A director's role comes with a lot of responsibilities, and if you want to become a unit director, you should know that these management professionals direct and manage medical professionals in an organization. They also take care of daily administrative and clinical tasks related to mental health programs. Other than these duties, unit directors assist in the recruitment process of healthcare professionals to increase the profits of an organization.
Most unit directors hold a bachelor's degree, and they commonly study business, nursing, or psychology. They have an understanding of patient care, customer service, RN, and professional development. Directors working in this role are detail-oriented with good interpersonal and analytical skills.
Unit directors get a very decent salary package from their companies. They can earn more than $54 in an hour and make around $113,000 per annum. Moreover, the career is expected to grow significantly, producing thousands of job opportunities in the US.
Unit Director Overview
Unit Director Careers
There is more than meets the eye when it comes to being a unit director. For example, did you know that they make an average of $47.45 an hour? That's $98,705 a year!
Between 2018 and 2028, the career is expected to grow 18% and produce 71,600 job opportunities across the U.S.
What Does a Unit Director Do
There are certain skills that many unit directors have in order to accomplish their responsibilities. By taking a look through resumes, we were able to narrow down the most common skills for a person in this position. We discovered that a lot of resumes listed analytical skills, detail oriented and interpersonal skills.
When it comes to the most important skills required to be a unit director, we found that a lot of resumes listed 20.2% of unit directors included patient care, while 18.5% of resumes included customer service, and 12.3% of resumes included rn. Hard skills like these are helpful to have when it comes to performing essential job responsibilities.
When it comes to searching for a job, many search for a key term or phrase. Instead, it might be more helpful to search by industry, as you might be missing jobs that you never thought about in industries that you didn't even think offered positions related to the unit director job title. But what industry to start with? Most unit directors actually find jobs in the health care and non profits industries.
How To Become a Unit Director
If you're interested in becoming a unit director, one of the first things to consider is how much education you need. We've determined that 44.2% of unit directors have a bachelor's degree. In terms of higher education levels, we found that 24.4% of unit directors have master's degrees. Even though most unit directors have a college degree, it's possible to become one with only a high school degree or GED.
Choosing the right major is always an important step when researching how to become a unit director. When we researched the most common majors for a unit director, we found that they most commonly earn bachelor's degree degrees or master's degree degrees. Other degrees that we often see on unit director resumes include associate degree degrees or high school diploma degrees.
You may find that experience in other jobs will help you become a unit director. In fact, many unit director jobs require experience in a role such as staff nurse. Meanwhile, many unit directors also have previous career experience in roles such as general manager or assistant manager.
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Unit Director Career Paths
As you move along in your career, you may start taking on more responsibilities or notice that you've taken on a leadership role. Using our career map, a unit director can determine their career goals through the career progression. For example, they could start out with a role such as director, progress to a title such as vice president and then eventually end up with the title vice president.
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Average Salary for a Unit Director
Best Paying Cities
Recently Added Salaries
Job TitleCompany  | Company | Start Date | Salary |
|---|---|---|---|
State of Connecticut Labor Department Unit Director (Hamden American Job Center P Labor Department Unit Director (Hamden American Job Center P | State of Connecticut State of Connecticut | 11/30/2020 11/30/2020 | $93,44211/30/2020 $93,442 |
Geel Community Services, Inc. Unit Director/Supervisor Unit Director/Supervisor | Geel Community Services, Inc. Geel Community Services, Inc. | 10/14/2020 10/14/2020 | $51,68810/14/2020 $51,688 |
State of Georgia Unit Director, Product (GTA) Unit Director, Product (GTA) | State of Georgia State of Georgia | 05/21/2020 05/21/2020 | $63,80005/21/2020 $63,800 |
State of Georgia Unit Director Unit Director | State of Georgia State of Georgia | 01/09/2020 01/09/2020 | $63,80001/09/2020 $63,800 |
Indian Health Service Unit Director Unit Director | Indian Health Service Indian Health Service | 11/27/2019 11/27/2019 | $88,81611/27/2019 $88,816 |
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Unit Director Resumes
Designing and figuring out what to include on your resume can be tough, not to mention time-consuming. That's why we put together a guide that is designed to help you craft the perfect resume for becoming a Unit Director. If you're needing extra inspiration, take a look through our selection of templates that are specific to your job.
Learn How To Write a Unit Director Resume
At Zippia, we went through countless Unit Director resumes and compiled some information about how best to optimize them. Here are some suggestions based on what we found, divided by the individual sections of the resume itself.
View Detailed InformationTop Colleges for Unit Directors
1. University of Pennsylvania
Philadelphia, PA • Private
2. University of Southern California
Los Angeles, CA • Private
3. University of Michigan - Ann Arbor
Ann Arbor, MI • Public
4. Stanford University
Stanford, CA • Private
5. University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
Chapel Hill, NC • Public
6. Duke University
Durham, NC • Private
7. SUNY Stony Brook
Stony Brook, NY • Public
8. University of Minnesota - Twin Cities
Minneapolis, MN • Public
9. University of California, Irvine
Irvine, CA • Public
10. University of Virginia
Charlottesville, VA • Public
Top Skills For a Unit Director
The skills section on your resume can be almost as important as the experience section, so you want it to be an accurate portrayal of what you can do. Luckily, we've found all of the skills you'll need so even if you don't have these skills yet, you know what you need to work on. Out of all the resumes we looked through, 20.2% of unit directors listed patient care on their resume, but soft skills such as analytical skills and detail oriented are important as well.
- Patient Care, 20.2%
- Customer Service, 18.5%
- RN, 12.3%
- Staff Members, 5.9%
- Professional Development, 5.6%
- Other Skills, 37.5% See All Unit Director Skills
Best States For a Unit Director
Some places are better than others when it comes to starting a career as a unit director. The best states for people in this position are Rhode Island, Delaware, New York, and Connecticut. Unit directors make the most in Rhode Island with an average salary of $114,761. Whereas in Delaware and New York, they would average $111,364 and $111,224, respectively. While unit directors would only make an average of $110,860 in Connecticut, you would still make more there than in the rest of the country. We determined these as the best states based on job availability and pay. By finding the median salary, cost of living, and using the Bureau of Labor Statistics' Location Quotient, we narrowed down our list of states to these four.
1. New York
$111,224
Avg. Salary
2. Connecticut
$110,860
Avg. Salary
3. Delaware
$111,364
Avg. Salary