12 MIN READ

Using Well-Formed Outcomes in Goal Setting

Building a Picture of Your Objective, and Achieving It!

Visualize the path you'll take to achieve your goals.

Many of us set goals at the beginning of a new year, at our annual performance reviews, or when something major happens, and we want to assess where we are and where we want to go. Yet sometimes, even with the best of intentions, we grind to a halt with these goals. Before we realize it, weeks and months have gone by – and we still haven't achieved the results we wanted.

So, how can you give yourself the best chance of successfully achieving your goals and your dreams? One way to do this is to create a "Well-Formed Outcome" that motivates you to move forward. By building a complete picture of that goal, and creating a strong internal representation of it, you can make the difference that speeds you to success.

The Well-Formed Outcomes structure is based on the principles of NeuroLinguistic
Programming (NLP), developed by John Grinder and Richard Bandler. It was first discussed by them in their 1979 book, Frogs Into Princes, and was modeled from studies of successful people. It involves asking a set of questions that identify and clarify your intentions, actions, and thoughts, so that you can define your goal in a "well-formed" way.