How To Become A Personnel Specialist: What It Is and Career Path

What is a personnel specialist and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted expert

Edward Ferguson

There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a personnel specialist. For example, did you know that they make an average of $24.55 an hour? That's $51,057 a year! Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 8% and produce 58,800 job opportunities across the U.S.

What general advice would you give to a personnel specialist?

Edward Ferguson

Department Chair/Associate Professor

The skill sets I feel that would be most needed to and prevalent in the next 5 years will be:
Hands on experiences with animals of all species.
Knowing animal behavior and body language
Computer skills for many aspects of the business world but also how to collect, review, and learn from data taken about productivity, breeding, sales, etc.
Being adaptable/open minded. Don't be afraid to try new things and think outside the box
Know common life skills/problem solving
Internships throughout their years of higher education, nothing is better than experience.

ScorePersonnel SpecialistUS Average

Salary

4.0

Avg. Salary $51,057

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

8.0

Growth rate 8%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

7.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.61%

Asian 7.36%

Black or African American 12.61%

Hispanic or Latino 18.06%

Unknown 5.08%

White 56.28%

Gender

female 53.69%

male 46.31%

Age - 40

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 3.00%

Asian 7.00%

Black or African American 14.00%

Hispanic or Latino 19.00%

White 57.00%

Gender

female 47.00%

male 53.00%

Age - 40

Stress level

8.0

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.3

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

7.0

Work life balance is good

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a personnel specialist

Explore personnel specialist education requirements

Most common personnel specialist degrees

Bachelor's

51.3 %

Associate

22.5 %

High School Diploma

13.1 %

Start to develop specific personnel specialist skills

Skills	Percentages
HR	9.75%
Audit Pay	9.05%
Customer Service Functions	7.52%
Personnel Actions	7.13%
Personnel Policies	4.10%

Complete relevant personnel specialist training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 6-12 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New personnel specialists learn the skills and techniques required for their job and employer during this time. The chart below shows how long it takes to gain competency as a personnel specialist based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real personnel specialist resumes.

Research personnel specialist duties and responsibilities

Serve as consultant for ADA and FMLA issues; also lead sexual harassment investigations.
Manage wage and salary administration and supervise payroll function.
Brief command employees impact by RIF.
Conduct combat safety and weapons training.

Prepare your personnel specialist resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your personnel specialist resume.

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Choose from 10+ customizable personnel specialist resume templates

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