Utah’s economy closed out 2018 with a bang that should warm the hearts of HR professionals. With a decade-low 2.8 percent unemployment rate and the strongest job growth rate in the nation, the state has a lot of employees to hire and take care of.
According to the Utah Economic Council’s 2019 report to the governor, the highest growth numbers came in industries like construction, trade and transportation, and education and health services. Driven by an influx of new residents coming into the state and settling largely along the Salt Lake City/Provo axis, the demographic factors pushing that growth aren’t going away anytime soon. And with Inc. 5000 businesses like Roy’s Clearview Business Intelligence and Ogden’s Freeus growing at more than 300 percent annually, employee recruitment, training, and administration are all major areas in which skilled professionals are in demand around the state.
That’s bread-and-butter work for human resources teams, and it’s fueling demand for more and more specialists in areas like training and development, which will see a 36.9 percent growth rate by 2026.
Salary Ranges for Human Resources Workers in Utah
HR workers with the right education and experience can blow the top off Utah’s $62,912 median wage by taking on the right specialist roles at Utah companies. While it’s common for managers in the field to make six-figures once they reach the top 25 percent bracket, some staff-level positions can also reach those levels.
A master’s degree is one of the surest ways to ensure that you can qualify to take such high-paying roles in the state.
Human Resources Manager Salaries in Utah
General HR managers, perhaps surprisingly, command the highest overall salaries in the state, with a median of $95,140 per year that outstrips even specialized management roles in training or compensation. But a lot can depend on location. in Ogden, for instance, training and development managers bring in the highest pay of all management roles in the top ten percent of the profession at $164,270.
Salt Lake City
With 850 human resource manager positions in 2018, SLC is one of the best places in the state to look for work in HR management.
Ogden
Although there are fewer opportunities in Ogden overall for HR managers, those working as general managers or in training and development easily out earn their Salt Lake City counterparts at the median salary level.
Human Resources Specialist and Assistant Salaries in Utah
A bachelor’s degree can get you in on the ground floor in Utah human resources work, and if you play your cards right, that can put you into some very lucrative positions in the field. A compensation, benefits, and job analysis specialist earning in the top ten percent of the profession can make up to $123,910, for example.
It’s not just Utah’s major metro areas that offer high rates of pay; the Central Utah nonmetropolitan area is ranked fifth in the nation for HR specialist pay according to the Bureau of Labor Statistics in 2018.
Salt Lake City
Here you’ll find the employment levels and salary rates for HR staff roles in Salt Lake City as of 2018:
Ogden
At the median, Ogden’s compensation, benefits, and job analysis specialists make a very lucrative $64,430, well-above the overall state median for this role, and the median in Salt Lake City.
Salary and employment data compiled by the United States Department of Labor’s Bureau of Labor Statistics in May of 2018 for human resources managers, specialists, and assistants – https://www.bls.gov/oes/current/oes_ut.htm#11-9111. The BLS salary data shown here represents median – 90th percentile salary ranges for the state and its MSAs (Metropolitan Statistical Areas) and includes workers at all levels of education and experience. This data does not represent starting salaries.
Job growth projections sourced from the Utah Department of Workforce Services and published in the U.S. Department of Labor-funded Long Term Occupational Projections (2016-2026) database – https://projectionscentral.com/Projections/LongTerm. Employment conditions in your area may vary.
All salary and job growth data accessed in October 2019.