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Transform Your Training with This Easy Tool
Does your training environment sometimes feel dull (or even dead) as you deliver content? Does the environment itself feel uninspired? Wouldn’t it be great to have a magic wand you could use to inject your training with energy!

Such a “magic wand” exists. Called Pair and Share, it is arguably the easiest and most effective training tool you can use. It always increases interaction, whether your class consists of four participants or four hundred. Importantly, Pair and Share also deepens every single participants’ interest and retention.

So…Is Pair and Share Magic?

Once you try it, you may think so. Pair and Share is simply a structured opportunity for your participants to process information in groups of two.

Why Does Pair and Share Work?

This super-easy technique does three important things. It:
- Helps store information in long-term memory
- Allows participants to reflect on content and make it their own
- Increases individual accountability
You can sprinkle Pair and Share several times throughout any training session to increase participation while reinforcing your message.

How to Use Pair and Share

Before or after providing content, guide the participants to form pairs with the person sitting next to them. Instruct them to process a specific, relevant point in the material. Your instructions should force them to work through the topic’s application to their own lives or work. Provide a total amount of time for the exercise—perhaps 30 seconds to one minute.

Select from the following verbs, or use others, when you give instructions.

“Turn to your partner and …
- List
- Discuss
- Fix
- Do
- Figure out
- Fill in
- Share
- Explain (etc.)
Examples:

Please turn to your neighbor and …
- Name five types of safety gloves and what each are used for.
- Define “saturation level”.
- Tell them the most important fact you have learned in the last ten minutes and why.
Believe it or not, this simple technique can determine if your participants remember or forget essential pieces of content. Sprinkle Pair and Shares liberally throughout your training sessions, and watch the classroom come alive!

Want more tips to improve your trainings? Learn how Guila Muir’s Instructional Design Workshop can help you to create powerful, effective training sessions.

Guila Muir , a premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters, has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great trainer!
January 12, 2015
What’s To Love About Training? A Selfish List for Trainers

Training is expensive and energy-intensive. In Robert Mager’s words, training should be considered an “intervention of last resort” to fix a problem. And as more and more organizations adopt a Human Performance Technology (HPT) orientation, training can play a progressively diminished role.

So, trainers, let’s be selfish for a minute. Even in the larger HPT picture, training has value. Truly great training–that is, training that excites participants about learning and changes their behavior as a result–relies hugely upon our passion.

I’d like to share my favorite things about training. I hope this list invigorates and stimulates your passion.

So what’s to love?

1. The energy exchange between the trainer and the participants.

If you are an extrovert, the interaction between you and your participants is your life’s blood. It motors your soul and helps get you through the drier parts of your work responsibilities.

If you are an introvert, this exchange provides a uniquely rewarding opportunity to share your knowledge with others. (It also provides you a legitimate reason to “hole up” and treat yourself after the session.)

2. Seeing the light bulbs pop

Nearly all my clients say this is their favorite part of training. Few things reward a trainer more than hearing participants say, “NOW I get it!”

3. Knowing you “did good” in the world.

We trainers have the right to say, “I helped people learn and change. In my small way, I changed people’s lives for the better.”

If hearing the words “I never thought I could do this, but now I can” is the biggest compliment you can get as a trainer, rest easy. You are in the right business. Your passion is a priceless gift to the world of Human Performance Technology. Happy New Year!

Find out how Guila Muir can help transform you from a boring expert to a great trainer.

December 4, 2014
How To Build “Home-Grown” Trainers
Have you ever wished you could reduce your organization’s dependence on outside trainers? How about developing your own workshops? Join the ranks of organizations that have benefited from developing their internal resources, saved money, and improved the relevance and quality of their training!

What’s Not Working

Over the last few years, I’ve worked with dozens of agencies to develop their own “home grown” trainers and tailor-made curricula. Why? Agencies tell me it begins with dissatisfaction with current options:

1. Sending employees out to workshops advertised by national companies. Though some of the information is valuable, the workshops are generic. Typically participating are a hundred people or more, from all industries. One or two from your organization that attend may benefit, but the value to the agency may end there.

2. Bringing in training experts. Though sometimes necessary and very appropriate, bringing in experts can be expensive. These specialists may provide a “one-size-fits-all” training – after all, they just gave this same presentation in Cleveland a week ago. And what happens if you can’t find an expert in your very specific subject area?

Exploring Options

The term “training of trainers” (TOT) can mean different things. To some, it means training people the “ins and outs” of a specific program, the ultimate goal being their ability to teach that program. For example, a local health promotion organization trains elementary school teachers to use its packaged curriculum. They assume that teachers will use their already-established training skills with the product. This type of TOT’s focus is on content.

A more flexible type of TOT focuses on process. It usually includes how to design a lesson based on adult learning principles, how to integrate a variety of participatory exercises, how to enhance presentation skills, develop learning aids and evaluate the learning. The best TOTs include strategies to ensure learning occurs and to identify and analyze training needs from the outset. Using these new strategies, participants often develop and present a lesson based on their area of expertise that they can use immediately.

Steps To Develop “Home Grown” Trainers

Once an organization decides to “grow” its own trainers, there are two major investments: a one-time investment in training and an ongoing investment of time.
- When possible, garner enthusiastic, visible support from the top.
  When leaders overtly support trainer development, all employees get the message that learning is a valued and important element of work.
- Select people to become “trainers in training.”
  These can be people with training expertise or just a strong interest, as well as subject matter experts who traditionally have “bored the pants off” people while transmitting information. Clarify expectations, time commitments and potential rewards for participating.
- Provide an expert Training of Trainers.
- Provide regular Trainer Development Meetings. These meetings usually take place once a month. Trainers meet to discuss what is working well and to debrief issues and challenges. Often a different trainer will model a “chunk” of curriculum or an activity each month.
Wouldn’t it be great to use the resources you have right at your fingertips to develop or expand your agency’s training potential? “Home gown” trainers benefit personally from enhancing their skills, the agency benefits from increasing its training ability and other employees benefit from increased training opportunities. “Home-grown” trainers play an important role in creating an organizational culture of learning, innovation and self-reliance.

Guila Muir is the premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters on the West Coast of the United States. Since 1994, she has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great presenter: www.guilamuir.com

© Guila Muir.
August 9, 2014
Dive In!
Presenting and Open Water Swimming

I am an “adult onset” swimmer. Learning to swim at age 46, I trembled with the same anxieties as many of my Presentation Skills clients. I even heard myself describe my experience using the same words. Swimming was unnatural, awkward, unnerving, and out of my comfort zone.

Twelve years after my first lesson, I continue to feel amazed at how many parallels I continue to discover between swimming and presenting. I often ask my workshop participants for similarities they perceive between these two divergent activities. Their collective wisdom will help YOU overcome your “fear of the water:”

1. You must prepare

Workshop participants cite this similarity most often. This makes me happy. Open water swimmers can literally die (and sometimes do) for lack of preparation. Presenters can metaphorically “die” if they are not prepared.

Keep the ratio of 1:3 in mind. For each hour spent presenting, it’s wise to put aside a minimum of three hours to design, prepare, and rehearse your material.

2. You must keep focused on the final goal

For swimmers, effectively sighting on the final buoy helps determine who wins and who loses. Open water swimmers can end up swimming hundreds of extra yards if they don’t continually keep their eyes on where they want to end up. Those who sight poorly end up off-course, exhausted, and maybe even wounded: One swimmer I know ran into a piling and broke a tooth because lost sight of his final goal.

Presenters also lose when they drift away from their stated purpose. Remember to carefully craft and state your purpose. (Here’s an article that will help.) Then remain accountable to your purpose throughout your presentation, even if metaphorical winds, chop or waves try to toss you off course.

3. You must stand tall

Efficient, graceful swimmers demonstrate the same physical skills as presenters. Although swimmers remain horizontal, the fastest ones elongate the back of their necks. Their shoulders roll back and down to achieve the most powerful stroke, and their chests press into the water.

Presenters, if you practice these exact physical techniques, you will appear more credible, authoritative, and strong in front of any group.

Both in swimming and presenting, conditions can be rough. The first few strokes can feel icy. But if you’ve taken these three participant-generated tips to heart, you will overcome those challenges within the first few minutes. Then everything will go “swimmingly!”

Send me your “swimming” and “presenting” analogies!

June 7, 2014

How Do You Know They Know? Evaluating Adult Learning

I continue to be surprised at the use of “Happy Sheets” as evaluation tools in training. Beyond letting the trainer know if he or she was loved and if the room was too cold, what else do they tell us?

In 1959, Donald Kirkpatrick developed his famous model of training evaluation. Since then, it has provided basic guidelines to assess learning. Experts have found that 85% or more of all training programs use “Happy Sheets,” which reveal nothing about actual learning. And because data is much harder to collect and attribute directly to the training the deeper you go, fewer than 10% of training programs use a Level 4 evaluation.

Level	Issue	Question Answered	Tool
1	Reaction	How Well Did They Like The Course?	Rating Sheets
2	Learning	How Much Did They Learn?	Tests, Simulations
3	Behavior	How Well Did They Apply It To Work?	Performance Measures
4	Results	What Return Did The Training Investment Yield?	Cost-Benefit Analysis (Return on Investment)

Outcome-Based Evaluations

By creating and using an evaluation based on the course’s learning outcomes, you may get closer to an honest answer to the question, How Do You Know They Know? which is evaluation at Level 2 of Kirkpatrick’s model. Typically, the outcome-based evaluation would ask participants to rate their own ability to perform the learning outcome, as in the following example:

As a result of this training, please rate your ability to do the following action from 1 (“I can’t do this at all”) to 5 (“I feel totally confident doing this”): “I can explain at least five features of the Get Fit program without using notes.”

In many cases, the outcome-based evaluation would also ask the participant to list or explain those five features–in this way, acting as a test.

Keep in mind that unless you ask additional questions, you are still simply collecting data on your participants’ perceptions of their own learning. Sadly, those perceptions of learning are usually much higher immediately after the training session than a few days or weeks later. This is why follow-up training and reinforcement is so important.

Nonetheless, using an Outcome-Based Evaluation can provide information on:

Performance issues about which the participants feel less confident.
Issues you could improve or clarify for the next round of training.

All of this data is valuable to you as you (1) improve the class itself, and (2) follow the participants into the workplace to observe and support them. We invite you to download free examples of Outcome Based Evaluations from Guila’s book, Instructional Design That Soars.

Guila Muir is an expert trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great trainer: www.guilamuir.com

November 6, 2013

Electronic Devices in the Classroom

by Guila Muir
info@guilamuir.com

I stood over the two participants, saying loudly, “No! No! No!” At first, they were so immersed in their screens that they didn’t even know I was there. As they returned to the present world, their faces changed from screen-fascination to shock. What was I doing, looming above them, looking so stern? They hadn’t heard a thing since they’d pulled out their devices.

I wondered the same thing. What was I doing there? Why was I so irritated? As a trainer, had I lost emotional composure (a major element of credibility, according to McCroskey, Holdrige & Toomb’s 1999 research)? Had I blown it completely as a trainer?

The class had just returned from a break, which I’d prefaced with “The break would be a great time to use your electronic devices.” That statement has been successful with dozens of groups. During breaks, participants check messages, and then totally participate during class. I made a decision some time ago that I wouldn’t state overt behavioral guidelines in my training sessions. Now I was beginning to think my subtlety had been a big mistake.

What’s the Big Deal?

I don’t take much personally after twenty-five years as a professional trainer, but lack of participation in a highly interactive session is the one thing that “gets my goat.” When a student uses his electronic device during class, I don’t understand why he is taking up space in the room. Recent research also shows that student performance goes down when cell phone use is allowed during training, (Duncan, Hoekstra, and Wilcox, 2012). When students text in class, other students are distracted as well (Tindell and Bohlander, 2012).

“It’s Just the Way It Is”

Most universities have created behavioral guidelines addressing electronic devices, with consequences attached:

“A student may not use an electronic device during class time without the express permission of the instructor. Use of cell/smartphones during class time is always prohibited, as is leaving the room to answer or make a call.” (Texas State University).

“Using electronic or wireless devices in the classroom is a privilege, not a right. Instructors may reduce points awarded for participation in class or other graded activities for the inappropriate use of electronic or wireless devices.” (University of Wisconsin).

Most trainers in business situations make a verbal statement about this issue as well. My not stating aloud my clear expectations in this instance was, well, my bad.

Strategies to Govern Use of Electronic Devices in the Classroom

Trainers, this classroom management issue falls squarely in your lap. Your participants may be modeling behavior that supervisors demonstrate or tacitly condone. In fact, it may well be an organizational norm. I have noted the lack of personal presence due to screen addiction in almost all the organizations I have worked with over the last five years.

So it’s up to you, and me, to challenge this in our classrooms.

Your statement about the accepted use of electronic devices needs to come before you get into any content—right up front, after describing what your participants will be able to do as a result of the class. You can state your specific expectations aloud as well as provide them in written form. These might sound like:

“Please use your electronic devices during the break. Turn them totally off,” (my preference), “or put them in vibrate mode during class.”

“You may use your electronic devices to research specific points during our training. I will tell you when these opportunities occur.”

You must provide frequent breaks anyway—not so much to allow participants to check their devices, but to ensure physical movement and an opportunity for students to relax and reflect. I like to give breaks every 60 to 75 minutes.

Moral of the Story

Although electronic devices are endemic in society, they should only play small and highly specific roles in the classroom. So, trainers, it’s up to us to ensure that behavioral expectations are crystal-clear. As I learned, subtlety around this issue doesn’t go very far in this screen-world we live in today.

Let me know your experiences with this topic!

Research cited: Duncan, D., Hoekstra, A., & Wilcox, B. (2012). Digital devices, distraction, and student Performance: does in-class cell phone use reduce learning? Astronomy Education Review, 11, 010108-1, 10.3847/AER2012011.

Tindell, D. & Bohlander, R. (2011). The use and abuse of cell phones and text messaging in the classroom: A survey of college students. College Teaching. 60. Pgs. 1-9.

Want more tips to improve your speaking self? Learn about Guila Muir’s Presentation Skills Workshop.

Guila Muir is a premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters. Since 1994, she has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great presenter: www.guilamuir.com

October 16, 2013
The Curse of Knowledge
by Guila Muir
info@guilamuir.com

Think of a skill you have, (such as driving, swimming, writing, reading…) Would you say you are unconsciously competent with this skill? That is,
- Can you do it without thinking about it?
- Is it part of you, like an instinct?
- Would you have a hard time explaining the steps of this skill to someone with no knowledge at all about it?
All of us have skills like these. And it’s great that we do! And yet, here’s the big question. Can this level of expertise actually hurt us as teachers, trainers or presenters?

Before taking a guess at the answer, consider this experiment Elizabeth Newton did in 1990 at Stanford University. She assigned volunteers to one of two roles, either a “tapper” or a “listener.” Each tapper was asked to pick a well-known tune such as “Happy Birthday” and tap out the rhythm on a table. The listener’s job was to guess the song.

Over the course of the experiment, 120 songs were tapped out. Listeners guessed only three of the songs correctly, making the success ratio only 2.5 percent. But before they guessed, Newton asked the tappers to predict the probability that the listeners would guess correctly. They predicted 50 percent. The tapers were flabbergasted by how hard the listeners had to work to “get” the tune.

Why?

The problem is that once we know something (for example, a song’s melody or a skill), we find it hard to imagine not knowing it. Our knowledge has cursed us. The more intimately we know a subject or a skill, the harder it may be to effectively teach or present it to others in a way they can understand. We may find it impossible to fathom how to teach because we don’t know where to begin.

The Need for “Conscious Competence”

It’s common knowledge that experts who know the most about a topic don’t always make the best teachers. In fact, some of the very worst teachers have the highest levels of knowledge and expertise. These experts have lost touch with conscious competence, and they wonder why their students aren’t learning.

As presenters and trainers, we must come to our subjects anew. We need to get in touch with what the Buddhists call “beginner’s mind”, an experience of openness, eagerness, and lack of preconceptions. But we must also “crank ourselves down” from unconscious competence to conscious competence.

Conscious competence is the state we’re in when we are able to do a skill, yet must still concentrate on its steps and nuances. It’s the state we inhabit when we don’t feel like an expert, even if we are. Even if we must concentrate in order to do the skill correctly, we can verbalize each step we take. We are not on automatic pilot.

A Challenge

So-beyond the need to “know your stuff,” which elements do YOU believe are most important to make a great teacher? Here’s this month’s challenge. Please take the time to answer the question, What makes a great teacher, trainer, or presenter? in the “add new comment” box below. I’ll publish the most-often stated ideas in our next newsletter.

Thanks to The Art of Explanation, by Lee Lefever, for introducing me to the Stanford experiment.

Learn about Guila Muir’s Presentation Skills Workshops.

Guila Muir is a premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters. Since 1994, she has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great presenter: www.guilamuir.com
August 12, 2013
Presenting from the Seat of Your Pants
The Challenge of Sitting

We can lose a great deal of speaking power when we present from a seated position. Why?
1. Half our bodies, with their eloquent capacity for language, are hidden.
2. Often, our hands are not visible.
3. Our internal organs are more tightly constrained.
What’s Wrong With This Picture?

Here’s how to present with confidence and authority while sitting:
- Place your feet parallel to each other, flat on the floor, facing forward. Your knees should be bent at a 90 degree angle. No crossing your legs!
- Feel your sitz bones, (the bones at the very bottom ends of each side of your pelvis) sitting squarely on the chair. These form your anchor.
- Roll your shoulders down your back, opening your chest.
- Practice gesturing in the camera. Make sure your hands are visible, but don’t move them TOO close to your face. Gesturing makes you appear much more dynamic, and helps bring your own energy up.
You’ve Got It!

Present from the seat of your pants. Whether you are presenting to board members, City Council, or being interviewed, you look and sound strong, approachable, and confident.
December 10, 2012
Your Biggest Gift as a Speaker
by Guila Muir
info@guilamuir.com

Does this sound like you? “I’m a fine communicator one-on-one, but put me in front of a group and I just die!”

Why is it easier for many of us to present in front of a few people than to a larger audience? Why do many of us believe that some people just “have what it takes” to present effectively, and the rest of us don’t?

The truth is that everyone has the innate gifts to speak in public. True, few may possess the flamboyance of a professional motivational speaker. But I question the value of this presentation style, which often looks inauthentic. And although it does matter how you use your hands (avoiding the infamous “figleaf” pose, for example) and how you pitch your voice, the real gift you have to offer is YOU.

Three Tips to Enhance Your Gift
- Connect.
  It’s important to remember that speaking publicly is a relationship event, NOT a performance event. Your audience remembers what you say because you connect with them, not because you are the smartest or most charismatic person in the world.
- Don’t speak “to,” speak “with.”
  Think of the event as a dialogue or conversation. Look directly at people and share your knowledge with them.
- Express yourself.
  Remember that your unique style is better than any set of “stage skills.” Be yourself.
But Is “Being Yourself” Really Enough?

All truly compelling presenters use their greatest asset–themselves–to sell their concept and get their message across. All also realize that they can intensify their authentic selves for a more dynamic effect. Don Pfarrer, author of Guerilla Persuasion: Mastering the Art of Effective and Winning Business Presentation, calls this the “Intensified You” persona. It is “a task oriented, turned-on, intensified version of yourself.”

When I work with clients to achieve their own Intensified You personas, I notice their increased confidence and resilience as speakers. This is particularly useful when they deal with jaded or potentially hostile audiences.

Elements of The Intensified You
- Subject Mastery: You must know your subject thoroughly AND know the limits of your knowledge.
- Steadiness: You must “keep a steady hand on the tiller”–knowing you might need to change course to avoid a hurricane, but not allowing a small squall to deflect you.
- Empathy: You must remain sensitive to your audience. If you were a member of your own audience, what would you need to hear? To see?
- Candor: Include in your presentation what needs to be there–don’t hide anything. Show you are aware of challenges or problems; then present solutions.
So — bring your authentic self as a speaker, but pump it up. This combination is unbeatable!

Learn about Guila Muir’s Presentation Skills Workshops.

Guila Muir is a premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters. Since 1994, she has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great presenter: www.guilamuir.com
November 11, 2012
How a Hook Can Save Your Presentation
by Guila Muir
info@guilamuir.com

I have discovered that my clients all love a good hook, and are always looking for new ones. Let’s review what a Hook is and isn’t. Then I’ll provide two dynamic Hooks for you to use in your next presentation or training session.

What a Hook ISN’T:

Fluff. Never make the mistake of thinking that a hook is unimportant and can be left out. It is an essential part of the learning experience.
Lengthy. A hook is typically not a full-blown exercise, energizer or icebreaker.
A pre-test. Don’t use a hook to identify the “smartest guys in the room.”
A way to fill those nervous first moments of a training session when you feel least confident. A hook has a definite role. Don’t waste the precious first moments of a training session with comments about the weather or unrelated issues.

What a Hook IS:
- A way to immediately engage your listeners.
- Relatively short. Although there is no actual rule about length, the hook should serve its purpose concisely.
- Connected to the session’s topic or purpose. Although anything can serve as a hook, it should have a relationship to your session’s purpose. Don’t lob out a meaningless joke just to get laughs.
- Connected to who your participants are. You must know your audience’s concerns. The best hooks relate to their past experiences.
- Emotional, even if only mildly so. Adults become engaged through their emotions. Good hooks incite almost any kind of emotion, including laughter, groans of recognition, anxiety, or excitement.
- Inclusive. Use a hook that all the participants can relate to. Again, the best hooks elicit the past knowledge, emotions, and/or experiences of most people in your audience.
Developing a hook takes careful preparation. However, your participants’ immediate interest and involvement is on the line, so a little preparation on your part is worth the effort.

Two Dynamite Hooks

You can use literally anything as a hook. Trainers have used visual aids such as short videos or toys from the local Dollar store. They have used riddles, music, anecdotes, yoga stretches, and many more ways to immediately engage their participants.

The two Hooks I’ve outlined here have proven to work with a bang every time:

1. Real-life Questions

These may be the easiest type of hook to create. As for all hooks, make sure you know enough about your audience to use topics that resonate. Also, as in all hooks, ensure that your questions elicit an emotional response.

See if you can guess the topics for these Hooks:

“How many of you get so frustrated with your computer sometimes that you’d like to put your fist right through that screen?”

“Raise your hands if you’ve ever participated in a nightmare meeting.”

“Raise your hands if you’ve ever hit your boiling point around kids—even if you don’t have any!”

Guidelines:
- Always ask a minimum of two questions. You need this many to get your participants’ brains moving in the direction of your training session.
- Create your questions so that nearly everyone will respond in the same way (for example, 99% of hands in the room go up or down.)
- Insist on a physical response (hands up, stand up, thumbs up, etc.)
Option:
Start your questions with the following:

“How many of you would NOT be willing to…(Remember, your goal is to get everyone’s hands up. Asking in the negative may be more provocative and participatory than asking in the positive.)

2. “Did You Know?”

(Provocative Fact or Statistic)

The world is full of provocative statistics you can use to hook your participants. Just keep your eyes out as you read blogs, newspapers and articles. You can usually make the most unrelated statistic relevant to your participants.

See how one trainer brought together issues as diverse as strawberries and personal choices:

“Did you know… that Delta Airlines recently saved $210,000 a year simply by removing one strawberry from salads served in First Class? One little strawberry was removed and passengers didn’t even notice it. Big results can be achieved by little changes. Today, we’ll talk about how little changes in your thoughts and attitudes can have big results in your own life.”

Here are two other examples, used in actual classes:

1. “Did you know that in one second…
- A telephone signal can travel 100,000 miles?
- A hummingbird beats its wings 70 times?
- And guess what, in one second, eight million of your blood cells die.
A lot can happen in one second. This session will give you tools to decrease your response time in household emergencies.”

2. “Did you know that ‘Generation X’rs’ have watched 23,000 hours of television by the time they are 20 years old? They also believe they have a better chance of seeing a UFO in their lifetime than a Social Security check. In this workshop, we’ll see how generational differences in the workplace affect all of us.”

3. “Before the rule, more than 50 people here were dying in trenches every year. When you get killed in a cave-in, it’s not an easy way to go. You’re literally crushed to death under the weight of the soil. Soil weighs approximately 3,000 pounds per cubic yard. Nobody deserves to go to work and die that way.”

Guidelines:
- Turn a provocative fact into a hook simply by prefacing it with the words “did you know?”
- Make sure your data is correct.
- Make sure to integrate emotion.
- Consider combining your fact or statistic with another hook, such as a Real-life question.
Always use a Hook if you are serious about immediate engagement and interest!

Learn about Guila Muir’s Presentation Skills Workshops.

Guila Muir is a premiere trainer of trainers, facilitators, and presenters. Since 1994, she has helped thousands of professionals improve their training, facilitation, and presentation skills. Find out how she can help transform you from a boring expert to a great presenter: www.guilamuir.com
June 17, 2012