Goal Builder

Goal Builder helps teams map strategy from high-level purpose down to measurable objectives. You work on a visual canvas inside your team workspace, connect goals in a hierarchy, track health issues, and use an AI assistant to draft or refine goals before you save them.

Goal Builder is available to team accounts only. Open your team from the workspace switcher, then select Goals in the sidebar.

The goal canvas

The canvas shows your team's goal graph as connected nodes. Each node represents one goal and displays its title, type, status, and progress where available.

You can:

• Select a goal — click a node to open its detail panel on the right.
• Move goals — drag nodes to arrange the layout; positions are saved for your team.
• Connect goals — draw a connection from one goal to another to set a parent relationship (typically from a lower-level goal up to a higher-level one).
• Create a goal — use the create action on the canvas to add a new goal manually.

Use the toolbar controls to zoom in and out of the canvas.

The four goal levels

Goals sit on a ladder of four levels. Each level supports the one above it, so the ladder runs from the most enduring statement at the top to the most concrete result at the bottom.

You do not have to memorize this. Wherever you pick a level — in the create dialog or on an assistant proposal — all four are shown side by side with these descriptions, and the level the assistant recommends is marked Suggested with a one-line reason.

Lower levels should connect upward to higher levels so your strategy stays coherent.

Filters and health view

Above the canvas, use filters to focus the graph:

• Type — show only purpose, vision, strategic goals, or objectives.
• Status — filter by on track, needs attention, at risk, and other statuses.
• Health view — highlight goals with structural issues.

Health view flags common problems, such as:

• Goals not linked to a higher-level parent
• Strategic goals with no objectives underneath
• Objectives without KPIs
• Goals with no assigned owner
• Titles that sound like outputs ("Build…", "Launch…") rather than outcomes

Health checks run automatically when the graph loads. Toggling filters is client-side only — it does not reload the page.

Creating and editing goals

Create manually

1. Open the create dialog from the canvas.
2. Enter a title and optional description.
3. Pick the goal level from the ladder.
4. Optionally set a deadline.
5. Save — the new goal appears on the canvas.

If you got here by accepting an assistant proposal, the dialog also lists the KPIs that will be created together with the goal. Remove any you do not want before saving.

Edit from the detail panel

Click a goal to open the side panel. From there you can update title, description, type, status, progress, and timeframe. The panel also has tabs for KPIs, activity, and connected systems.

KPIs belong on objectives. Add metrics with baseline, current, and target values so progress can be tracked over time.

The assistant never saves goals for you. It only suggests changes; you always review and confirm before anything is created or updated.

Goal Assistant (AI)

At the bottom of the canvas, the Goal Assistant is a chat-style input. You do not need to know how to phrase a good goal — write it however it comes out, and the assistant does the formulation for you.

What you can ask

The assistant understands several kinds of requests based on what you type:

Example prompts:

• "we need to get better at keeping our big customers"
• "Increase enterprise retention to 95% by end of FY2026"
• "What's wrong with our goal graph?"
• "Show goals without KPIs"

Reading a proposal

A proposal is a working draft you can adjust before anything is saved. It shows:

• You wrote — what you typed, above the rewritten title, so you can see what changed and why.
• What changed — the reasoning behind the rewrite, such as turning an activity into an outcome or adding a target.
• Other phrasings — up to two alternative wordings. Click one to use it instead.
• A SMART checklist — which of Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound the draft already satisfies, with a note for anything still missing. Purpose and vision statements are intentionally not measurable or time-bound.
• The level ladder — all four levels with the recommended one marked Suggested and a plain-language reason. Click a different row to override it.
• Suggested KPIs — each with a direction, unit, and baseline-to-target range where the assistant could infer one. Tick the metrics you want; they are created together with the goal.
• Questions — up to three things the assistant needs to sharpen the goal, such as a baseline or a deadline. Click one to start your answer in the input box, then send it for another pass.

Accepting a proposal

Click Use this goal to open the create dialog with everything pre-filled, including the KPIs you ticked and the deadline. Review it, adjust anything, then save. The goal and its KPIs are only created when you confirm in that dialog.

Click Refine instead to start a follow-up in the input box so you can add detail and ask again.

If AI is unavailable, the assistant falls back to a basic keyword-based suggestion and tells you so on the proposal.

What the assistant does not do

• It does not create, update, or delete goals automatically.
• It does not change the canvas layout or connections without your action.
• Filter suggestions from chat are informational; use the filter bar above the canvas to focus the view.

Improve with AI (detail panel)

When viewing a goal in the detail panel, Improve with AI opens that goal for refinement context. Pair this with the Goal Assistant by asking the assistant to improve the goal's wording or measurability.

For best results, select the goal first so you know which one you are working on, then use the assistant with a prompt like "Improve this goal to be more outcome-focused."

Goal agent, observations, and recommendations

When you connect external systems to a goal, a goal agent can be enabled for that goal. The agent monitors progress and can surface:

• Observations — signals that something may be off track (for example, a KPI lagging with limited time left)
• Recommendations — suggested next steps based on those observations

Agent status and recent observations appear in the goal detail panel under Systems / Agent. Monitoring may also run on a schedule in the background for active agents.

This is assistive monitoring — recommendations are proposals for your team to review, not automatic changes.

Tips for a healthy goal graph

1. Start at the top — add purpose and vision before filling in objectives.
2. Connect everything — every objective and strategic goal should link upward unless it is top-level.
3. Measure objectives — add KPIs with baselines and targets.
4. Use outcome language — prefer "Increase retention to X%" over "Build a retention dashboard."
5. Assign owners — every goal should have a clear accountable owner.
6. Use the assistant for drafts — let it propose structure, then accept and edit before saving.

Related

Goal Builder lives under each team workspace at Goals in the sidebar. Team members need access to that team workspace to view or edit the graph. Changes are scoped to the team — personal accounts do not have a separate Goal Builder view.