IUSCA Employer Hiring Guide for Strength and Conditioning Roles
The International Universities Strength and Conditioning Association (IUSCA), in collaboration with the International Qualification Framework Independent Regulatory Council (IQF-IRC), has published a new Employer Hiring Guide for Strength and Conditioning Roles, providing employers with a practical framework for defining, advertising and recruiting S&C positions.
Recruitment within strength and conditioning can be difficult to interpret consistently.
The same job title may describe substantially different levels of autonomy, responsibility and professional accountability. An Assistant Strength and Conditioning Coach in one organisation may work within a clearly supervised developmental position, while someone with the same title elsewhere may independently design programmes, contribute to interdisciplinary decisions and carry responsibility for athlete outcomes.
Qualification requirements can vary just as widely. Entry-level roles may ask for postgraduate degrees, advanced professional certification and several years of experience, while positions carrying significant independent responsibility may sometimes provide relatively limited recognition through their title, salary or status.
The new Employer Hiring Guide for Strength and Conditioning Roles has been developed to provide a clearer and more proportionate approach.
Its central principle is straightforward:
Classification should follow practice.
The appropriate professional level should be determined by what a practitioner is expected to do, decide, lead and be accountable for, rather than by job title alone.
Connecting recruitment to the IQF Practitioner pathway
The guide applies the IUSCA International Qualification Framework (IQF) Level Descriptors directly to employment.
The IQF describes professional progression through increasing levels of reasoning, judgement, autonomy, responsibility, complexity management and capacity for error correction. This provides employers with a structured way of identifying the level of practitioner capability that a particular position actually requires.
For employment purposes, roles will most commonly align with five points on the pathway:
IQF Level 2: supervised and developmental practice
IQF Level 4: defined-scope practitioner activity
IQF Level 6: autonomous scientific practitioner activity
IQF Level 7: advanced scientific practice and senior professional responsibility
IQF Level 8: strategic leadership, governance and master practitioner activity
The framework allows employers to consider autonomy, supervision, programme design, athlete or client complexity, interdisciplinary working, leadership, strategic influence and accountability before deciding what qualifications or experience should be required.
This creates a more defensible relationship between the work being performed and the criteria used to appoint someone to perform it.
Proportionate qualification requirements
One of the guide's most important recommendations concerns qualification inflation.
Higher qualifications should be required where the scope and complexity of the role genuinely demand them. They should not become default barriers to entry.
Under the IQF structure, Levels 2 and 4 sit below full degree-level professional recognition and can be accessed through appropriate education, vocational training, professional certification, supervised practice and applied experience.
A relevant undergraduate degree should normally become essential at IQF Level 6, where the practitioner carries autonomous scientific and professional responsibility. A relevant master's degree should normally become essential at IQF Level 7, where advanced practice, interdisciplinary leadership and responsibility for the decision quality of others become central to the role.
The guide therefore encourages employers to distinguish carefully between essential and desirable criteria.
An essential requirement should describe something a candidate genuinely needs in order to perform the role safely, ethically and effectively. Additional qualifications, specialist technologies, particular sport experience and other potentially useful attributes can then be identified as desirable where appropriate.
Aligning salary with professional responsibility
The guide also addresses salary and employment conditions.
Salary should reflect the actual scope of the position, including its qualification requirements, professional certification, experience expectations, autonomy, complexity, responsibility, leadership demands, working hours, contract type and national or sector context.
IUSCA also strongly encourages employers to publish a salary or salary range.
Clear salary information helps candidates assess whether the role is appropriate for them and makes it easier to understand whether responsibility, seniority and qualification expectations have been aligned appropriately.
The guide includes indicative salary alignment alongside the employer-facing IQF levels, together with guidance for interpreting full-time equivalent, part-time, casual, term-time and other employment arrangements.
Improving the recruitment process itself
The guidance extends beyond writing the job advert.
A substantial section addresses advertising, shortlisting, interviewing, practical assessment, scoring, candidate communication, accessibility, safeguarding and evidence checking.
The underlying principle remains consistent: the recruitment process should assess the capabilities actually required by the role.
For S&C positions, this may include coaching, reasoning, communication, judgement, programme design, evidence use, professional boundaries, interdisciplinary working and leadership at a level appropriate to the position.
Practical assessments can therefore be valuable, but they should test relevant professional capability. The guide discourages arbitrary physical tests or exercise demonstrations that have little relationship to the responsibilities of the post. Where a practical task is used, employers are encouraged to assess how the candidate observes, communicates, adapts, explains and makes decisions.
Interview questions should similarly change with the level of the role. A developmental practitioner should not be assessed using the same expectations as a Head of S&C or Performance Director.
Practical resources for employers
The Employer Hiring Guide has been designed as a working resource rather than simply a statement of principles.
It includes guidance covering role classification, qualification expectations, essential and desirable criteria, salary alignment, job advert construction, recruitment and interviews, developmental roles, autonomous roles, senior and strategic positions, and specific early-career, youth and private-sector contexts.
Employers can also access:
a complete Employer Job Advert Checklist
a Suggested Job Advert Template
recommended IQF certification wording
a quick-reference qualification and certification guide
an employer wording bank
detailed example job descriptions and selection criteria across common S&C positions
The example templates cover roles ranging from interns and placement coaches through Assistant S&C Coaches, autonomous practitioners and senior practitioners, to Heads of S&C, Directors of Performance and specialist consultants.
Introducing IUSCA Aligned Roles
The guide also establishes the criteria supporting the IUSCA Aligned Role designation.
To receive Aligned Role status, an advert should demonstrate appropriate alignment across areas including salary, working arrangements, contract type, role purpose, responsibilities, essential and desirable criteria, IQF certification requirements, qualification expectations, supervision, professional conduct and the relationship between responsibility and remuneration.
This will increasingly support the IUSCA Job Board in helping practitioners identify positions where the expectations placed upon candidates have been considered against a transparent professional framework.
Importantly, the guidance allows employers to specify the relevant IUSCA IQF certification or equivalent recognised professional certification. The purpose is to establish an appropriate level of professional capability for the role while supporting transparent and proportionate recruitment across the wider profession.
Supporting a stronger international profession
The Employer Hiring Guide forms part of the wider development of the IUSCA IQF professional infrastructure.
By creating a common reference point for role scope, qualifications, certification, autonomy, responsibility and salary, the IUSCA and IQF-IRC aim to help employers make better informed recruitment decisions while providing practitioners with clearer expectations about professional progression.
Effective recruitment has consequences beyond filling an individual vacancy. It influences access to the profession, professional development, remuneration, career progression, practitioner recognition and ultimately the quality of strength and conditioning services provided to athletes and organisations.
The guide provides employers with a practical structure for approaching those decisions more consistently.
As its closing principle states, the appropriate IQF classification should follow what the practitioner is expected to do, decide, lead and be accountable for in practice. Applied consistently, this can support clearer roles, more suitable applicants, better career pathways and stronger professional recognition across international strength and conditioning.
The IUSCA Employer Hiring Guide for Strength and Conditioning Roles is available now.
View the IUSCA Job Board and employer resources: iusca.org/jobs
