As a SWE with DevRel tendencies, I’ve been reading commentary for the last couple of days regarding what qualifies one to be a developer advocate. Seeing some of my “mentors from afar” weigh in with sometimes contrasting views caused me to reconsider my thoughts on developer advocacy.
It’s difficult to arrive at a consensus on who classifies as a certain role if there is no common understanding on the meaning of the terms. As an outsider looking in, it appears a standardization of nomenclature across the industry just as we find in the more technical aspects of any scientific discipline would be helpful.If there was a DevRel congress to agree on the meaning and usage of terms, my simple (hopefully not oversimplified) proposal would be this:
Developer Relations is that department, org, or team charged with ensuring developers internal and/or external are exposed to those products and services that most closely align to their pain points and needs for more efficient and effective solutions. Onto that prefix one can add a variety of specific role titles as appropriate per the size of the team, needs of the company, and pending which department the Developer Relations group reports to. Some roles could include Developer Relations Engineer, Developer Relations Community Manager, Developer Relations Logistics Specialist, Developer Relations Technical Writer, and many more. Often, teams will only have 1-2 roles with team members wearing multiple hats due to their smaller size while more robust teams may have all roles filled. In this specific structure, everyone on the team can refer to themselves as an advocate in general conversation while referring to their specific title for more professional purposes.
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