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Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

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Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#41

For people who are already doing part-time dev work, do you find that people are curious and/or suspicious about why you're doing it part time? ie, "If you're actually good at this, why aren't you a full time employee or consultant?"

My personal theory is that if people don't work precisely 40 hours a weak, Suck Rays from the magnetosphere begin to interfere with performance.

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#42
post #11
post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are probably not using the word "cloud" enough when you speak about what you do.

I've found that introducing yourself as a "full-stack cloud" is the best opener.

That is impressive but how many years of experience do you have in the cloud?

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#43
Part-time is easy to come by when you're doing consulting work, since you can work out the requisite hours with your clients. I did full-time remote consulting for about 5 years, dropped to part-time consulting for a year to concentrate on music.

Finding a client that we could be flexible on hours with was difficult, though. Many clients are tied to the ass-in-chair time cycle. We eventually found a small company that was made of people who were largely remote and worked really flexible hours themselves.

Eventually I found a job in SF that offered full-time and part-time, and you can move between the two. This has been really great since we started a family last August - I took a month off, then came back doing 4-day weeks.

If you're in SF, we're hiring - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=6477194

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#45
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post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you looked there https://www.odesk.com/jobs/?qs=java ? I see many small jobs right now.

odesk? I thought that was realistically only for low-cost overseas outsourcing.

On the surface it seems that way. There are a number of people who comment here every time this comes up though that swear they make a living through oDesk. Though they don't typically specify what "making a living" means to them or where they live. There are higher paying jobs on oDesk they are just a lot harder to find and get. I suspect if you are highly specialized in a small set of popular thing then you can probably under bid the outsourced competition on many of the posted jobs and that is how people who make it there are successful.

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#46
post #39
post #34

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Have you looked there https://www.odesk.com/jobs/?qs=java ? I see many small jobs right now.

odesk? I thought that was realistically only for low-cost overseas outsourcing.

Yeah; I would recommend staying away from odesk unless you are overseas and can live off of $10 to $20 an hour.

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#47

I've found it's almost impossible to find good work using cold calls or responding to ads. Try to find people you know. Getting the first job is the hardest, but if you do a good job -- the referrals will start to roll in. This has been inadvertent, however I've also gotten a lot of work through various projects[1][2] I've done that have gotten big on HN. Write it off mentally as a marketing expense, and spend a few…

Any tips for actually getting a Show HN post on HN? I've posted a few things but been frustrated to see them immediately fall out of the new page with only a couple votes.

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#49
post #47

I've found it's almost impossible to find good work using cold calls or responding to ads. Try to find people you know. Getting the first job is the hardest, but if you do a good job -- the referrals will start to roll in. This has been inadvertent, however I've also gotten a lot of work through various projects[1][2] I've done that have gotten big on HN. Write it off mentally as a marketing expense, and spend a few…

Any tips for actually getting a Show HN post on HN? I've posted a few things but been frustrated to see them immediately fall out of the new page with only a couple votes.

Make something genuinely cool.

Re: Ask HN: How to find part-time developer work?

#50

Part-time is easy to come by when you're doing consulting work, since you can work out the requisite hours with your clients. I did full-time remote consulting for about 5 years, dropped to part-time consulting for a year to concentrate on music. Finding a client that we could be flexible on hours with was difficult, though. Many clients are tied to the ass-in-chair time cycle. We eventually found a small company tha…

Hey, I would like to learn more about where you work. I couldn't find your email in your profile.
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