Top Metros for Training and Development Managers: New York Leads, San Jose Pays the Most

Across the U.S., training and development managers have a national median annual salary of $133,000 and national employment of 48,050. LaborCove’s metro‑level data shows how local markets differ from that baseline, both in pay levels and in the concentration of jobs. The national projected employment growth rate of 5.8% for this occupation provides a broad context but does not indicate how any specific metro will change. Instead, the metro rankings here come from LaborCove’s Geography Scores, which summarize the available geographic data into a single comparable figure for each location. Within the top 10 metros, no single metric explains the ranking order. For example, San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA has the highest reported median salary in the group, yet New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ holds the top Geography Score and the largest reported metro employment count. This makes the ranking table more useful as a set of trade‑offs than as a simple list from “best” to “worst.”

The national median annual salary for training and development managers is $133,000. Several top metros report median salaries at or above that figure: New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ at $173,810, San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA at $230,020, San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA at $173,530, Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA at $142,180, Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA at $168,240, Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN at $133,800, and Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV at $143,640. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX has a reported median salary of $128,110, which is slightly below the national median, while Burlington-South Burlington, VT at $125,010 and Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL at $124,520 also report median salaries below the national figure. This shows that top‑ranked metros in LaborCove’s results span both above‑ and below‑national pay, rather than all clustering on one side of the national median. On the employment side, New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has 3,520 training and development manager positions in the supplied data, compared with the national employment count of 48,050. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA also report four‑digit employment counts (2,150 and 2,080, respectively) within the top‑10 list, while other metros such as San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA (880) and Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA (560) have smaller reported employment counts than those larger hubs.

San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA reports the highest median salary among the listed metros at $230,020, yet it ranks #2 with a LaborCove Geography Score of 66.05. New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ, with a lower median salary of $173,810, ranks #1 with a higher Geography Score of 75.25. A similar pattern appears when comparing New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ and San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA. San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA has a median salary of $173,530 and a Geography Score of 52.91, while New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has a median salary of $173,810 and a Geography Score of 75.25. The salaries in those two metros are very close, but the Geography Scores differ substantially. Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX illustrates another case where salary and ranking diverge. Its median salary of $128,110 is below several other metros in the top 10, including Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA at $142,180 and Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA at $168,240, yet Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX ranks #5 with a Geography Score of 48.00, ahead of Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA at #6 with a Geography Score of 44.69.

Within the top 10, New York-Newark-Jersey City, NY-NJ has the largest reported employment count for training and development managers at 3,520. This is higher than the reported counts for other large metros in the list, including Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA at 2,080 and Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX at 2,150. Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN reports 1,440 positions, which is a smaller employment count than either Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX or Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA, but still a four‑digit figure within the group. Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV and San Francisco-Oakland-Fremont, CA report employment counts of 1,080 and 1,110, respectively, which are also lower than the counts for Dallas-Fort Worth-Arlington, TX and Los Angeles-Long Beach-Anaheim, CA. San Jose-Sunnyvale-Santa Clara, CA at 880 and Seattle-Tacoma-Bellevue, WA at 560 have smaller employment counts than these larger hubs but still appear in the top 10 by Geography Score. Burlington-South Burlington, VT and Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL are part of the ranking but do not have employment counts supplied, so no direct employment comparisons can be made for those two metros.

Burlington-South Burlington, VT ranks #8 with a Geography Score of 42.81 and a reported median salary of $125,010, while Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL ranks #10 with a Geography Score of 41.54 and a median salary of $124,520. Both report median salaries below the national median of $133,000, yet they are included among the top 10 metros in the Geography Score ranking. Chicago-Naperville-Elgin, IL-IN sits in the middle of the ranking at #7, with a Geography Score of 42.84. Its median salary of $133,800 is slightly above the national median and also above the salaries reported for Burlington-South Burlington, VT and Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL. Washington-Arlington-Alexandria, DC-VA-MD-WV ranks #9 with a Geography Score of 42.38 and a median salary of $143,640. Its salary is higher than the median salaries reported for Burlington-South Burlington, VT and Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL, even though it ranks lower than Burlington-South Burlington, VT and just above Crestview-Fort Walton Beach-Destin, FL in the Geography Score ordering.

For this occupation, the supplied national projected employment growth rate is 5.8%. This projection applies to training and development managers across the United States as a whole and is separate from the OEWS employment counts used for the metro rankings. Because no metro‑level projected growth rates are supplied, this national projection cannot be used to infer how employment will change in any individual metro area. The Geography Scores in this article summarize current geographic data rather than forecasted changes. When interpreting the rankings, it is therefore important to distinguish between the present‑day comparisons captured in the Geography Scores, salaries, and employment counts and the broader, national‑level projection that does not differentiate among specific metros.

LaborCove builds these metro rankings using authoritative labor‑market data and its proprietary Geography Score methodology. For training and development managers (occupation code 11-3131), the underlying employment and wage observations refer to Occupational Employment and Wage Statistics (OEWS) data as of May 2025. The national projected employment growth rate of 5.8% is a separate occupational projection for the U.S. as a whole. The LaborCove Geography Score is a composite measure that allows metro areas to be compared on a common scale. For this article, we use the supplied Geography Scores, median annual salaries, employment counts, and rankings for each metro. The precise internal weighting of those inputs in the Geography Score is not disclosed, so this Insight reports the scores and compares them but does not attribute rankings to any single factor. Because the national projected growth rate is reported only at the national level, it is used strictly as overall context for the occupation and not as a metro‑specific forecast. Likewise, employment counts are treated as counts of jobs in the data, not as direct indicators of job openings or hiring probability. Readers should use these findings as structured input into their own decisions. Individual priorities such as preferred industries, employer type, or non‑work considerations will matter alongside the quantitative differences highlighted here.