Question

Topic: Other

Help To Justify Replacing A Graphic Designer

Posted by Anonymous on 1/12/2012 at 9:31 AM ET 250 Points
I work for a global provider of a custom product in the healthcare industry. All of our Marketing (internal and external) is developed and created internally by our Marketing department. We do a lot of advertising including ads in 10+ industry specific journals each month (often with multiple ads), a couple of monthly mailers, several flyers, 4 full catalogs annually (30-40 pages each), monthly mailed newsletters, and many other projects that are too lengthy to go into but you get the picture.

We lost 2 of our 3 graphic designers and are now down to 1 full time graphic designer. We have a couple of employees who have moved on to other positions within the company but help out with design on a few projects for us. Management has told us that they will not be hiring another full time graphic designer at this time. We are desperate for additional help as it is becoming nearly impossible to balance everything and keep our schedule going. Not to mention, the quality of design has taken a huge hit in favor of getting jobs out the door.

We also have a huge project coming up that will completely change the look of our product, meaning all of our existing collateral will have to be updated.

We need help in justifying to management how badly we need to hire another full-time graphic designer since they don't see it as necessary (partly because we still manage to get most projects completed on time).

Please share anything you think may be helpful (best practices, ratios, benchmarking information). We've run out of ideas.

Thank you,
Jaime
To continue reading this question and the solution, sign up ... it's free!
SUBSCRIBE
Or, SIGN IN

RESPONSES

  • Posted by Jay Hamilton-Roth on 1/12/2012 at 9:14 PM Accepted
    If you're still managing to get most of your projects completed on time, why should they approve another hire? From their perspective, they're saving money and getting the job done.

    From your perspective, if things aren't as good as you like, but still "good enough", you've got to prove why more = better. Perhaps outsourcing some work can give you more results for not much more of a budget hit. If someone's about to quit because of the load, that's important for management to know as well. If you can show ROI for better graphics, do it. Otherwise, the best you can do is keep the communication channels open - showing the results you're achieving, but also mentioning missed opportunities (and the cost for missing them).
  • Posted on 1/12/2012 at 9:31 PM Accepted
    I agree with Jay (above).

    Just to add - if you approach them with the idea that a complete overhaul of all marketing collateral will add a large amount of work on top of your current load, in order for the project to launch in a timely manner, you need help in the graphics department.

    Find your employers point of pain, not yours (even though yours is huge). Think in terms of "selling" your employer on the idea that they need to reinvest in another graphic designer.

    What are the selling points?

    Consider what their objections are. Is the only objection that they feel the cost can't be justified? If that's the case, isolate that objection, and concentrate on showing them that NOT hiring another designer is costing more.


    For instance, these other employees that are pitching in. Factor in how many hours they pitch in and how much their hourly pay is. The employer is already paying for additional help, they just don't see it. The work that these other employees are supposed to do is getting set aside because they are helping in the design dept.

    Look at the situation from these kinds of angles.

    Good luck!
  • Posted on 1/16/2012 at 2:44 PM Author
    Thank you both for your responses. These ideas should definitely be helpful to us as we move forward.
BACK TO TOP

Post a Comment

Related Discussions

Community Info

Top 25 Experts
(Other)