How To Become A Public Affairs Manager: What It Is and Career Path

What is a public affairs manager and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Quoted experts

Jamie Shaw,

Jody McBrien

A company's reputation and relationship with the public are crucial in business success and longevity. Therefore, it is the public affairs manager's job to ensure that the company maintains its public reputation by planning, implementing, and monitoring appropriate external communications strategies.

More than that, a public affairs manager stays on top of public policy changes that can affect their organization. They also maintain open lines of communication with government agencies, business organizations, and communities to preserve the best interests of their organization.

When hiring a public affairs manager, companies look for candidates that possess a degree in communication, political science, business, and other relevant fields. Furthermore, they highly consider those that have lots of experience in the industry and have a good track record in public affairs, PR relations, or other related lines of business.

Considering the critical nature of this job, a public affairs manager earns an average of $103,000 a year, which comes as no surprise seeing that a huge part of their company's reputation rests on their shoulders.

What general advice would you give to a public affairs manager?

Jamie Shaw

Dominican University

Network. Network. Network. Get to know your colleagues at your new company once you get there. There are so many ways to do this, including just asking to set up 15-minute information interviews. Besides making relationships with others, which will help make work easier and more fun, understanding why and how a different department operates helps understand the whole organization. This will ultimately make you a better employee.

ScorePublic Affairs ManagerUS Average

Salary

6.6

Avg. Salary $84,758

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

8.7

Growth rate 8%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

4.5

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.42%

Asian 5.14%

Black or African American 6.06%

Hispanic or Latino 9.20%

Unknown 4.67%

White 74.50%

Gender

female 51.18%

male 48.82%

Age - 41

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 - 41

Stress level

8.7

Stress level is very high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

9.4

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

3.8

Work life balance is poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a public affairs manager

Explore public affairs manager education requirements

Most common public affairs manager degrees

Bachelor's

77.4 %

Master's

14.3 %

Associate

5.0 %

Start to develop specific public affairs manager skills

Skills	Percentages
External Stakeholders	14.25%
Press Releases	5.68%
Government Relations	5.51%
Strategic Communications	5.10%
Community Relations	4.93%

Complete relevant public affairs manager training and internships

Accountants spend an average of Less than 1 month on post-employment, on-the-job training. New public affairs managers 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 public affairs manager based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real public affairs manager resumes.

Research public affairs manager duties and responsibilities

Respond to media queries, write news releases and manage media engagements while acting as spokesperson for several multifacete organizations.
Respond to media queries, write news releases and manage media engagements while acting as spokesperson for several multifacete organizations.
Establish air show hashtags to auto-populate the wing s Facebook page with images taken by viewers in the crowd.
Track and optimize SEM and SEO for international online marketing campaigns.

Prepare your public affairs manager resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your public affairs manager resume.

You can use Zippia's AI resume builder to make the resume writing process easier while also making sure that you include key information that hiring managers expect to see on a public affairs manager resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable public affairs manager resume templates

Build a professional public affairs manager resume in minutes. Browse through our resume examples to identify the best way to word your resume. Then choose from 10+ resume templates to create your public affairs manager resume.