Director of Accounts Receivable

Overview: An established sales and marketing organization in Northern New Jersey, serving a premier Fortune 500 client base, is seeking a Director of Accounts Receivable to lead its corporate receivables strategy and day-to-day operations. This role will shape and manage the company’s credit-to-cash processes, ensuring sustainable growth, optimized cash flow, accurate cash application, and an exceptional client experience in a fast-paced, performance-driven environment. The ideal candidate is a forward-thinking, hands-on finance leader who combines strategic insight with strong operational execution. This individual will actively manage and develop the Accounts Receivable team while remaining closely involved in daily A/R activities, including collections, cash application, account reconciliation, billing, credit management, and issue resolution. The successful candidate will be comfortable moving between high-level strategy and detailed execution—transforming processes, leveraging technology, resolving complex account issues, and developing a high-performing team to deliver measurable business impact.

Strategic Leadership & Financial Management: Lead the Accounts Receivable function, driving strategy, policy, and best practices across invoicing, collections, cash application, and credit management. Establish and execute a corporate receivables roadmap that supports business growth, operational efficiency, and cash flow optimization. Partner with senior finance and business leaders to align receivables strategies with corporate financial objectives. Provide strategic and operational oversight of all A/R accounting, reporting, reconciliation, and cash application processes, ensuring compliance with GAAP and internal controls. Develop, monitor, and report on key performance metrics, including aging trends, DSO, collection effectiveness, unapplied cash, and cash application accuracy. Identify trends, root causes, and opportunities for improvement and translate findings into actionable plans.

Operational Excellence & Cash Application: Oversee accurate and timely invoicing, payment processing, collections, and cash application across a complex, multi-state and multi-channel environment. Maintain hands-on involvement in daily A/R operations, including troubleshooting payment discrepancies, resolving unapplied or misapplied cash, reviewing account reconciliations, and addressing escalated customer issues. Ensure customer payments are accurately and promptly applied to open receivables across multiple payment methods and channels. Oversee the research and resolution of unidentified payments, short pays, deductions, overpayments, chargebacks, and other cash application discrepancies. Drive improvements in cash posting accuracy, unapplied cash balances, reconciliation processes, and month-end close activities. Implement automation and digital tools to streamline billing, collections, cash application, and credit workflows. Lead initiatives to enhance forecasting, analytics, and reporting, supporting executive decision-making and operational transparency. Ensure compliance with multi-state sales tax requirements (Avalara experience preferred).Calculate and process customer rebates in accordance with contractual requirements. Process and oversee credit card payments and ensure credit card discrepancies or issues are resolved promptly and accurately.

Credit & Risk Management: Direct all aspects of credit evaluation, limits, and approvals, balancing growth opportunities with prudent risk management. Develop and maintain strong relationships with clients to resolve non-payment issues, negotiate settlements, and achieve positive business outcomes. Establish scalable credit policies and governance frameworks that support sustainable revenue growth. Partner with Sales and Operations to proactively address credit risk, payment disputes, deductions, and other issues that could affect collections or customer relationships.

Hands-On Team Leadership & Collaboration: Provide direct, hands-on leadership and day-to-day management of the Accounts Receivable team, maintaining visibility into workloads, priorities, account issues, and performance. Manage, mentor, and develop team members through regular coaching, goal-setting, performance feedback, and professional development. Establish clear individual and team performance expectations and hold team members accountable for collections, cash application accuracy, reconciliations, and other A/R objectives. Work alongside the team when necessary to resolve complex customer accounts, payment application issues, collection challenges, and operational bottlenecks. Ensure appropriate workload distribution, coverage, cross-training, and process documentation across the A/R function. Foster a collaborative, solutions-oriented environment that emphasizes accountability, accuracy, responsiveness, and customer service. Collaborate cross-functionally with Sales, Operations, Accounting, Treasury, and IT to enhance the end-to-end order-to-cash process. Champion a culture of continuous improvement while maintaining strong day-to-day operational discipline.

Qualifications: Bachelor’s degree in Accounting, Finance, Business Management, or a related field; MBA preferred.8+ years of progressive experience in accounts receivable, corporate accounting, financial operations, credit, or collections, including at least 3 years in a leadership role. Demonstrated hands-on experience managing an Accounts Receivable team, including coaching, performance management, workload prioritization, and direct involvement in day-to-day A/R operations. Strong cash application experience, including high-volume payment posting, account reconciliation, unapplied cash resolution, deductions, short payments, overpayments, and payment discrepancy research. Proven success managing large-scale receivables operations in a multi-entity, multi-channel, or high-growth environment. Strong understanding of the complete order-to-cash cycle, including billing, cash application, collections, credit management, reconciliations, and reporting. Strong command of financial systems (Microsoft Dynamics GP/Great Plains preferred) and advanced Excel capabilities, including pivot tables, lookups, and macros. Experience implementing or optimizing automation within billing, collections, or cash application processes strongly preferred. Excellent analytical, problem-solving, negotiation, and communication skills, with the ability to work effectively with both senior leadership and front-line team members. Demonstrated experience driving process transformation, automation, operational excellence, and measurable improvements in A/R performance. Ability to thrive as a player-coach who can set strategy while remaining actively engaged in execution and problem-solving. Equal Opportunity Employer