Coaching & Mindset
Keep Asking Why Until You Find The Goal Behind The Goal
From the FASTER syllabus: this article is taught in full in Motor Skill Application Specialist — where Why Why So So is taught →
In short: A client's first goal, 'lose weight' or 'get toned', is rarely the whole thing they're after. FASTER's Why Why So So process asks what the goal will look, feel and perform like, then follows 'why is that important' two or three layers down before switching to 'so what happens if you don't get there', repeating until the real goal surfaces. It is taught on the Motor Skill Application Specialist course and it runs as an ongoing process across the working relationship, not a one-off form.
The first answer is rarely the whole answer
A client says they want to lose weight, or get toned, or get stronger. Write the programme against that sentence alone and there's a real chance the client drifts off in six weeks, because the sentence they gave up front usually wasn't the whole thing they came for.
Why Why So So
One of the things taught on our Motor Skill Application Specialist course is a process John Hardy built for exactly this, called Why Why So So. It's a running conversation, not a form, and it keeps going until something real turns up:
"Ask the client to describe their end goal... Find out what they will look like, what they will feel like, how they will perform, what they might want to do next. Then start asking 'why'... Continue to ask why, and if you get two or three deep then think about moving to a so. If the goal changes then reset your whys. Ask what would happen if they do not achieve that goal (so what?). Then push again, so what if that happens."
Two threads, run one after the other. The whys find out why the goal matters. The so-whats find out what's at stake if it doesn't happen. Both keep going past the point where most conversations stop.
It isn't a comfortable process, and it isn't supposed to be
The course text says this straight: it's clunky to start with, and it has no fixed end. A client will sometimes land on their real goal and be as surprised by it as the trainer is. Handled well, that moment does more for the working relationship than any programme on paper ever will.
The stick and the carrot, both named
Getting to the "why" gives a trainer the carrot, the thing the client is moving toward. Getting to the "so what" gives the stick, what's at risk if nothing changes. Naming both, out loud, in the client's own words, is what makes a goal something a client keeps coming back for rather than something they wrote on an intake form once and forgot.
What to do next
Why Why So So is one module inside Motor Skill Application Specialist, £1,800 paid in full or £300 deposit then 12 monthly payments, the course built around turning a popular programme into one that fits the client in front of you. Price is on the page, no sales calls, and free lifetime return access is included, so the process is still there the day a client's goal changes on you. PT Manager opens the moment you sign up with any FASTER course, and it's where the goal you dig out gets recorded rather than half-remembered by the next session.
The FASTER Journal shares the next teaching point first. Sign up at /newsletter and it arrives the moment it's ready.
You just read one answer. The course is all of them.
Motor Skill Application Specialist — where Why Why So So is taught — taught by the people who wrote it, with free return access for life. The price is on the page, payment plans at checkout, no sales calls.
Also worth a look: PT Manager tracks the goal once you've found it.
See what the course covers →Frequently asked
Is Why Why So So a one-off intake question?
No. The course teaches it as an ongoing process that can run across weeks, not a form filled in once at the first session.
What if the client's goal changes partway through the whys?
The course's instruction is to reset the whys from the new goal rather than force the old line of questioning to fit.
Does finishing a FASTER course open PT Manager?
Yes. PT Manager opens the moment you sign up with FASTER, and adding real clients unlocks once you pass a course.
Reading this for your own training? Every trainer on the FASTER register has been assessed by us — search by town or speciality, free.
Find a FASTER trainer →
