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Ayan
Ayan

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Dark reality of being an intern

As the industry is heading towards the top, the expectations and experience required for a role of fresher is getting a little overboard. They expect freshers to know it all? Which doesn't really make sense.

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In my first internship they gave us a project to work on without any guidance; albeit asking them constantly

"What should we(the team of interns) do/change or perhaps what they want?" and guess what? the only response we all got was change the UI a little bit add in some ...

Mind you we had no industry experience and didn't know how the code works? We somehow managed to figure it out.

But when we submitted the code and were waiting for the head to evaluate and give us feedback.

All she did was taunt us on how low the quality of the whole project is and that she had expected a lot more..

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I felt Bad. I put in days and nights to understand and change the code without getting help from them.
They made us work overtime they'd call us anytime of the day and we ought to be present

this is what I later understood is "Toxic Work Culture".

Later, we used to get criticized for our "discipline" when we all were working day and even night, sometimes barely sleeping.

The internship period was of 3 months. First month was unpaid and from second onwards we were supposed to get stipend as well some % of the money in exchange for the projects/ work we did.

After a month of working and putting up with their bias. There comes a text slapping all of us in the face, "IF anyone here is hoping to get paid on the tasks we are giving you, can leave the group now. After observing the work and discipline it is unpaid for 3 months".

I wasn't hoping to get paid from the start because i knew the stipend wont be that big of an amount. perhaps i lied to myself to feel better about the whole thing.

The money would've helped me a lot and then i'd atleast not be troubling my parents everytime i needed something. And maybe i could save it up and pay my sem fees.

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well that brings us to the mistakes I made.

  1. Being available 24*7 be it for meets where i had to wait 40-50 mins (post scheduled time the irony is they weren't the ones on time)

  2. Not leaving after the first month.

  3. Making sure all conditions of the offer letter/ contract are fully accepted by both parties (not just you)

Not understanding my self worth. As much as you'd think getting the relevant industry experience is important. It really is not when it comes to your health both mentally/physically.

Before ending this article, I'd like to ask the question, Did you as well experience something like this? Share in the comments.

You've read the whole article thank you.

Ayan is programming - Buymeacoffee

wannabe dev.

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Top comments (1)

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huzaifaansari0 profile image
Huzaifa Ansari

Stay strong brother