Also, what on earth is Software Engineer V? They also have Software Engineer I through IV.

Edit: it looks like it's an experience tier (I: 0-2 years, II: 2-4, III: 4-6, IV: 6-8, V: 8-10)

Senior Principle Software Engineer??

So what's the best way to give yourself an opportunity to push into the $250k range?

1. Move into straight management?
2. Get into a big company like Google or FB and try to really shine?
3. Move into something like product owner?
4. Start calling yourself an architect?
5. Hook up with a desperate startup willing to pay out the nose?
6. Try to work into becoming a ringer consultant?
7. Other?

Totally out of my ass:

7 (Learning a super high demand technology/domain) > 2 > 1


I think 3 and 4 won't do much. 5 will almost never work (unless you overvalue the EV of equity, which lots of people do). I don't really know where 6 fits in.

Edit: In a long term sense 5 might be pretty valuable. Its can be easier to move up to management in a start up and it can be easier to learn lots of new skills/technologies that will then let you make a lot of money.

Seems like if you really are an awesome developer, starting your own consulting shop (or small consulting firm) and undercutting some of the massively expensive shops isn't a bad plan. Certainly seems better than trying to rock at a place like google.

This fits in with knowing some really in demand technologies very well.

Suzzer, iirc you've know angular quite well. Seems like if you have a good reputation, and can help people with angular projects, you could easily bill in the $125-150/hr range.

Also, as best I can tell, if you have a good reputation there's no trouble finding a constant flow of projects.

Yeah, I think this is the key.

I think it really depends on the person. Lots of great developers just want to develop and not worry about finding clients, negotiating contracts, working on stuff they don't want to work on, and so on.

'shining' at google entails competing with level II and Sr SEs (some of which have masters/phds). unless you are a rock star/staff engineer ( which most are not ), 'shining' means putting portfolios together for review in order to get promoted - very hellish process from what i was told. plus there are somewhere near 50k employees at google - not counting contractors.

equity probably.
work for a startup. get options that 99% will never see any real value. use your 'one time' for purchase by a 'real' company. profit.

Where do you guys go where people routinely offer to pay $100+ an hour for consulting work?

Most freelance sites have people offering to do work like that for $10/hour and a lot of people also post low budget applications where they have about a $2k budget but expect a massive project.

Your own "startup". I put it in "" because I don't mean the ZOMG-hypergrowth stuff but rather a bootstrapped business that solves business problems on a smallish scale i.e. 3-5 midsized customers/year

Industries that are hell and/or use strange technology. Healthcare, finance/banking, government/military.

I don't think consultants in the especially high demand areas (security, big data technologies, complex algorithm work, ...) etc. are getting their jobs through online sites like that. Edit: Like clown mentioned, it might also be a matter of someone know a lot about a specific domain and getting paid crazily because of that.

A few years ago I worked with a consultant who specialized in Oracle work (and was paid crazy amounts of money) and all of his contracts came from referrals.

.

I agree. It is hard to tell how many facilities have a clue in going about screening for these qualities. From my experience not many.

I live in the Puget Sound area where Amazon and Microsoft dominate. Salary requirements are little lower here. I completely agree with you about the opportunity companies have. From my experience there are woefully few that know how to seize that opportunity.

I see these kinds of salarys from NYC recruiters on linkedin. Per diem rate on Manhattan is like $2000 a week.

It's all networking. Tons of people don't want to use an elance, and are willing to pay good money for a well referred, knowledgeable, local programmer and (maybe most importantly) someone with a good communicator/good demeanor.

I'll probably not consistently make $100/hr+ in my consulting career... but something like $80/hour working on interesting projects is perfect with me. I value enjoying the project I work on more than a little extra money, but I also have some money so I don't need every cent.

The guy who hired me on my current project has been doing development for about 15 years, and has basically an endless supply of $100+/hr gigs lined up for him once we finish this job. It's all about network and referrals. He's a smart guy, but isn't nearly as skilled a developer as a lot of people. It's just about networking. He's a fun guy to work with, and very professional.

Also, since he enjoys working with me and thinks I've done a great job, wants to pull me in on a bunch of those.

That being said, since I only bill the hours I actually work, and only work hours where I feel like working, I get realistically get done what I'd do in a full work week (having to be somewhere 9-5) in like 20 hours of billable time.

That's perfect though, since I don't want to code for more than about 4-5 hours a day anyway, and the companies are happy since the work gets finished.

We have a crazy deadline at my current project next Wednesday, and I've put in about 55 hours of head in code in the last 7 days... really miserable.

Good thing is I can go skiing for a week starting next weekend.

wI worked at a consulting company that focused solely on providing contractors and unique skill sets to projects. It is borderline ridiculous how some technology decisions get made at companies, and managers/directors, etc. regularly decide to use technology that not a single person on their team is familiar with, and once they mess around with it for a while and get nowhere, it becomes a $125/hr REQ to find a contractor for 2 months. Some managers use this strategy all the time, and just plan to hire 3-5 contractors (or more) a year to get stuff done, other ones make arbitrary incorrect decisions early on in a project and need to get bailed out later.

People also quit companies in the middle of project cycles all the time, so they need someone to come in right away.

All of this is especially true of software development companies that are delivering to external clients. If a deadline is about to get missed for a major client, money will be thrown at it in bountiful quantities.

There are also niche skill sets where often times someone who served as an architect at a software company will later go on to work with that company's clients to help them use the software. This is good for both the company and the client, so it doesn't become a situation with non-competes and NDAs where it probably would in other industries, instead it is supported (not always officially) and people working at those niche companies can usually refer ex-employees that consult now.

I think I need to actively find a new pool of clients. I get referrals quite a bit but often times they are for crap jobs. Sometimes I just turn down jobs because I know right away after talking to the client for 10 minutes that he'll be the type of person who will be impossible to please and work for successfully.

Nchabazam,
Where do you find those people though other than locally? I'd love to be able to consistently find $50-80ish/hour dev jobs.

I mean the first way to get started would be to put your resume on Monster + Dice and look for some 2-3 month contracting gigs. Only accept them when it is a large well known company, that way you will meet people there. Do that for a few different contracts and if you are good you will have a huge network.

At first, just treat it like a job search. Lots of employers ostensibly looking for full-time employees are often happy to take on contractors, provided that you have the skill set to be useful from day 1.

It is just local. I lived in Boston til recently where I now live in Boulder/Denver area... so there are lots of tech companies in the areas I've lived.

I didn't have a lot of work experience until recently. I got my foot in the door with the company I'm working for now by networking, and offering up myself for cheap. I did a quick project, they saw my value, then I said I needed more... did a longer project... renegotiated, etc.

I guess I can't talk too much, but I'm basically working full time for these guys at a higher hourly than I'd make as a full time employee, but working less hours. This gives me time to pursue other projects as well in my extra time.

I'd imagine you could find something similar if you want, or better, since you seem like a really talented dev and have been doing it longer than me.

I do know that if this company doesn't make it, the guy that got me the project is giving my name to all sorts of people. He keeps asking me while we're working on this project if I want to work on this, or that, or whatever.

Depending on how things go down the road, I'm probably going to try and do more investing and may hire a few other contractors as a small LLC to do some consulting work. We had the debate earlier in this thread, but I'm not looking to make $800k a year running some big consulting shop, just trying to get my head out of code all day and experience some other aspects of the business.

I agree with the perspective captured here. What hourly rate do you think is equivalent to 250K/year as a full-time employee? I'm sick as hell today so I may be overvaluing stability + benefits but I think you'd have to be able to bill at or around 175/hour for you to consistently clear 250K, considering benefits, self-employment tax, business overhead, etc.

This was posted on HN a few weeks ago which might help you put together a more accurate estimate http://14clicks.com/80-hourly-freelance-rate-wage/

This is weird because it kind of assumes you're trying to run a one man development shop without hiring anyone. Yes, in that case, you'll have a lot more overhead. You'll also be in a position to start expanding, and making a lot more off of it.

Candybar: I have no idea, but I don't think $250k a year is possible as a consultant unless you're billing out very high (as pointed out, $175+), or are expanding to running at least a small LLC. It's hard to bill 40-50 hours/week consistently, and I certainly really wouldn't even want to.

I feel like assuming you're spending 2x the time on non-billable hours and that you need to invest 25% of your money back into the business aren't valid medium-long term.

So maybe for the first 3-6 months that's true, but after that you have a cushion of money that you just keep using for the things like paying expenses/freelancers and your overhead of starting the business/finding clients goes down.

I only do freelancing because I'm terrible at finding problems that people would love to have solved. I would be really happy personally having my own saas that has a bunch of people paying some amount per month.

I never treated freelancing as a real job. I don't post my resume anywhere or go out to find work. I also like the idea of working remotely when possible. I used to work in an office all day and for lack of a better term it sucked balls.

Spent like 3/5 days doing nothing related to what my job consisted of because they didn't have enough work for me to do. This eventually lead me to work slower so it didn't look like I was goofing off for most of the week.

After about 2 years of that I just quit and freelanced since. That is why I only like working remotely now. I can't stand the thought of purposely being less efficient. Anyone else feel the same?