You know that producing an outline is an effective strategy for helping you organize your writing. Whether the content is a novel, an interview, a review, or any other form of prose, preceding the actual writing with some sort of framework — a hierarchical vertical list, a bullet list, an interconnected web of words or phrases — provides a structural scheme.

But have you ever used a reverse outline?

A reverse outline is an evaluative tool you create after you’ve written the content. Although any kind of outline is suitable for this task, for your first reverse outline, use the traditional roman numeral/roman alphabet structure.

If you’re reverse-outlining a novel or an essay of more than a few pages, start with a single chapter or a section so you don’t overwhelm yourself.

Number each paragraph. On a separate sheet of paper, or in a new online file, list the main point (I), followed by the ancillary points (A, B, C). Rinse and repeat, on or in a single document, for each paragraph.

Once you’ve completed the outline, review it and determine whether a paragraph is weighed down by more than one point, whether the points you’ve identified are the ones you want to emphasize, and whether any points are superfluous or misplaced.

In addition, consider whether the outline’s organization, and by extension the chapter or article’s organization, reflect your intentions. If not, decide whether you need to revise your intent or the output. (Hint: It’s much easier to adapt a topic or a thesis statement to a piece of writing than the reverse.)

Reverse outlining helps you reorganize not only paragraphs but also the entire work. On a paragraph level, determine whether you need to combine, divide, insert, delete, or move. For the work as a whole, revise as necessary to build an argument or carry a narrative.

Repeat the process as necessary for a longer piece — and if, for example, an extensive article has five sections that you’ve reverse-outlined in as many steps, reverse-outline the whole article as well.

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