! I was wondering if you could help me with differentiating between goal outcomes and projects? Conceptually I understand that projects should be the stepping stones to your goal outcome, but I am having a hard time either making my goal outcomes too narrow (too much like a project) or too broad (like a value goal). As a result, I have found a lot of redundancy when assigning tasks straight to projects, and projects straight to value goals. Maybe it would help if you could provide another example. Anyone, feel free to help me out on this!
Aside from my confusion, thank you so much for producing such information-rich content. I am not kidding when I say that you have saved me so much stress and mental anguish from having a lack of alignment and direction when it comes to making a task-management system. I hope you know you are reaching your goal of impacting a greater community!
Thanks Braden, really appreciate your feedback and support! It really means a lot to me to hear this.
Goal Outcomes should be bigger and more ambitions, beyond what a single project can achieve. I suggest you set bigger longer reaches for the Goal Outcomes if you are having trouble distinguishing them from projects. Set goals that will take a year or two or three, and make your project aiming for a 1 to 3 month time frame.
Goal Outcomes are higher level than Projects. Projects are designed to move you toward the Goal Outcomes, you could have several Projects needed to get you all the way to the goal outcomes (or could be just 1). Projects are an undertaking (what you are actually doing/executing), Goal Outcomes are, well, an outcome -- a measurable end result. I have videos on each to help clarify.
@@augustbradley Thanks August! This was very helpful! I look forward to your next video!
@@augustbradley Hey August! I know a lot of this system is based on GTD, but in GTD projects are anything that require more than one consecutive task. I've been having some difficulty, like Braden, understanding where & how to draw the line between projects and goal outcomes.
This is my understanding, is it accurate?:
Projects - Conceptually meaningful chunk of tasks that deliver value once completed.
Goal outcomes - basically SMART goals - Measurable goal posts that are easy to come up with projects to try and hit those goalposts.
Awesome videos, thanks for sharing this with us!
@@lucasdellabella1270 PPV is not based on GTD, it as an alternative that solves what I see as many of the problems with GTD and a more modern approach that better leverages modern tools (particularly Notion). GTD was never capable of so much of this since it was created for less capable tools (with a limited framework of what is possible).
GTD defines "Projects" way too small, that clutters your workflow with far too many Projects - that then never get done. This is one reason so many fail to stick with GTD. It's better to have a higher hurdle for what qiualitfies as a project, then give more attention and deeper check-ins on the few more highly prioritized projects (with a dashboard giving you a full overview of everything related to the project).
Goal Outcomes are higher level than Projects.
Projects are designed to move you toward the Goal Outcomes, you could have several Projects needed to get you all the way to the goal outcomes (or could be just one).
Projects are an undertaking (what you are actually doing/executing).
Goal Outcomes are, well, an outcome - a measurable end result.
Hope that helps!
@@augustbradley Awesome, thanks for clearing up my misunderstanding. Makes total sense. It seems that your task chains are the middle ground between "not worthy of being a project" and "too complicated for a single task". Thank you so much for the response!
Have you even tried breaking goals down into shorter time frames? Such as a yearly goal broken down per quarter. Would love to hear your thoughts on it.
This is exactly what I've been looking for.
Thank you so much for this! You are doing a great job...
I appreciate that!
Awesome, just as usual.
August, as an IT guy with a database creation and management background I've faced a problem in Notion. Let's consider the following example. We have three related DBs with two consecutive relations (Goal Outcome -> Value Goal -> Pillar). Using these two relations I would like to construct one relation (Goal Outcome -> Pillar) to avoid redundancy with having a separate relation (Goal Outcome -> Pillar), which may easily contradict the Pillar from the respective Value Goal.
The example above can be extended in a way to get a Pillar for each Action Item automatically from superior databases through corresponding relations. I think this feature would make the design of the entire system much nicer and efficient.
I thought it can be done through rollups, but I haven't succeeded.
I'm pretty sure you faced this kind of problem as well. What's your "philosophy" in this matter?
Thank you!✌
You're right ProExcept, it can be done through rollups, I've managed to do it both ways (upstream and downstream ie in the pillar DB get the tasks associated to the goals values / goal outcomes / projects and in the task DB get the pillar to show up). I'd be happy to help if you need a hand in configuring the rollups. You can send me an email if you'd like :)
Edit : I managed to make something work that's not exactly what you want, @ProExcept, sorry, I got carried away by my enthusiasm 🙄 !
@@sandrinem.-z.6115 Thank you. Imagine, this morning before I saw your reply I've suddenly realize how to make it done properly) Energy follows thought! Thanks for the response, I hope it will help people. Have a good day!
@@proexcept So glad to read that you've eventually figured it out ! Kuddos ! Have a nice day too !
@@sandrinem.-z.6115 Well, it seems like I need help anyway because I've faced one more problem. I've sent an email to you. I much appreciate your help.
I have a feeling that August didn't make templates for these as after all the videos in the series this is a good time to start practising to make our own databases and these aren't too hard to create especially when @Sarah Cho pasted the code for the progress bar code:
slice("▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓▓", 0, round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 10)) + slice("░░░░░░░░░░", 0, round((1 - prop("Completed") / prop("Goal")) * 10)) + " " + format(round(prop("Completed") / prop("Goal") * 100)) + "%"
Hi August, if you do see this comment, i am curious to know why the categories in the value goal DB don't match with the pillar groups. Thank you for your amazing content.
Dear August, Thank you again for sharing freely this whole system, it gave me a real fresh start in my life management. After a few months of implementation, I still face difficulties with having simultaneously the value goals and goal outcomes. Do you still maintain both in your current system on the day to day basis? I understand the difference between the measurable aspect and the broader value but it leads me often to rephrase the same goal in two different manners. Would greatly appreciate your thoughts and experience about this specific point. Thank you
Hello @augustbradley
What can I say that hasnt been said before. Thank you so much for creating and sharing this system with such excellent videos and supporting material. I've reached video 17/37 from the Focus and alignment system and slowly implementing the system in Notion. Hopefully soon I will master it all. At the same time, I also pray Notion continues to exist as a tool for years to come as the implementation of PPV is so dependent on it.
Thank you so much for this, August! It is of extraordinary help!
Just a small question, any reason why 'Pillars' are not attached to Value Goals intentionally? I don't see the Pillar column in Value goals.
August, I love your system! I notice you classify everything throughout your system as a category of business, family, or growth/health. How would you fit volunteering into your system? Would your volunteering goals, projects, pillars, and tasks fit within one of those three categories or would you add a fourth category?
It's a good question! I, similarly, have creativity as something that I want to include, but not everything within that is for profit. I went with "Endeavour" over business, to include work/business, but also other things that don't quite fit.
Thank you for your work!
Dear August! Why using ''Category'' in Value Goals instead of Relation to Pillars?
+1 curious about this, too
Hi August. I would love to hear more about how you integrate your book readings/summarisations with the rest of your OS to internalise them. I recall you mention in a previous video the mindset & identity sculpting where you put significant things you have come across. However, I want to know if you have a system for better internalising 20 books. This can be a lot of content, even when summarised!
Another great video! I'm curious if you align the quarter assigned to a Goal Outcome with when it starts, when you plan to work toward it, or the target completion date. I'm also intrigued by your Priority assignment for Goal Outcomes and how those work (since they appear to just be a number). Finally, how does the "Always" Priority under Value Goals differ from the five ordinal priorities? Thanks August!
Good questions Geoff! Quarter is aligned in my approach with when I plan to do and complete it, so it could be over more than one quarter. There's room for personal preference here.
Priority in Goal Outcomes is a minor issue, just an option if you want to sort the list manually by ranking them, I don't usually bother with this, not essential.
The "Always" Value Goal priority is a way of grouping similar-status items together. The priority setting is entirely for sorting purposes, and some things (such as family) aren't really deserving of a priority ranking, they are perpetual. So I have Always to designate that, and to have them grouped together in the sorting. Great questions.
@@augustbradley Very much appreciated. You are one of the most generous people I've ever come across and are truly an inspiration. I just started your series a few days ago and did my first weekly review last night, and I was proud to enter you in my Gratitude field for this week.
@@geoffjball So cool to hear I made your Gratitude for the week! Congrats on the first weekly review, stick with it! It's a total game changer.
Are teh Value Goals and Goal Outcomes templates available?
Where should they be housed, under Pipelines database?
Hi, great videos and specially, great concepts you use to track daily activities to get your life dreams into reality. Thank you so much.
I was wondering if you are planning to show how to build the Goals data bases. I am having some problems to understand the relationships once you put them in a New line in the Goal outcome or value goals. Thanks
Hi August, thanks so much for all of this amazing content! Quick question -> I'm a little confused how the "quarter" database interacts with the various other databases. Do you cover this in an upcoming video by any chance?
Hey August! There is no template available for Value Goals and Goal Outcome template! Please share the template!
Hi August, in GTD exist the 20.000 feet special level which is role and responsibilities. I can't see anything which looks like that in your O.S. (I've seen pillars video too).
Where and when do you manage that to trigger your system? Value give you drivers to your goals, R&R give you another kind of drivers. Thanks
Hi Patrice, good question. Roles & Responsibilities would fit within the Pillars, and then any changes or advancements (aspirations) would be executed through Value Goals/Goal Outcomes/Projects. If there are no specific objectives for change and maintenance or organic growth is what;s desired, it would be maintained or advanced through "Habits & Routines" (which has it's own database and is tracked fro progress in the Data Tracking database). During Monthly and Quarterly reviews, they are examined and refined as necessary. That seems to me to thoroughly cover it, though I would be interested to hear your thoughts if you feel something is being missed.
While I have a great deal of respect for GTD and use some elements of it in my system, I think it does over-complicate some things and adds unnecessary complexity in instances. Always a balance.
Hi august! You mentioned that all goal outcomes must have projects, but can it be possible that a goal outcome has only tasks? Say for example I have a 2 week school break now, and hence more time to do more exercises. I thus set a goal to ‘Run 30km in this 2 weeks’ and ‘Climb for 10hours in this 2 weeks”. However I cant seem to think of a link to a specific project for each, as I can simply link action items directly to each goal outcome, for example ‘6km run on 22june’ which I would have put in my action database and linked to the goal.
The running objective you gave as an example sounds more like a Project than a Goal Outcome. Outcomes are desired end results, Projects are more process-oriented. The Goal Outcome would d be a bigger end-result, such as reach a specific weight level or get your running speed up to a certain pace. The goal of running 30k per week is a project to get to the goal outcome of improving your speed or loosing weight or something like that. Makes sense? If a Goal Outcome can be achieved in a couple tasks, then it's not a big enough reach -- aim for something bigger and higher that takes more work to get there.
August Bradley : Notion Productivity thank you! Yes this makes sense:)
If I would replicate your setup, where would I put the Value Goals and Goal Outcomes databases? Under Pillers or Pipelines?
For the Value Goals I can image that it falls under Pillers, while Goal Outcomes would be better suited within Pipelines. I'm curious where you placed them. Thanks!
Nice Richard, your instincts are correct. That's exactly how I have them organized.
Where do do these databases live in the left hand panel? I am also trying to figure out how to organize all of these databases/pages in the left hand panel. This would also include all of the pages for each category listed under each pillar in the command center
Great video! Thank you.
Can Value goals have projects attached? Or habits & routines? or does that simply mean you didn't specify the specific goal outcome to the value goal, connecting the projects / Habits & routines to the value goals. In Other words: do all projects / habits&routines have a goal outcome or does it make sense to have some projects / habits&routines directly related to value goals, without goal outcomes in between?
+1 I'm struggling with this kind of things too.
Lol 2 year after. But Personally if the value goal doesn't have precise and measurable goals that I want to achieve in that moment (maybe I just want a "maintenance” of that value goal in that moment), then I will link habits and routines for example at that specific value goal )
I keep seeing the relation to quarters but I haven't yet found the quarter database in your videos. Would you be willing to point me in the right direction?
HI August,
Just wondering how you go above archiving data - be it old projects, goals, tasks, etc.?
Also which pages / databases go under the "pipeline" section in the left hand panel?
Love the series! Truly life-changing! But one thing I'm unclear about, is the difference between goal outcomes and projects?
"Goal Outcomes" are one step above "Projects" in the pyramid. For example, in the video, he talked about "building a thriving business" as one of his "Value Goals." To make it clearer and more actionable, the "Goal Outcomes" is "create and launch 3 new products." But that's still very high-level. So the next step is to break it down into "Projects." For example, each new product is one "Project." And under each "Project," August will have specific, more granular tasks.
Hope this helps.
@@small_strides Thank you for the explanation, as I have the same problem understanding the real difference between Projects and Goal Outcomes. But I still have problems when I try to use the system and fill all the fields in the various tables/pages.
Let's just say that I'm trying to use Notion PPV... to create Notion PPV! So, my Value Goal here is "Optimal Self-Organization", and examples of tasks are like "Watch that video of August Bradley", "Build that Project database" etcetera. At this point, I'm stuck: what connects my tasks to my Value Goal? I've created a project called "Build Notion Life OS - PPV", but then what is the Goal Outcome that links the Project to my Value Goal?
Or maybe should I set my "Build Notion Life OS - PPV" as a Goal Outcome and let it without underlying projects?
If you (or others) would like to help me understanding this point, I would be extremely grateful! Thank you in advance!
@@melchiah4925 Let me attempt an answer. Firstly, if you're just starting out using his system, don't worry too much about the Value Goals/Goal Outcomes categorisation. David Allen's advice in Getting Things Done is to have a solid grasp of day-to-day execution, and then these higher-level stuff will come eventually.
Focus on building the Action Zone and Projects Dashboards (and probably a habit tracker too). Once you are familiar with the system and can see results, then you can expand and start thinking about the Value Goals/Goal Outcomes.
According to August, Value Goals are less quantifiable, whereas Goal Outcomes are. For example, taking your Value Goal, a possible Goal Outcome is "Not having to work on weekends" or "leave the office at 6pm sharp on 2 days a week."
Let's say your Value Goal is to be a wealthy person, then possible Goal Outcomes could be "see my investment grow 10% yoy," or "save 30% of monthly income."
Hope this helps. :)
@@melchiah4925 Goal Outcome = Start Using a LifeOS ? Other projects then e.g. Add Books ?
Hello August! Recently I found Notion and it was just a matter of time until I found your channel. I was looking for some ways to increase my productivity while quarentined and got all jobs postponed, since I work with video creation. I have to say that your channel is awesome and I really resonated with your content. I was researching PARA structures inside Notion but your method looks better and is more mindful, now I'm in the process of creating something like your system. I'm eager to see your Client space, Vaults and the way you store content and references/notes within your areas/pilars. Also, do you use google drive? I'm still trying to figure a way to use them together.
That's great Popy, really happy you found us here. And I agree, PARA is too limited for Notion. Those additional sections are coming in the series, working my way systemically through the system 🙂. I use Google drive and Dropbox, but at this point there are no integrations, that is coming in Notion but not sure how long.
@@augustbradley Awesome, August! Thanks again for your effort and the value you're bringing to us. I just finished implementing what I called the 1st phase of your system. Eagerly waiting for those sections and how you review your cycles. I'm new to the review thing and after reading a lot of minimalism and productivity content in the past days I think this is the step that I'm missing and will benefit a lot form.
@@PopyMartins Weekly/Monthly reviews are such an important step, the glue that holds everything together. Videos on that coming soon.
@@augustbradley I was just watching your Notion Office Hours live with MP and I was able to extract most of things that were still confusing me from there. Still need to understand some things but I believe I have everything that I need to kickstart and try your awesome system.
@@PopyMartins The pieces are coming together. Awesome Popy!
August excellent video!! Do you create the goal outcomes database in each toggle or do you create it somewhere else and link it in the alignment zone.
Thanks August - your system really resonates with me. Enjoying linking up the various levels. It was interesting when you changed the way you were showing the task status. I was already doing something similar. I am interested in what you do with your client projects.... I have a number of Project databases defined by Client type (or the work within that client type) and then a personal project database. At present I am showing these as separate toggled Projects within the Execution Pipeline - I cannot see a way of having them in one database. [They were all over on the left-hand side of the flow chart as a list of databases feeding in]. I can then link to these databases (just makes, for instance, the Task database quite wide as it has 5 different columns for the different Linked Project databases (each task only linked to one project database) would be interested in your thoughts. Exceptional as always - really looking forward to find out the detail of how you do the reviews/cycles as the glimpses from the other videos whetted the appetite!
Hi Gary, thanks so much for the feedback, it's awesome to hear this. Means a lot to me that it's working so well for you. I will get to the client database at some point in the series, until then here's a little info about my approach:
The client database is not just a duplicate/replica of the Projects database, it is doing all that and more. If a client is "Active" then essentially whatever we're engaged on together at that time is an "active" project (the entire Client entry in the database is, to me, a big high-priority project if it's active). Then depending on how big the scope of the project is, we could have sub-projects broken out in our shared client workspace or even in a sub-table embedded within. Each client engagement has a workspace just like in the Projects DB pages, but they are shared with the client so we are both working in it. It has different DB field properties than the Projects DB, and is often more of a dashboard with more sub-pages and shared resource organization. I'll do a future video on it.
August Bradley : Notion Productivity thanks August. Thanks for taking the time to give an in-depth response. Yes my work DBs have different fields depending on the type of work etc. E.g Accounts work DB / Payroll DB etc as the work within these is similar I can have the clients who I am doing that work on within each of those DB. I have a Client DB which has the links to the other work DB that relate to that client and therefore within their Client DB page is a dashboard for that client with all the linked projects and within that the linked tasks etc.. Then in the Action Zone under projects I have filtered each Work DB for Active ones eg “Active Accounts” under a toggle. I also have “Accounts to get in” under a separate toggle. It is working for me. None of this is linked with the actual client - it is just a way of me keeping track of my workflow.
I am doing a weekly review but less so monthly or quarterly - they are more just an extension of the weekly review (which is duplication) so I am really looking forward to your video on the review/cycles to see how I can leverage these.
I am working through my Goals and Goal outcomes at the moment. Have always had goals, but they have been more Value Goals with little measurability (very loosely linked to some of my projects - more mentally rather than actually). So producing Goal Outcomes linked to the Value goals and projects and pillars is amazing. Look forward to letting you know in a few months/ a year how that has progressed my Goals ..
Thanks again.
@@garyabbott6115 Outstanding Gary, great progress!
I'll be honest, I rushed over this and quickly built the framework.
But I missed the crucial distinction between Value Goals and Value Outcomes; my Value Goals were less idealistic and more outcome orientated, which created a confusing system that I sadly neglected because I felt intimated.
For example, rather than having a catch-all for fitness, I had several separate goals that would've all sat under an "exceptional Fitness" umbrella. It made the system feel spread to thinly, and I began paying less attention to individual goals and giving less of a defining role in the system.
So my advice to avoid the same mistake is: listen to August. Keep it simple, embrace Systems thinking and don't let two database become interchangable.
so value goals are not long term goals.. they are more like pillars for our attainable goals?
Hello August,
First, thank you very, very much for all the work you've done and the teaching you're offering us on this platform. I am starting in Notion and would like to implement your system. I have seen every video up to this one (for now) but i'm still struggling for one thing : Implementation. You detail a lot (a very well) how everything is structured, the logic behind it and the backbone of the system; but I still don't really know where to start in Notion. Do I start by creating a bunch of pages, then link other pages to them ? Which page do I start with ? Do I create one database at a time ? As a beginner in Notion I'm still a bit confused about how to really create this. I subscribed to your newsletter and downloaded the templates but it's still unclear for me. Is it possible to do a video of the process of creating these things in Notion now that we know the purpose of it ?
Again, thank you very much for your hard work, a very friendly hug from France ! (sorry my english is not perfect)
Theodore
Hi August, if the value goal is the same as the pillar we can do a rollup any reason to do it stand by?
Hey August, I'm very close to finishing to completing my own goal outcome and value goals database! The only obstacle I have left to get through is how to make the progress bar. Are you going to make a tutorial on how to make these things anytime soon?
Congrats on your progress Samuel! For the progress bar, just copy/paste the formula from here for the style you like: www.notion.so/Progress-Bar-b908b8a1e4804ca5a6ababb313b216bc
Hi August. Great video again. It’s awesome the way this system links the higher aspirations to lowest level tasks, and makes sense. However it feels harder to do bottom up. What if, for example, one is ‘given a project’ which can’t be refused - there may not be a measurable goal outcome in existence. What are your thoughts on this kind of situation?
Many thanks
Pleasing the person who gave it to you? Maintaining a good track record? (of studying or employment or client satisfaction)
@@DavidEsp1 yes good one! I had also considered something very similar - like ‘carry out my job function to the best of my ability’ - it could be a good (valid) catch-all for a number of projects. It could be enhanced further by making it measurable like ‘complete accepted projects in original time frame’, or some other marker. Perhaps the latter is the goal outcome, and the former the value goal…..
Many thanks for your reply. 👍🏻
August thanks for your videos, I'm a total Notion newbie and I'm still getting the hang of it.
I already subscribed to your newsletter and duplicated the templates. Is there a Template for Goals, pillars and alignment zone? Sorry if this is too obvious I am just starting with notion.
Thanks Emilio! No, I haven't created that one and that dashboard does not lend itself to a template because it has so many different interlinking databases. Interlinking databases break when downloaded as a stand-alone template. Some of the Notion pros are talking with Notion about improving this. Thanks!
Thanks for your reply. I started clicking around (best way to learn) and I think, I have built something similar. I have watched all your videos, and really thank you for giving away this information for free. It is better than most courses I've seen. May I suggest a paid course when you really go into detail for building it just like you did with the Command Center? Newbies would really appreciate it. I had to figure out how to program the formulas for the progress bar and checkbox and other stuff digging into your templates. But a follow along for each page would be an awesome course.
@@emiliojimenez5105 Good idea Emilio! I am planning and designing a course to go from scratch, just as you suggested 🙂
Ah, Now I get the missing piece of the puzzle. I was confused between Daily Tracking and Habits & Routines database. But Now I see How your Habits are serving to your Goal Outcomes.
Can you elaborate why you have created two databases i.e. (Daily Tracking and Habits & Routines). Do they serve different purpose?
Nice Abdulluh! You outline your intentions and game plan in the "Habits & Routines" database -- that just sets the intentions and allows other databases to link (set relations) to those activities. Then in the "Daily Data Tracking" database you set up habit tracking check-boxes or data-inputs to track your actual activity every day. Then you review how well you are doing at implementing your habits and routines by reviewing the Data Tracking table view. See where you need to improve, and step it up! Hope that helps!
where can i find template for Goal Outcomes and Value Goals?
How do I get the progress bar? Did I miss the video?
If your goal outcome is termed longer than the month, do you put the starting quarter or the finishing quarter into the quarter field?
Why?
Thank you for this video, I was able to gain some clarity around my own goals through watching your process. Perhaps I missed this, but do you align your Value Goals and Goal Outcomes to Pillars? And if not, why? I see the need to align things to ensure that your goals are actually fitting into one of your "compartments" to ensure that you are focused on the "right" things.
Thanks Rachel! Yes, definitely - Value Goals are aligned with Pillars and now I have a rollup in the Goal Outcomes to automatically pull the Pillars assigned to each Valuer Goal directly into the Goal Outcomes as well. My next video will likely touch on this as I show some updates in the system using Rollups.
How are you measuring the progress of goal outcomes? I can't figure out
We evaluate that in monthly and quarterly reviews. Assess then re-prioritize.
this video took 2 hours for me to go comprehend and build! thanks
I'm a little hazy on the difference between goal outcomes and projects. Are goal outcomes simply a kind of super-project? Curious to hear if anyone is using a similar approach but using fewer DBs somehow.
I'm also trying to figure out what is the difference between those two... If you got any new insights, let me know!
@@momoy3370 I have thought about this a lot since posting, and I've landed on this:
PROJECTS: Things to do that have multiple steps. Projects are simply collections of tasks. They could be named similarly, with a verb (or should otherwise have an obvious end point). Once the tasks are done, the project is done.
OUTCOMES: Things to achieve. Outcomes are specific and easily identifiable as done or not, BUT the path to get to them is not necessarily clear or totally in my control. One or more PROJECTS will represent my strategy for approaching them - in other words, outcomes are answers to the question "Why do this project?" They could also be called "achievements", "goals", "epic quests", "super projects" or "key results" (in the OKR framework).
Hope that makes sense!
@@lukeMac Thanks a lot! I couldn't understand the difference either and your explanation helped me a lot
Is there a template for goal outcomes and value outcomes?
Where do you put your databases? I don’t see them on your sidebar and I’m trying to work out somewhere out of the way to put these so I only access them when required.
Like Amy, I find myself looking forward to when you have gone over everything, but still want to get it all set up now! Question, would it be possible to get screenshots of each of your pages including what fields are included? I'm approaching this as a framework that I can (will) modify, but would like to have a clear picture as I start.
Thanks!
Let me think about what kind of documentation I can put together, I'm facing a massive shortage of hours-per-day between client work and video production. A great problem to have, but nevertheless the shortage is a factor for anything new. Good idea though, thinking it through. I have a solution in the works to all this, but involves some software development and implementation so won;t be immediate.
@Dan Allen, one of my coaches used to say, "You can get there slow, for free or you get there fast. And speed costs".
Like you, I want it all now! I'd suggest (as I have) to hire August to coach you on the section you need help on. Reach out to him privately. His rates (which I won't disclose here) are VERY reasonable for private coaching. I was shocked it wasn't 3-4x that.
I suspect it's more a question of whether he has time in his schedule for more 1-on-1 consulting.
Mind blown
So, should value goals be visible in Action Items?
Would I be on track to say that Value Goals are Qualities that I want to realize in my life?
Nice job!
Question for you August:
What's the difference between Life Pillars and Value Goals then?
It seems odd to me that Pillars and Value Goals both lead to Goal Outcomes. Shouldn't be Pillars -> Value Goals -> Goal Outcomes?
Value Goals are things you would like to accomplish/achieve - your aspirations. Pillars are an organizational structure, covering all aspects of your life. I will clarify this in an updated Pillars video coming soon.
August Bradley Thanks for the reply! 🙏
Hi August. It's sometimes unclear to me what Goal Outcomes should be. For example, I have a value goal to expand my software portfolio. Should I have a goal outcome to create three apps, or a separate goal outcome for each app to create. For the first one, I would then have a project per app. For the second I could have more projects per app, and accumulate my resources in the goal outcomes instead. Any advice on what you think is best?
Hi peter. i'm also into the dev field and here is my inputs for growing my portfolio. First of all, i have a value goal with work/business category that say: "An exceptional software engineering skill", that's my big goal, what i want to be. From that, i have several Goal Outcomes. One of them is: "Portfolio: Build three apps". I can mesure progress and move forward my value goal step by step. An app is a project for me, and i have a lot of tasks and notes from them.
@@Mothinx I see, that makes sense. Thanks for sharing.
How would you apply this in a University aspect when we have multiple modules?
August, a question: The Value Goals are clearly connected with the Pillars, but in the table in the video I don't see the Pillar field, just the category. Has the Pillar field been hidden in the table, or is it a conscious choice to tie the Value Goals only to the Pillar category?
Thank you!
I think August replied somewhere in the comments about this. I think it's because it's reflexive. Whatever Outcomes are connected to Values is assigned the Pillar. If you related the Values to Pillars, I think it would consume all areas of your Pillars within the Category. Whatever Category references all Pillars related to the category. Idk if the wording is right or not, but I think it would be redundant in the end.
I did get another questions about this, and am confused by it. The Pillars are connected to the Value Goals and always have been. Sometimes the field/column is off to the side of the view and you have to scroll over to see it. But yes, Pillars and Value Goals are connected by relations as one would
expect. If the view in the video did not show that, it was an incomplete view. Hope that helps!
@@augustbradley I thought it was so, thank you for clarifying it further.
Hi August and thanks for great content! I have been following your tutorials and trying to mimic your system but have some thoughts on how to implement the Progress Bar in a useful/practical way in the Goal Outcome and Project Databases.
From what I can see these two bars doesn't relate to each other with any automated tricks but are updated manually in the Goal Outcome?
I've seen you automate this in the Project database with rollups with tasks but not with projects as rollups in the Goal Outcome database.
Do you choose the # Goal in the Goal Outcome to be the number of projects/or set a value of 10/20?
I have some online courses I am doing and would like to link these to the Goal Outcome Database. In the Course Database I have a progress bar and it would be nice for this to be shown in the Goal Outcome view also, or does it over complicate things? How do you go about keeping track of your courses if they relate to a Goal Outcome?
Starting at [9:00], Bradley explains why he chooses not to automate the progress tracking of Goal Outcomes.
He arbitrarily sets the value to 20 and subjectively deducts from it as he works towards it. He feels that counting the number of existing Projects will mislead you.
Did you know that if you are 'Filtering By (New Template)' in the template, the table DBs in your new project will auto populate as soon as you name it?
Yes, of course. That feature was added after the date this video was published. It was largely added because of my many videos asking for this capability :)
how can i get the value+ outcome databases ?