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

What is a senior technical director and how to become one

Updated January 8, 2025

4 min read

When it comes to technological development within a company, the buck stops at the senior technical director's desk. From spearheading the development of new software to managing other technical employees to teaching others in the company about the technological aspects of the business, the senior technical director does it all.

A tech-savvy person with experience under their belt can find work as a senior technical director in a variety of fields. Technical directors can work for a software company developing new products or in an engineering firm managing a new project. A senior technical director can even get in touch with their creative side by working in film, television, or theater productions. After all, the gorgeous lighting and visual effects on a screen don't just appear out of thin air.

Whatever field they work in, the senior technical director needs to have a lot of knowledge about their specialization. For many senior technical directors, this includes getting advanced degrees such as a master's or Ph.D.

ScoreSenior Technical DirectorUS Average

Salary

8.9

Avg. Salary $148,603

Avg. Salary $59,228

Stability level

6.8

Growth rate 8%

Growth rate 0.3%

Diversity

5.0

Race

American Indian and Alaska Native 0.17%

Asian 6.38%

Black or African American 7.92%

Hispanic or Latino 14.55%

Unknown 5.59%

White 65.39%

Gender

female 16.32%

male 83.68%

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

6.8

Stress level is high

7.1 - high

Complexity level

8.4

Complexity level is challenging

7 - challenging

Work life balance

5.6

Work life balance is fair

6.4 - fair

Key steps to become a senior technical director

Explore senior technical director education requirements

Most common senior technical director degrees

Bachelor's

69.9 %

Master's

17.3 %

Associate

5.3 %

Start to develop specific senior technical director skills

Skills	Percentages
Cloud	9.99%
Project Management	6.74%
Product Development	6.50%
Technology Solutions	5.36%
Customer Satisfaction	5.31%

Complete relevant senior technical director training and internships

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

Research senior technical director duties and responsibilities

Manage 7x24x365 NOC with a staff of 36.
Manage ASG's IP portfolio.
Manage FDA submissions for medical devices.
Lead data center consolidation efforts, improving SLAs and reducing outages.

Get senior technical director experience

Generally, it takes 1-2 years to become a senior technical director. The most common roles before becoming a senior technical director include technical director, director team lead and senior director.

Prepare your senior technical director resume

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

Build a professional senior technical 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 technical director resume.