[HenryBemis]

I won't downvote, I want your opinion to be visible so other people can read this. I am one of those 'suckers' that left a job/career (call it what you will) in the Big4 to go solo.

Apart from boosting my annual income x4, I am no longer involved in backstabing, politics, shitstorms, and other permanent employment 'pleasantries'. The C-levels who sign my invoices keep me out and away from all that. I have gained their trust and they keep me around to get-the-job-done. I do get some surprises every now and then, but nothing I can't dance around those. The gig economy (up to a level) works for me.

>where you don't manage to get a fulltime workload out of a year

I only NEED to work 3 months in a year, and spend the other 9 sitting on my behind doing my hobbies. Of course I work as much as possible (8h/day - 5d/week) and I do take some time off (by European 'standard'). I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant. E.g. anyone in Europe with a good GRC knowledge had plenty of time to get in shape for GDPR.

[stakhanov]

I wasn't arguing against being a consultant, merely pointing out that an hourly rate of a consultant is something where a bit of context is needed in order to be able to interpret the number, and that a consulting rate can easily seem high compared to an implied hourly rate received by a fulltime employee in a low-risk environment if the context is unknown or misunderstood. -- But the same is also true for comparing fulltime salaries, especially with onsite jobs, where cost of living, cost of real estate, tax regime, social security implications etc all have a huge role to play and make an apples-to-apples comparison difficult.

[tmaly]

> I found it that once I start monitoring the contracting market, getting weekly alerts, see the trends, etc. it is possible to build on your existing skillset to make sure you remain relevant

What data sources and techniques do you use to monitor trends?

[HenryBemis]

I have registered to services like Reed, or JobServe. I have some wide-enough searches that send automated reports, and some very narrow (e.g. "GDPR", "SOx"). It looks like spam, but it gives me a good idea of how many contracts are available, for which areas/domains, and at what rates. This way I can see when the market increases or drops for the narrow searches. The wider terms searches help me identify new and upcoming trends.

It looks tedious and time consuming, but after the first month, just scrolling through 3-4 emails gives me a pretty good idea of where the market is going.

[akulbe]

I would love to talk to you about what kind of work you're doing now.

[HenryBemis]

Audit/Security/GRC.

"I help companies pass their audits".

You tell me what audit you have to pass, and I will work with you to pass it successfully. It could be just a 3rd party audit you got coming up, or some regulatory/contractual requirement(s) you need to fulfull (PCI-DSS, VISA PIN, GDPR, HIPAA, SOx, ISOs, etc.)

You name it. We sit down, make a plan, put dates on that plan, put names and roles on that plan, provide the proper support/Sponsor and (with a little/a lot of pain) you pass the audit. But you PASS your audit. There is no miracle recipe, no 'feeding the multitude'. Good old smart and hard work.