"set things in motion" is correct and usable in written English.
It is a phrase that typically means to start something or begin a process. Example: After years of planning, the project team was finally ready to set things in motion.
We need something to break this asphyxiating stagnation and set things in motion.
A school trip to the Australian War Memorial set things in motion for the Summer Bay gang.
But before you get there, the act of declaring your intention with clarion clarity will set things in motion.
"I came of age at the time when Betty Friedan set things in motion, and it had a tremendous impact on my life.
His boss, Piero Soderini (Simon Jones), has officially set things in motion but is not sure Machiavelli's approach is the way to go.
She set things in motion: making sure other horses had their exercise schedules, and that grooms and exercise riders were ready for the day.
In both tales Mr. Deaver sets things in motion and then, in a variation on "exquisite corpse," the other writers take up the story.
A protein known as p53 that Dr. Gary Gilliland of Merck calls the cell's angel of death normally sets things in motion.
Star names such as Messi, Suarez and Neymar may get the headlines but Busquets is almost as crucial in the pivot role that holds things together at the back and sets things in motion going forward.
The Association liked the idea of Chicago getting its own literary center, and put Evans, a novelist and former sports writer for the Chicago Sun Times, in charge of setting things in motion.
When Ford died the day after Christmas in 2006, Swan said he boarded a military plane within hours to the former president's California home while his deputy was setting things in motion at a Washington command center.
