Graphic Design

I interviewed for a freelance design gig with the two chief creative officers at a startup, we really hit it off and I got the job. From there I was put in touch with the manager of the creative team (who is brand new) as well as the only staff graphic designer. In my first week, I was tasked with designing an email for a holiday campaign and creating a one-sheet of information about a rebranded product.

When I went to look at the one-sheet assignment, the work they asked me to do was already done (albeit somewhat poorly, the photoshopping of a label the staff designer had attempted to update looked incorrectly warped, the perspective was off). But I was new so I didn't want to criticize someone I was supposed to be reporting to, instead, I went with a "Hey! It looks like maybe this task was already done, but please let me know if additional updates or changes are needed!" And they were basically like, "Oh yeah, my bad. Thanks."

For the email, I was never sent a reference email to work from (and had to hunt down the copy I was to use) so I was designing blind and didn't really know what I was trying to match or how to best stay on brand. The staff designer said twice that she would send me a reference and didn't. Only after two rounds of feedback (during which all of the responses from marketing and the designer herself were positive) did she finally send the reference so I could fine-tune and match the font sizing etc. in the final pass. I got a "great work on this, thanks so much!" and, since then, it's been crickets.

When I went to invoice them, I was really conflicted because I know the time it took to design the email was probably double what it should have taken, if I had had the resources I needed. I considered shaving the hours down out of fear that whoever was paying the invoice would be like "Whoa, wtf? Why did this take her so long? Let's not hire her again." I mentioned this to my friend who works for the marketing team full-time and she basically said that the staff designer is kind of a joke and she's not surprised I didn't have what I needed. She also encouraged me to invoice for the full time, so I did. She additionally suggested that I explain why it took so long, but I didn't feel comfortable throwing the designer under the bus on my first assignment.

It's now been almost a month and I have not heard anything from either the creative manager or the designer. I reached out to both on Slack to say I have some free time this week if they need an extra hand with anything. The manager gave me a "great, thanks so much! I'm getting back into it this week and will let you know" and the designer ghosted altogether. Now I kind of wish I had denoted that she didn't give me what I needed, otherwise the job would've been done much faster.

What would you do in this situation? Part of me feels like it's their loss and I wouldn't really want to work with such a disorganized team anyway, but it was a good rate and I really liked the people I initially interviewed with. Sorry for the lengthy post, just a little frustrated because work has been somewhat slow lately and I feel like I've lost a potentially good client.