[Chris]

Hi Ed,

You raise an interesting point regarding outcome goals versus "action" goals. Personally I tend to set "outcome" goals as it is the end result that is most important, not how you get there (and there are usually a number of different ways to get there).

Say your goal is to loose weight, if you state your goal as "I want to weigh XX pounds on 31st December 2006" then that defines your desired outcome very clearly, which I think is important. However, there are a number of different ways you could get to that weight. Increasing excercise is one, but reducing caloric intake is another and you could balance these two to varying degrees. One option is that you exercise twice a week for 30 minutes and reduce your daily calorie intake quite significantly. Another option would be to exercise everyday for an hour and not reduce the calories as much. What I'm getting at is that there is never just one way to achieve a particular goal.

Say in your case you set your goal as an "action" goal which is to work out 20 times in December. If you then fail to work out 20 times (say you mange 12) but your diet is exceptional and you still loose the desired amount of weight.... technically you have failed to reach the specific "action" goal that you set, even though you have actually achieved the end result that you were after.

I think it is probably still important to state your goals clearly as desired "outcomes", as part of the process of setting goals actually stimulates your subconscious to start guiding you towards achieving that goal. Mentally I think you will be more closely focused on achieving your desired outcome (through any means) more than if you were just focused on a bunch of "behaviours".

That said, I think it could be useful to set "behaviour" type goals in addition to your "outcome" goals, such as "visit the gym three times a week throughout december", or "avoid fast food on Mondays-Fridays for a month" as these give you very specific targets to aim for on a day to day basis. Maybe you call these "sub-goals" or just "targets". So state your desired outcome very clearly as your main goal, and then list 2 or 3 "sub-goals" which maybe specific behaviours/habits/targets that you need to achieve in order to meet your main goal.

So the short answer is: I think both are useful!


PS I think Mycroft makes a good point about being very specific about your goals when you write them down, including a date by which you want to have achieved each goal.