How to be a Great Instructor with Cyril Shokoples

Jul 8, 2025

Ask episode

Chapters

Transcript

Episode notes

How do you become a great instructor? No instructor or guide wants to be mediocre. Few students or guests want their instructor to deliver an average performance. This would hardly improve learning, create great stories or build positive memories. So how can instructors, coaches and guides be great?

One person who has worked extremely hard to become consistently great at instructing and guiding is Cyril Shokoples. Cyril is an ACMG / IFMGA Mountain Guide and a past president of the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides. Cyril is also an EMS instructor, and an Open Water Scuba Instructor. Cyril specializes in teaching high angle rope rescue, avalanche safety, avalanche search and rescue, wilderness emergency care and mountaineering skills.

Cyril has been training Canadian Forces Search and Rescue Technicians, known as SAR Techs, for over thirty-five years. He was also responsible for the creation of the Parks Emergency Responder program for national park wardens in Canada.

When he is not teaching, Cyril has been working extensively in the guiding industry as a climbing and Heli-ski guide.

Cyril joins Chris and Jordy to share key strategies and philosophies that can help anyone to be become better at instructing and guiding. If you work hard, Cyril’s advice might even help you to become great!

Key Takeaways

How can we become great instructors and guides?

Start by Aspiring to Great: If you want to be great, you have to want to be great in the first place. We generally become what we aspire to be. If your goal is to be merely average then that’s likely what you will end up delivering.

Prepare Like a Professional: This can sometimes require us to spend longer getting ready for what we are going to be instructing or guiding, than it is actually going to take us. Preparation should involve anticipating anything that can happen like the questions that might be asked, or anything that could go wrong.

Practice With Purpose: This can involve mixing up how we do things including trying out new ways of explaining or presenting information. It also involves reflecting on how we did after the fact with the goal being to learn how we could do it even better in the future. If we keep doing the same thing without reflecting on how we can make it great, we can expect to get results that are more likely to be mediocre.

Ask People for Their Advice: Don’t underestimate the fact that people like to share what they know. This is a human need that most people have.

When Presenting: Try to stay calm, be dynamic, engage the group you are dealing with and add fun where possible.

Guest Bio

Cyril Shokoples started his career as a scout leader over forty years ago. Since then, Cyril has become one of the most respected rescue skills instructors and mountain guides in Canada.

Cyril is an ACMG / IFMGA Mountain Guide and a past president of the Association of Canadian Mountain Guides. Cyril is also an EMS instructor, and an Open Water Scuba Instructor. Cyril specializes in teaching high angle rope rescue, avalanche safety, avalanche search and rescue, wilderness emergency care and mountaineering skills.

Cyril has been training Canadian Forces Search and Rescue Technicians, known as SAR Techs, for over thirty five years. He was also responsible for the creation of the Parks Emergency Responder program for national park wardens in Canada.

When he is not teaching, Cyril has been working extensively in the guiding industry as a climbing and Heli-ski guide.