How To Become A Fitness Instructor And What Remuneration Can I Expect?

Career coaches are known to ask their clients, “What did you want to be as a child?” To help their clients make better career choices. As a child, you may have loved sports. As an adult you’ve incorporated physical activity into your daily life. Sometimes you come home after a workout and think, “I would love to be a fitness instructor.”

How do you make that dream come true? And maybe more importantly, can you make a living doing it?

Watch And Learn

One of the best ways to learn how to teach fitness classes is to see how the professionals do it. Pay attention to the music they use and start your own music library. Write down what you like and dislike as a student. You can use your notes later to help create your own style.

Also take this time to determine what it is you really want to teach. Nothing leads to burnout faster than doing something you hate. Spinning, for example, might be the most popular things going. Maybe you can last through an entire spinning class. But if just the thought of getting on the bike sends you into a mild depression, don’t teach spinning classes. You may be able to endure the class, but if you don’t love it, how are you going to motivate others? And after all, motivating others to do something they may not want to do anyway is one of the most important aspects of the job.

Keep Abreast Of The News

Your students will look up to you. In their eyes, you are the expert. Really! Let them down in some way, and they will drift to other instructors.

Take the time to read about what’s going on in the industry and about topics like weight-loss, anatomy, and exercise psychology. Scientists are constantly making new findings. When your students come to you with questions, and they will, you want to be the knowledge base they need.

Get Certified

You’ll need to get certified in two things:

• Cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) and
• Fitness Instruction.

Heaven forbid that this ever happens to you, but a student could conceivably have a heart attack in your class or in your presence. That’s why facilities usually require that instructors have CPR certifications. It is not hard to get and it will have to be renewed either every year or every two years.

Most facilities also require you to have primary fitness certification. You can be the best, most popular instructor at the club, but not having this can get you fired. Getting certified involves taking classes, or self-study, and passing an exam.

Remuneration

How much you make will depend on who you work for — a club or yourself. Salaries for contracted employees in gyms usually range from around $20k to $40k depending on experience and specialisation. Individual clients might be willing to pay as much as $80 per hour. However between $25 and $40 per hour is a much more realistic figure.

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