Okay, yes, that's a hard disagree.
I have an education and experience in software development. If a manager told me to make a product in an unsafe manner, I'd refuse, and if push came to shove, leave.
Leave, both because I wouldn't be able to defend my work as a professional, but also because I wouldn't work under someone who would want to dictate the manner in which I do what I do.
This is missing the point. If you’re a 2 man team it’s much more important to have code that has a couple bugs in it but allows you to quickly find your product market fit. As opposed to perfect code with no bugs that is useless.
No one is disagreeing that tests are good in a vacuum / mature product. But if your focus is building a mvp, and you’re trading off the test time with other things, it’s not always worth it.
Screw “leadership” but consider for a second that you’re the leadership.