So yeah. Everything is cool now. I understand this is an unprofessional post but perhaps my peers out there understand where I’m coming from. It was a strange several months… slides. This person called photoshop files and websites “slides”.
Sounds like a great marketing idea to me. One day you’ll be grinding your teeth when he makes his fortune elsewhere. 
It would help if you would tell us what this is regarding…
(Mods: Let this person edit their OP and fill the rest of us in!)
Was he fired BECAUSE of him doing this?
If so, that’s hilarious.
I do not know why the person was fired but we’re all telling our war stories of difficult encounters. We had another person work here briefly, who left for a new job after a brief several months. When this person left, they warned me about the marketing director, giving me a sympathetic, “Good luck.” This person also told me of the whole “slides” issue.
So my only story is very minor (possibly not interesting):
I presented a draft of a site in development. Some headline text on the site was in all caps. It was a mistake. They asked me why it’s there because they were worried I was basing my development off of an incorrect mockup. I explained that the text was incorrect because of how I programmed it, not because it was in the mockup. I stated that it was not in my mockup.
They didn’t accept my explanation. I then said that I made all headlines uppercase because most headlines in the site were uppercase except for a couple and I still needed to add additional code to specify details for those exceptions.
This became a small argument because the person didn’t believe a word I was saying. I was baffled. This was within the first couple minutes of presenting the WIP. They got stuck on text that was all caps. This sort of dynamic seemed to exist between this person and others. Things became tense. However my team is now very relieved.
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Does your company have any concept of requirements?
It sounds like ideas go from the lips of marketing people to the tips of your programming fingers with not a lot in between…
It’s a business that is in heavy development. Start-up-esque environment. There was no buffer between the marketing director and programmers, as you’re pointing out. I am sympathetic to this sort of start-up, hurly burly but having a Mkt Dir who doesn’t trust the professional perspective of the only programmer working on a project is just a bad approach. In environments like this where not all positions are filled, you sort of have to defer to the person who has the expertise in the area.
The person who left, who was briefly our creative director, likely has amazing stories (judging by all the facepalming). I’ll need to pick that person’s brain.
After you speak to him, and publish your book, I propose a 10% discount for all SitePoint members!! 
Oh wait, another moment with the MKT Dir while using Basecamp. An email correspondence:
- A file is posted to basecamp sending emails to everyone on the project
- A person deletes the file a moment later because it is incorrect
- MKT Dir: I got an email but can’t access the file. Can someone show me where it is?
- Designer: It was removed from basecamp after the email was sent to you. Ignore it. A file will be re-uploaded later.
- MKT Dir: I don’t understand. I still can’t find the file.
- Creative Dir: The file is no longer there but the email remains. Just ignore the email for now.
- MKT Dir: I don’t understand. Can someone just show me where the file is? It’s not showing up in basecamp.
We all ignored the MKT Dir after this. However the exact same problem happened again a month later.
Did he make you do sites like this?
That’s a really good article… But it’s hard to handle and I almost gave up on it somrhwere in the middle. Horrible UX
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@mawburn that makes me think that someone was literally like say, how could I turn my website into a PowerPoint… oh wait…
It’s becoming a trend. It’s very annoying, like Parallax.
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Its a bit like when people call computer programs ‘apps’ oh wait you too microsoft 
Not really, “app” is short for “software application”, which better describes them than “programs”, since there are multiple pieces coming together to create a final product, rather than just a set of instructions sent to a processor.
The word “app” has been around longer than me.
The MKT Dir wasn’t requesting a slideshow. Rather it seemed they conflated the paradigm of powerpoint with websites. Basically, they wanted a website developed with full width and height, slides of content within that, and originally didn’t want it responsive because they didn’t understand what that is (powerpoint isn’t responsive). So it became difficult to communicate the conceptual differences with websites.
it might be but to the average joe they have been referred to as programs since i was a kid. If you go into control panel on anything up to win 7 you will see ‘programs - uninstall a program’
Apps came with smartphones.
Just because Windows calls it something or does something, doesn’t mean it’s correct. They are referred to (correctly) as Applications everywhere else.
In my world, a program and application are similar but different. Basically, if I’m told to write a “script”, then it’s something I’ll knock out as fast as possible. If I’m asked to write a “program”, it’s going to be bare bones but work well probably written in a single language. If I’m asked to write an “app”, then it’s going to be full featured with a proper UI.
I’m not really interested in arguing about it though. Just thought I’d correct your original statement. I’m just being pedantic.
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Seems like he was clueless and unwilling to change to the environment. I wish this was true for all work environment… I want the industry to adapt ‘Hire Fast. Fire Fast.’ So many companies hire really fast on underqualified developers…and takes them so long to fire them…
I certainly don’t wish the heartache of being unemployed upon anyone. This former MKT Dir is clearly good enough at something or some type of position but maybe not a director position. Anyway, many of us are very relieved this person was fired relatively quickly. It only took several months.