What Do Gym Owners Really Look for When Hiring a Personal Trainer? Chris Kraszewski Shares His View

If you are newly qualified as a Personal Trainer, or working towards becoming one, you might assume that getting hired by a gym is mainly about qualifications, technical knowledge and how confidently you can coach an exercise.

Those things matter.

But when I recently sat down with gym owner Chris Kraszewski, I wanted to ask him a simple question:

What do you actually look for when hiring a Personal Trainer?

What I liked about Chris’s answer was that he did not immediately start listing qualifications, years of experience or technical knowledge.

Instead, he talked about people.

How they communicate.

How honest they are.

How well they engage with members.

Whether they understand what they want from their career.

And, when I eventually forced him to choose just one quality above everything else, his answer was clear:

Total engagement.

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It starts with understanding the person

Chris explained that almost everyone walks into an interview intending to give their absolute best.

That means a polished interview answer does not necessarily tell you much about the person sitting in front of you.

Instead, he wants to understand what makes them tick.

Why do they want to work there?

Why do they think the gym will work for them?

What are they trying to achieve?

Where do they want their career to go?

Rather than simply asking somebody to list their strengths and weaknesses, Chris uses these conversations to get a deeper understanding of the person.

As he explained, by digging into someone’s mindset, you often begin to uncover their strengths and weaknesses naturally.

For anyone preparing for their first PT interview, that is worth thinking about.

Do not go into the room simply trying to give the answer you think the gym owner wants to hear.

Know why you are there.

You do not need to be brilliant at everything

Another point Chris made was that finding someone who is excellent in every single area is difficult.

One person might be weaker in one or two areas but exceptionally strong in several others.

That does not automatically make them a poor Personal Trainer.

Chris gave the example of a relatively new member of staff who was knowledgeable and highly engaging, but spoke incredibly quickly.

For some members, that could potentially make him harder to understand.

Rather than writing him off because of that weakness, Chris and his manager worked with him on it.

That tells you something about Chris’s approach as an employer too.

He is not simply asking:

“Is this person already perfect?”

He is also looking at:

“What strengths have they already got, and what can we help them develop?”

That is an important point for newly qualified PTs.

You are not expected to become the finished article the moment you receive your certificate.

You need a strong foundation, a willingness to learn and the ability to take feedback.

What do the members actually think?

One of the things that stood out to me most during our conversation was how involved Chris remains with the experience of his gym members.

Every couple of months, he personally phones a group of newer members.

He asks them why they joined, what they want to achieve, where they are on their journey and how their experience has been.

That gives him direct feedback about both the business and the people representing it.

On one occasion, three different members spoke particularly positively about one member of staff.

They described him as knowledgeable, engaging and really good at helping them.

It turned out to be the same individual Chris had initially thought might need more development from a teaching point of view.

I think that is a great example of why judging a PT on one weakness can be a mistake.

The members were not thinking about whether he spoke slightly too quickly.

They remembered that he engaged with them and knew what he was talking about.

Never forget how intimidating a gym can feel

Experienced gym users can easily forget what walking into a gym feels like when you have never done it before.

Chris described some people as walking into the gym and feeling as though there is a huge brick wall in front of them.

They have to overcome that fear before they can even start thinking about exercise.

That means the job of the gym team is not simply to provide equipment and programmes.

They have to help make the environment feel welcoming and relaxed.

Chris therefore wants his staff to recognise what individual members need.

Some members want conversation.

Some need reassurance.

Some need a little guidance.

Others already know exactly what they are doing and would rather be left alone.

A good Personal Trainer needs to be able to spot the difference.

That requires emotional intelligence and awareness, not just exercise knowledge.

Even eye contact matters

Chris mentioned something surprisingly simple that he pays attention to.

Eye contact.

His thinking was straightforward.

If somebody struggles to look at him and engage during an interview, how comfortably are they going to engage with the gym’s members?

That does not mean you need to become the loudest, most extroverted person in the room.

Being engaging is not the same as being loud.

It means being present with the person in front of you.

Can you communicate with them?

Can you listen?

Can you make them feel comfortable?

Can you recognise when somebody wants help?

These smaller signals form part of what Chris described as a whole catalogue of things he looks for when building his team.

Genuine engagement should not feel like a sales pitch

Chris also spoke about the employment model within his gym.

He explained that he has never used the type of arrangement where a new PT immediately has to pay hundreds of pounds each month to the gym before they have earned anything themselves.

Instead, his staff are paid for the hours they work on shift.

For Chris, that helps make their interactions with members feel genuine.

He wants someone speaking to a member because they genuinely want to help them, not because they desperately need to turn every conversation into a Personal Training sale.

Whatever type of gym you eventually work in, there is a valuable lesson in that.

People can normally tell whether you are genuinely interested in them.

If every conversation immediately turns into a pitch, members notice.

A good PT should be able to speak to somebody without mentally calculating whether that person could become their next paying client.

Build the relationship first.

So what is the number one quality?

At this point in the conversation, Chris had already explained that there was not really one single characteristic he looked for.

There were lots of things.

So naturally, I made him pick one anyway.

I gave him a hypothetical situation.

Imagine you are not allowed to meet the candidates.

You can only be told that one of them is exceptional in one particular area.

What characteristic would make you choose them?

Chris’s answer was:

Total engagement.

He talked about somebody being able to describe themselves, explain where they want to go and give you some idea of the timeline they have for their career.

In other words, somebody who understands themselves and can communicate that to another person.

Honesty matters more than the perfect answer

This led into another major theme from our conversation.

Honesty.

Chris gave an interesting example.

If someone came into an interview and told him:

“I only want to be with you for three years.”

You might expect that to immediately count against them.

Chris said he could actually respect it.

Why?

Because it is honest.

That person has a plan.

They know what they are trying to achieve.

They are not pretending they want to stay forever simply because they think that is what the employer wants to hear.

Chris made it very clear that he values transparency and does not want people telling him what they think sounds good.

Because if somebody is transparent with him, there is a much better chance they are going to be transparent with colleagues and gym members too.

And as we said during the conversation, people are usually pretty good at spotting when someone is not being genuine.

The feel factor

Chris could probably sit down and create a detailed recruitment checklist.

Knowledge.

Communication.

Eye contact.

Honesty.

Engagement.

Career direction.

But he also talked about something harder to put on paper.

The feel factor.

Does this person feel right for the business?

Can you imagine them interacting with members?

Will members feel comfortable approaching them?

Do they seem genuine?

Do you believe what they are telling you?

Those things are difficult to measure with an interview scorecard, but they matter when you are trusting somebody to represent your gym.

And I think that is probably the biggest lesson from the whole conversation.

A gym owner is not simply employing someone because they can write a good programme or demonstrate a squat.

They are trusting that person with their members.

What should you take into your next PT interview?

If you are preparing for a Personal Trainer interview, of course you should be technically competent.

But do not spend all your time trying to memorise perfect answers.

Think about your own story.

Why did you get into fitness?

Why do you want to help people?

What do you want from your career?

Where would you like to be in a few years?

What are you already good at?

What do you still need to improve?

And can you talk about those things honestly?

You do not have to pretend that you know everything.

Chris’s approach shows that a good gym owner can recognise strengths, see potential and help someone develop their weaker areas.

But you do need to demonstrate that you can engage with people.

Because ultimately, gym members are not just interacting with your qualification.

They are interacting with you.

Thanks to Chris Kraszewski

A big thank you to Chris Kraszewski for being so open about the way he recruits and develops his team at 360 Fitness in Shoreham by Sea.

What particularly stood out to me was the attention he gives to the human side of running a gym, from personally speaking to new members about their experience to recognising the potential in staff and helping them develop rather than expecting perfection from day one.

Conversations like this are incredibly useful for aspiring and newly qualified Personal Trainers because they give you an insight into what employers actually value beyond the qualification.

If you own or manage a gym and would be happy to share your experience and advice with the next generation of fitness professionals, we would love to hear from you.

And if you love fitness and are considering becoming a Personal Trainer yourself, get in touch with Storm Fitness Academy and we can help you work out the right route into the industry.