How To Become A Credit Director: What It Is and Career Path

What is a credit director and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

3 min read

Credit Director is a senior-level employee in an organization's credit department. They oversee balance and collection functions, hiring, firing, evaluating, and promoting credit department employees. They create stock scoring models to predict risks, approve or rejects loan requests based on credibility and potential revenues and losses.

Typically, you need to earn a bachelor's degree or master's degree in Accounting, Business Administration, Finance, or a similar field to become a Credit Director. Additionally, it would be best to have a previous career in a related field and experience.

Generally, most of the graduates who gravitate in this field end up laying claim to annual earnings at $96,949. The current median pay for a Credit Director ranges from $90,419 to $115,160 in the U.S. However, this figure can vary significantly depending upon your experience and skills.

ScoreCredit DirectorUS Average

Salary

8.4

Avg. Salary $129,845

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

9.5

Growth rate 17%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

3.4

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.34%

Asian 8.28%

Black or African American 7.92%

Hispanic or Latino 15.29%

Unknown 4.12%

White 64.05%

Gender

female 27.34%

male 72.66%

Age - 46

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 - 46

Stress level

9.5

Stress level is very high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

9.3

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

4.9

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a credit director

Explore credit director education requirements

Most common credit director degrees

Bachelor's

71.8 %

Master's

16.2 %

Associate

9.0 %

Start to develop specific credit director skills

Skills	Percentages
Credit Policy	6.13%
Oversight	5.62%
Credit Card	4.81%
Process Improvement	4.64%
Receivable Portfolio	4.08%

Complete relevant credit director training and internships

Accountants spend an average of 1-3 months on post-employment, on-the-job training. New credit directors 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 credit director based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real credit director resumes.

Research credit director duties and responsibilities

Manage a staff of 50+ FTE.
Partner with small and entrepreneurial business to develop business plans and assist business owners with achieving payroll.
Communicate collection concepts to associates using FDCPA guidelines and the company training guide.
Developed/Share best practices, including collection practices and FDCPA rules/regulations training.

Get credit director experience

Generally, it takes 6-8 years to become a credit director. The most common roles before becoming a credit director include credit manager, credit and collection manager team lead and vice president.

Prepare your credit director resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your credit director 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 credit director resume. You'll find resume tips and examples of skills, responsibilities, and summaries, all provided by Zippi, your career sidekick.

Choose from 10+ customizable credit director resume templates

Build a professional credit director 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 credit director resume.