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Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

highestpayinggigs.com

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Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#31

Post by jamestimmins »

arcticbull wrote: post #11
tschwimmer wrote: post #9

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Damn, what segments did you work in? The firm I'm working with maxes out at like $100 an hour.

$100/hr is really low in the bay area; most SWE generalist contractors can walk in and get $150 no questions asked, anywhere. $200 if you're more experienced in the specific area and $250+ if you "have a name for yourself" online. Rule of thumb at least around here is take your base salary in thousands per year, and that's your hourly rate. If you're getting $200K base, charge $200/hr for your contracting time. The e…

I'm always curious how contractors get hired by startups. Most of my work has been one-off jobs with non-tech companies, and I feel like I rarely see contractor gigs for solid technical startups.

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#32

Post by arcticbull »

jamestimmins wrote: post #31
arcticbull wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

$100/hr is really low in the bay area; most SWE generalist contractors can walk in and get $150 no questions asked, anywhere. $200 if you're more experienced in the specific area and $250+ if you "have a name for yourself" online. Rule of thumb at least around here is take your base salary in thousands per year, and that's your hourly rate. If you're getting $200K base, charge $200/hr for your contracting time. The e…

I'm always curious how contractors get hired by startups. Most of my work has been one-off jobs with non-tech companies, and I feel like I rarely see contractor gigs for solid technical startups.

Usually through network. Frequently it's people you've worked with in the past that end up at startups, have worked with you before and need your help on something. That'll get you through the door. Management often looks at it as a potential "contract-to-hire" opportunity and if they like you will try and sell you on full-time employment.

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#33

Post by WillPontificate »

HenryKissinger wrote: post #30
josephjrobison wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Information download” is a genius term. In the right industry a company can save years of failure by paying the right person for X amount of hours to glean a ton of knowledge very quickly, assuming they can’t just outright hire them.

What does it take to become this kind of person in less than 10 years?

That's kind of the barrier to entry, no?

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#34

Post by [deleted] »

stevehawk wrote: post #6
0xDEEPFAC wrote: post #5

Not to be inflammatory, but this article reads like a clickbait ad. I would take it with a grain of salt... If it seems too good to be true it often is.

Not only that.. if you click on their link to 'expert networks' to talk to.. one of them is apparently completely staffed by 20-somethings that look fresh out of college. Doesn't inspire the idea of expertise.

[deleted]

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#35

Post by WillPontificate »

josephjrobison wrote: post #18
joe_the_user wrote: post #7

The actual world of super-high paid consultant would be interesting to hear about. This is either a niche-within-a-niche or a scam, depending on whether you believe the page. The thing is, maybe there are circumstances when someone who's just quite well informed about an otherwise boring industry can get an "information download" gig as described but I'd also guess those are very occasional - only so many investors n…

“Information download” is a genius term. In the right industry a company can save years of failure by paying the right person for X amount of hours to glean a ton of knowledge very quickly, assuming they can’t just outright hire them.

Mathematically this probably could never be justified as a permanent hire. Not enough steady demand.

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#37

Post by jbob2000 »

BrentOzar wrote: post #26

Hey, that's me, might as well answer questions here. I[1] do performance tuning for Microsoft SQL Server. The licensing costs on MSSQL Enterprise Edition are $7K USD per CPU core, so a typical single high-performance server costs $250K-$500K. Factor in hardware, multiple replicas (high availability, disaster recovery, scale-out reads) and it's not unusual for a company to have spent millions of dollars on their datab…

Do you think it would be cheaper for these clients to build their applications on a cloud, rather than buying hardware?

That’s not to say that they wouldn’t have optimization problems if they moved to the cloud. But I’m stuck wondering why any company would make the decision to run their own db servers?

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#38

Post by sixtypoundhound »

BrentOzar wrote: post #26

Hey, that's me, might as well answer questions here. I[1] do performance tuning for Microsoft SQL Server. The licensing costs on MSSQL Enterprise Edition are $7K USD per CPU core, so a typical single high-performance server costs $250K-$500K. Factor in hardware, multiple replicas (high availability, disaster recovery, scale-out reads) and it's not unusual for a company to have spent millions of dollars on their datab…

That's hands down awesome.

I need to find a way to do that for analytics.

Re: Expert Networks: A Secret World of $500 per Hour Consultations

#39

Post by ifoundthetao »

WillPontificate wrote: post #35
josephjrobison wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

“Information download” is a genius term. In the right industry a company can save years of failure by paying the right person for X amount of hours to glean a ton of knowledge very quickly, assuming they can’t just outright hire them.

Mathematically this probably could never be justified as a permanent hire. Not enough steady demand.

It can be justified in the context of hiring that person keeps that knowledge resource from competitors. Then it makes a lot of sense to pay them enough to stay, as it allows you to outpace competition in the marketplace.
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