I just had to scroll back up to double check what you said your job was, because I was sure you said you were in charge of software development, and then I thought, “no, I must be misremembering that, because there’s no way the CEO and marketing person could genuinely believe that they know more about open source software development than a software developer.” But no, you really did say your job was head of software development, and the CEO and marketing person really did think they know more than you.
The Dunning-Kruger effect is very real in marketing and executives.
Titles are a bit inflated in small companies, so “head of software development” meant I was the team leader of a team of 7 developers including myself. But yeah, they really thought they knew so much more about open source and open source developers than me.
Even if you’d said you were “just” a software developer, not even a head of a small team of developers, I’d still work on the assumption that you know more about software development than a CEO and a marketing person. Relevant professional experience gives you much more credibility than they had. :)
Did you not fancy telling them what a stupid idea it was?
I did tell them. Multiple times and in very direct words. They told me I don’t understand nerds or open source.
Both marketing and CEO are jobs where Dunning-Kruger is considered an asset, not a problem.
I just had to scroll back up to double check what you said your job was, because I was sure you said you were in charge of software development, and then I thought, “no, I must be misremembering that, because there’s no way the CEO and marketing person could genuinely believe that they know more about open source software development than a software developer.” But no, you really did say your job was head of software development, and the CEO and marketing person really did think they know more than you.
The Dunning-Kruger effect is very real in marketing and executives.
Titles are a bit inflated in small companies, so “head of software development” meant I was the team leader of a team of 7 developers including myself. But yeah, they really thought they knew so much more about open source and open source developers than me.
Even if you’d said you were “just” a software developer, not even a head of a small team of developers, I’d still work on the assumption that you know more about software development than a CEO and a marketing person. Relevant professional experience gives you much more credibility than they had. :)