- Techie was fired from AI internship after requesting a stipend hike via WhatsApp message
- They built the startup’s entire language model and brought in over seven clients in 3 months
- Manager dismissed work as test campaigns and declined to negotiate pay revision
A techie has caught social media's attention after claiming they were fired from an internship over an innocuous WhatsApp message in which they asked for a pay raise. In a social media post titled, "Fired from my internship over a single WhatsApp Message," the techie detailed that they joined as an artificial intelligence (AI) engineer intern at a small startup on a 'peanuts stipend' for a six-month term, with a promise that their earnings would be revised at the three-month mark.
As the only technical person on the team, the techie said they built the company's entire small language model (SLM), increased efficiency, and brought in more than 7 clients. When the review period came up, they pointed towards these metrics and asked for a 'steep percentage hike'.
"Hello mam, so I have completed 3 months now, and I wanted to bring up the stipend revision that was mentioned during onboarding. Over the last 3 months, I've built, tested, and deployed SLM agents, worked on latency optimisation, and benchmarked various models," the techie wrote in the message, adding: "Considering all of this, I was expecting something around the (xxxx) range, though I'm open to discussing it further."
However, instead of negotiating, things went sideways, as the manager 'panicked' and got 'incredibly defensive' about the pay hike.
"She claimed a hike that big was impossible for a student, downplayed my work by calling it "just test campaigns and test clients" that weren't used in production, and acted like me working independently was a complaint rather than me being self-driven," the techie said.
A few days later, the techie received a cold email informing them that their internship had been terminated due to a "mismatch in expectations". The CEO even lectured the techie for 30 minutes about the startup culture and called them "money-minded''.
"They literally fired me for a negotiation text, completely disregarding four months of heavy-lifting code when they could have simply said "we can only do X amount" and I would have happily agreed," the techie said.
"I don't want to beg for a low-paying job under managers who treat standard business discussions like a personal betrayal, so I'm planning to just send a final email demanding my formal experience certificate and walking away."
Check The Viral Post Here:
Fired from my internship over a single WhatsApp Message
by u/OrganicTelevision652 in developersIndia
'They Were Planning Keep You Underpaid'
As the post went viral, social media users assured the techie that they did nothing wrong and that the company was planning to keep them underpaid.
"Dude chill, always set your standards high, don't let anyone downplay you. If they lost you, it's their loss," said one user while another added: "I can feel you. I was also fired from the job in a similar way. The lesson I learnt is not to do unnecessary things other than the business requirement. The cost optimisation should have been in the maintenance part of the project, not the original project."
A third commented: "Don't be a servant of people. If you feel you deserve it, just ask for it. They will be making profits, and you deserve a cut. These times will come and go, but you gotta learn to understand that you are not a world saviour. You are a person who studies hard to earn money."
A fourth said: "I guess you shocked them. From the sound of it, they were planning on keeping peanuts for a long time. It's good you found out early. Try to leave that place."
