How To Become A Personal Fitness Trainer Without Certification

Believe me. I’m your friend. You want to achieve a fitness or nutrition goal and I’m here for you. Most of the time, I have been supporting words of encouragement. But there are times when, in order to help you, I have to say, or write in this case, things that you may not want to hear.

This is one of those times.

Now I can understand where you’re coming from. You are an advanced student. You even choreograph your own classes at home. You read about the latest findings in the world of fitness and nutrition. Your friends come to you for advice. Heck, you’re already doing the job.

“If businessmen can start and run successful companies without degrees, why do I need certification?” Don’t deny it. I know that’s your rationale.

But you’re forgetting one important aspect of a personal fitness trainer’s job — the safety of their clients. Running a business doesn’t entail the risk of people getting hurt or even dying because of something the business owner says to do. Yeah, there are some extreme cases, but they involve jobs that are dangerous anyway and the employees know the risks (and are usually paid for it).

Fitness training is different. Your clients come to you to safely reach their health and fitness goals. It’s like going to a doctor. Would you go to someone who isn’t licensed to practice medicine? I think not.

Is it Mandatory?

Now you might have done a little research and found out that certification is not a legal requirement for personal fitness trainers. So yes, technically you can go out, start telling people that you are a personal trainer and start getting clients. But what are you going to do if your clients have serious health problems along with their fitness goal? Or want to train to complete a specific task (run a marathon, or complete a yachting race for example?) with or without some type of limitation? How are you going to know what to do with them?

And where are you going to work? You won’t be hired without achieving some sort of certification. Even teachers who have worked in their area of expertise need degrees in education. They may be hired with the stipulation that they get it within a certain amount of time, but if they don’t, they are fired.

The same is true of fitness instructors, case in point and true story. An extremely popular aerobics instructor, who really knew what she was doing, lied about having a fitness certificate. A routine check exposed her lie and she was fired.

Why? Because what you learn during the certification process gives you the basics to offer safe as well as engaging classes. I’ve seen the material and I felt like I was back in school studying biology.

And then, what are you going to do if someone gets injured. “Oh, I’ll cover that by telling them that I’m not certified.” I won’t even bother to respond to that.

You don’t need to go back to university to become a personal trainer, but without a certificate, you’re no more than a training partner.

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