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Comment by mulmen | Hacker News Reader

Any suggestions on how to actually do this? How do I get started? Do I moonlight?

I'd suggest starting with being around the interfaces between orgs.. Anywhere you can put your head down and work for days without talking to other companies is a luxury to indulge in sparingly if you are insuring for future employment as not the cheapest labor in not the cheapest land.

I don’t understand. How do I transition from a FTE at a corporation to a contractor? How do I get the first contract?

In most cases its "by having previous connections" or "pure luck".

If it would be easy - everyone would be doing consunlting coz it pays way better and work-life balance is also better.

Is work life balance really better when you have to worry bout finding your next gig and also that everything’s on you (don’t have a team/others to fall back on)?

When 3 months of one gig pay for your whole year of expenses - yes its better.

You must live outside the US. In the US If you’re only looking at expenses many full time jobs can get there in 3-6mos too. And not even big tech

Sure it’s nice to have the choice to not work between engagements but again you’ll be back to finding the next one

If you bounce from full time to full time with 75% unemployment you are a no-hire many places and almost universally in a downturn. Consulting and contracting is often used to be vague and even pretend you are unsuccessfully looking for contracts a lot of the time precisely because that is the reality for many and more acceptable for many types of employment.

If your FTE role is general developer you are jumping with no experience and will need to be lucky. If your last FTE role is sales engineer or professional services, you are already proficient in many of the skills and networked. If you aren't sure how to get a first contract you didn't really choose the right FTE role yet.

That makes sense, thanks.

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