Anthropic AI jobs are one of the most sought-after jobs. However, the company’s lucrative job has just been left by Mrinank Sharma, a leading AI safety engineer at Anthropic, who has stepped down from his high-profile role not for another tech job, but to pursue poetry and what he calls “courageous speech.” His resignation has ignited conversation in Silicon Valley and beyond about the emotional and ethical toll of working at the frontier of artificial intelligence.
Who is Mrinank Sharma?
Mrinank Sharma was the leader of the Safeguards Research Team at Anthropic, an AI startup focused on building reliable and safe machine learning systems. In his role, he oversaw research into jailbreak defences, automated red teaming, monitoring misuse, and investigating AI behaviour, work widely recognised within the AI research community.
Mrinank Sharma’s departure was confirmed in a reflective letter posted on social platform X (formerly Twitter), where he outlined not only his future plans but his worldview — one increasingly at odds with a purely technological focus.
Mrinank Sharma’s education
Mrinank Sharma’s academic journey is nothing short of elite. He completed a Master of Engineering (MEng) in Machine Learning from the University of Cambridge, followed by a Doctor of Philosophy (DPhil) in Machine Learning from the University of Oxford. These credentials placed him among the most academically accomplished researchers in the AI safety field.
At Oxford, he focused on statistical machine learning, the backbone of many modern AI systems, before moving into industry research, where he applied theoretical insights to real-world safety problems.
Why he left?
In his resignation note, Sharma didn’t cite burnout or a new tech offer. Instead, he wrote that “the world is in peril,” pointing to a web of crises including but not limited to AI risk. He expressed the belief that tackling such existential questions requires more than technical work; it requires wisdom, integrity, and deeper reflection.
His intention now is to explore a poetry degree and engage with writing that complements scientific inquiry, an unconventional but deeply personal shift.
What is his future plan?
Mrinank Sharma’s departure is more than a personnel change at a rising AI firm it highlights the growing recognition that technological progress must be paired with philosophical and ethical introspection. Whether his journey into poetry influences future discourse in AI remains to be seen, but the message is clear: for some researchers, meaning matters as much as machines.