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

What is a senior art director and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

Quoted expert

Yash Egami

A senior art director is a higher position in the creative industry. Thus it requires more than natural talent for illustration or graphic design. Senior art directors are responsible for the execution and on-time delivery of high-quality creative materials. They focus on timelines, budgets, strategic resource planning, and the day-to-day operations of their respective departments.

Some of the tasks that senior art directors perform include, but are not limited to, dictating the conceptual and visual development of designs, guiding and mentoring the creative team and deliverables, consulting with clients during revision, purchase and support stages, and lastly, creating designs. Most companies prefer senior art directors to have a bachelor's degree in graphic design, as well as five to ten years of work experience in a related industry. In addition, some companies want a potential employee to demonstrate their proficiency with a specific software program by holding a certification.

This senior position comes with a lot of responsibilities and a matching monetary compensation. The average hourly wage for a senior art director is $43.47, which equates to $90,420 annually. The career is likely to grow in the following years, resulting in various job opportunities across the United States.

What general advice would you give to a senior art director?

Yash Egami

VP, The One Club

A recent Forrester report says that the ad industry will lose 50,000 jobs through 2021, with 35,000 of them already lost since the pandemic. The traditional ad agency model was already in trouble, with many brands hiring away talent and creating their own in-house agencies. Add to that the recent reckoning with the Black Lives Matter movement, and what we're seeing is an industry that is being forced to go through monumental change in order to survive.

While traditional roles like art director or copywriter are on the decline, the good news is that, in an effort to reinvent themselves, agencies are seeking creatives with digital skills like UX design and programming. The rise of in-house creative departments has also meant more opportunities for job seekers within brands rather than agencies. And because of the demand for more diversity from clients and those within advertising, recruiters are making more of an effort to hire multicultural talent.

At The One Club for Creativity, we've been at the forefront of change in the industry through our diversity and inclusion, professional development and gender equality programs. We recently hosted our annual multicultural career fair, "Where Are All the Black People?" that brought together thousands of diverse talent with 40 agencies and companies looking to hire. We launched One School, a free online program for Black creatives who want to get into the industry but don't have a portfolio or the economic means to afford to go to ad school. And we're working on upskilling courses for professionals who want to reinvent themselves or keep up with the changing demands of our industry.

So if you're a recent graduate who specializes in art direction, our advice would be to keep an open mind about what kind of company you want to work for and think about expanding your skillset to include digital skills so that you can future-proof your career. Where you are isn't as important because, since the pandemic, agencies have become more comfortable with working remotely and they are more open to having a workforce not centered on the traditional agency hubs, like New York or Los Angeles.

ScoreSenior Art DirectorUS Average

Salary

7.7

Avg. Salary $103,294

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

7.9

Growth rate 4%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

3.9

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.63%

Asian 7.51%

Black or African American 4.29%

Hispanic or Latino 13.94%

Unknown 5.56%

White 68.06%

Gender

female 34.56%

male 65.44%

Age - 39

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 - 39

Stress level

7.9

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

9.2

Complexity level is advanced

7 - challenging

Work life balance

4.0

Work life balance is poor

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a senior art director

Explore senior art director education requirements

Most common senior art director degrees

Bachelor's

78.6 %

Associate

13.3 %

Master's

5.0 %

Start to develop specific senior art director skills

Skills	Percentages
Graphic Design	8.86%
Photography	8.77%
Creative Concepts	7.30%
Sketch	6.56%
Digital Marketing	6.26%

Complete relevant senior art director training and internships

Accountants spend an average of Less than 1 month on post-employment, on-the-job training. New senior art 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 senior art director based on U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics data and data from real senior art director resumes.

Research senior art director duties and responsibilities

Manage and direct interaction designers, marketing designers, HTML production and user research teams.
Direct and manage all photography including composition, talent acquisition and photo manipulation.
Design materials including POS, mailings, brochures, posters, flyers and other collateral materials.
Create flyers, show cards, and prepare artwork and media files for exhibitions director.

Get senior art director experience

Generally, it takes 4-6 years to become a senior art director. The most common roles before becoming a senior art director include art director, graphic designer team lead and senior designer.

Prepare your senior art director resume

When your background is strong enough, you can start writing your senior art 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 senior art 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 senior art director resume templates

Build a professional senior art 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 senior art director resume.