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Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

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Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#31

Post by muzani »

GoToRO wrote: post #16
theli0nheart wrote: post #6

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I’m in a similar boat as OP, and I can tell you that folks are VERY skeptical of success when you haven’t been a part of the corporate rat race. My success has a consultant has (so far) apparently little relevance to passing interviews at FAANG and the like. People like talking to me though, so I guess there’s that!

Companies want loyalty. Beeing good at what you do has almost no importance above a very basic level. Loyalty is important because they have all kind of internal crap that is not documented, not organized and which you will accumulate if you stay with them 10+ years. Also, beeing a consultant shows that you are independent, but what they want is conformism, people with no ideas of their own and so, not independent. 9…

While companies want loyalty and will incentivize loyalty, what's to say a former consultant isn't loyal? Consultants take huge pay cuts to work under a boss. They're more resilient to competing offers and won't jump for a 10% offer. They're often sick of being their own boss and are less likely to quit and do a startup. They're used to taking on massive stress, and sometimes even being the scapegoat for it

So in some sense, ex consultants are better loyalty per skill level compared to many lifetime FTEs.

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#32

Post by muzani »

muzani wrote: post #30

I did the same. I found that big companies (the Tier 2 telcos, etc) either couldn't afford me, worried about scalability/teamwork skill, or just didn't like what was on my resume. They want people who fit in well as a cog into their corporate machine. There was one pleasant exception to this, a small team carrying a billion dollar company, but I felt the company had too many processes and moved too slowly. The startu…

Oh one thing to add is that a lot of them didn't like seeing a list of projects. You should list maybe 3 or so.

If you can make a living freelancing, they know you can code. They're looking for how much impact you've had on the project, or whether you work well as a team. As well as what kind of long term benefits you bring - can you branch off a subsidiary on your own or expand a product into other markets?

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#33

Post by GoToRO »

muzani wrote: post #31
GoToRO wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Companies want loyalty. Beeing good at what you do has almost no importance above a very basic level. Loyalty is important because they have all kind of internal crap that is not documented, not organized and which you will accumulate if you stay with them 10+ years. Also, beeing a consultant shows that you are independent, but what they want is conformism, people with no ideas of their own and so, not independent. 9…

While companies want loyalty and will incentivize loyalty, what's to say a former consultant isn't loyal? Consultants take huge pay cuts to work under a boss. They're more resilient to competing offers and won't jump for a 10% offer. They're often sick of being their own boss and are less likely to quit and do a startup. They're used to taking on massive stress, and sometimes even being the scapegoat for it So in som…

That's a nice insight but lets see who are the bosses that do the hiring in large companies? They are people that stayed in the same company for 10-15 years. What you wrote looks strange and even silly to them. Otherwise they would have become consultants themselves long time ago. Even if they aknowledge that you are indeed very good, their little ego will not let them hire you.

To answer more directly to your comment, it doesn't matter that you are actually loyal if their perception is that you might not be. In fact they just don't know what to make of you. They never met somebody like you.

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#35

Post by muzani »

GoToRO wrote: post #33
muzani wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

While companies want loyalty and will incentivize loyalty, what's to say a former consultant isn't loyal? Consultants take huge pay cuts to work under a boss. They're more resilient to competing offers and won't jump for a 10% offer. They're often sick of being their own boss and are less likely to quit and do a startup. They're used to taking on massive stress, and sometimes even being the scapegoat for it So in som…

That's a nice insight but lets see who are the bosses that do the hiring in large companies? They are people that stayed in the same company for 10-15 years. What you wrote looks strange and even silly to them. Otherwise they would have become consultants themselves long time ago. Even if they aknowledge that you are indeed very good, their little ego will not let them hire you. To answer more directly to your commen…

Yeah, that is probably true. Big companies tend to hire entire companies to outsource work to, even when those companies are less efficient than individuals.

I did notice that all the corporate people have nearly zero mutual friends on Facebook, whereas with consultants and startup people there might have well over 100 mutual friends. It's quite an extreme.

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#36

Post by kraftykuts »

The last few months I have gone back to studying, and have undertaken COMPTIA A+, COMPTIA NETWORK+, COMPTIA CLOUD+ and COMPTIA CYBER SECURITY ANALYSTS. All due to the lack of suitably qualified cyber security analysts in Australia. If you guys have any advice I am all ears....I have a couple more months to go before I pass the exams...

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#37

Post by JSeymourATL »

> I'm going to be applying to the Big N companies...

Don't apply to companies. HR Flunkies & Recruiter Bozos won't apprecaiate your background.

Instead, reach out directly to the guy you most help. Think CIO/CTO, Heads of Engineering. Linkedin is good for identifying these people.

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#38

Post by TooCleverByHalf »

solipsism wrote: post #28
TooCleverByHalf wrote: post #23

Apologies for being off topic, but I'm looking to attempt the opposite transition. Go from Big Co to self-employed consultant and would love to pique your brain about your journey if you'd be willing to field a few questions of mine at some point?

Unless you plan to excite the OP with your questions, I think you want to pick OP's brain.

Haha the most exciting questions OP will ever hear!

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#39

Post by senordevnyc »

muzani wrote: post #30

I did the same. I found that big companies (the Tier 2 telcos, etc) either couldn't afford me, worried about scalability/teamwork skill, or just didn't like what was on my resume. They want people who fit in well as a cog into their corporate machine. There was one pleasant exception to this, a small team carrying a billion dollar company, but I felt the company had too many processes and moved too slowly. The startu…

Thanks for all the feedback, really appreciate it. I think you've nailed the pros / cons. I've really enjoyed self-employment, but I'm honestly a little bored and burnt out. Ready for a bit of a break.

Re: Ask HN: Going from 12 years of self-employment to tech job?

#40

Post by senordevnyc »

alaskamiller wrote: post #24
dbancajas wrote: post #21

off topic but can you share your rise to 300-400k/year? Do you just bill more than your previous contract? i.e. 125/hr last 6 months, so at renewal time you jump to 150-175/hr? Did you work 2 or more jobs at the same time? It seems like 300-400K/yr remote work in a low COL would be the dream setup for most of HN, but to each his own. What's the take home on your salary after expenses/taxes?

Likely billable rate of $100-$150 at 2000 hrs per yr. Earlier on during the iOS dev crunch of 2010-2012 billable rates were hitting the $200+ mark. From 2013-2016 those rates dropped down to $150, in the past 4 years those rates plummetted to $80 and now lately even $40. Unless you're working on extending some native API or have expertise in the newer ARKits and HealthKits or you're adding value elsewhere in terms of…

I never ever bill hourly. 90% of the work I do is value-based pricing, with a weekly or monthly rate once in a blue moon. My effective hourly rates are much, much higher than anyone would pay me strict hourly.

Also, I'm not sure where you're finding clients, but the market for senior iOS dev definitely is nowhere near $40 / hr. If you're competing with offshore devs on Upwork or people who do "web, iOS, Android, and anything else development!!" then yeah, maybe. But there are tons of clients out there who need senior talent with deep iOS expertise and professionalism and pay north of $100 / hr, or much more if you price based on value.

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