The Art of Training and Presenting - Prerequisite Skills of a Trainer
in the Art of Neuro Linguistic Programming

Certification as a NLP Trainer is not simply granted for attending a trainer training. The process of fulfilling the requirements for certification as a NLP Trainer is an intensive process that continues after Trainer Training, which includes

• gaining additional experience in the teaching of NLP (at least 100 hours),
• training in Hypnotic Patterning (with an emphasis on Ericksonian Hypnosis beyond Master Practitioner level),
• serving as a Resource Assistant in Practitioner and Master Practitioner training (many Trainers have also served as a Resource Assistant in Trainer Training),
• a written test,
• and submitting a recording of a live seminar.

The basic processes of communication excellence that are being trained are classified Input Skills, Internal Representation Skills and Output Skills (Utilization Skills). Any higher-level pattern can be represented as an ordered sequence of the basic skill level chunks.

First and foremost, NLP Trainers are expected to demonstrate the integration of the NLP operational presuppositions into their thinking and behavior (both verbal and non-verbal). In general, Trainers are expected to demonstrate competency, versatility and finesse in utilizing the skills at the Practitioner level of training (as outlined in the Criteria for Certification as NLP Practitioner) and the skills at the Master Practitioner level of training (as outlined in the Criteria for Certification as NLP Master Practitioner).

INPUT ACUITY SKILLS

consist of the ability to detect, that is, to use senses with agility and flexibility, increasing the range of what you are able to perceive in all sensory systems. The verb "to detect" is operationally defined as the ability to identify and make sensory-based discriminations.

1. Detect representational systems and sequences of representational systems through the set of physiological phenomena collectively referred to as "representational system accessing cues."
2. Make discriminations in all major input channels: Visual, Auditory tonal and digital, Kinesthetic and their sub-modality distinctions.
3. Detect and make the distinction between simultaneous and sequential incongruities; make the distinction between unfamiliarity and discomfort, agreement and understanding.
4. Detect the differences in the form of conscious and unconscious mind communication.
5. Language Patterns: Detect the linguistic distinctions known collectively as the Meta Model, Milton Model, which includes presuppositions, ambiguities and temporal distinctions the ability to detect the linguistic markers that presuppose Meta Program reference structures; the ability to detect the class of language known as Sleight of Mouth Patterns.

INTERNAL REPRESENTATION SKILLS

consist of the ability to use your internal processes with agility and flexibility. Internal requisite variety is operationally defined as the ability to do the following:

1. Represent information in all sensory systems.
2. Access information from and in each representational system.
3. Store information in all systems.
4. Overlap from each representational system into another.
5. Make sub-modality distinctions in all primary representational systems and resequence characteristic representational system sequences.
6. State Management: access states and physiology that promote quality in flexibility and variability in thinking and behavior which are independent of the three obstacles to learning and teaching:
1. internal dialogue at too high a volume;
2. tunnel vision: only seeing what is in the center of your visual field and failing to notice and recognize the relational aspects in the environment;
3. unnecessary tension in the body.
7. The over-all purpose of developing, expanding and enhancing these abilities is to create greater flexibility, creativity and mobility in thinking; the ability to make conscious shifts in perspective, mood and behavior that make available new channels of discovery, learning and change for yourself and others.

OUTPUT SKILLS

Utilization Skills include modeling skills, rapport-building skills, anchoring skills, language skills and multi-level communication, design and presentation skills that utilize conscious and unconscious mind learning strategies, meta-linguistic awareness (the ability to think about language and comment on language). Output flexibility is operationally defined as the ability to do the following:

1. Vary behavior in all output communication channels.
2. Establish rapport at both conscious and unconscious levels; pace and lead in each and all representational systems, verbally and non-verbally, including:
• whole and part body postures
• breathing patterns
• intonation patterns
• sensory-system predicate usage
• sequences of eye accessing cues, and
• sub-modality accessing cues and gestures
3. Adjust one's language and analog to pace the structure of another person's experience with reference to Meta Programs, and the class of language known as Milton Model and "Sleight of Mouth Patterns"; also appropriately adjust (i.e., balance) the configuration of Meta Programs.
4. Demonstrate the ability to use mirroring, direct matching and indirect matching (also referred as cross-over mirroring).
5. Sort incongruities, polarities and “double-bind” either-or thinking patterns and reintegrate in ways that broaden the scope of how someone looks at what they are doing; and in ways that expand the range of what's possible.
6. Elicit and anchor states in each and all representational systems, i.e., kinesthetically, auditorily and visually; directionalize and contextualize states using the basic anchoring formats:
• setting and utilizing spatial anchors
• stacking anchors, amplifying anchors
• collapsing or synchronizing anchors, and
• chaining (or sequencing) responses
7. Demonstrate strategy elicitation, design and installation, including criteria and elicitation and optimization; the ability to detect and utilize the following key strategies: internal performance strategies, motivational strategies, decision strategies, and learning strategies.
8. Utilize the linguistic patterns of the Meta Model, Outcome Frame and Well- Formedness Conditions, Milton Model, and “Sleight of Mouth” reformulations to gather and organize information to expand the range of possibility and choice in thinking and in action.
9. Ecological implications and implications of change: structure and implement “testing” (i.e., evidence) procedures. "Predict" the implications of change through time to “preserve” the integrity of the system as a whole.
10. Applications of NLP technology: identify the structure and function of each technique; appropriate contextualization and generalization of change techniques; re-anchoring formats, reframing techniques and basic negotiation models, submodality technology, threshold patterns, adjusting threshold tolerance, Swish Patterns; and Future-Pacing techniques.