[throwaway875u58]

This was me a few years ago. My end goal was to build up savings in the 3-5 year time frame.

My off-ramp was to:

1) Take on consulting clients

This allowed for a shift in day to day/finding an alternate source of income asap. Depending on opportunities available, you might want to skip this step.

2) Identify interesting startups in the area + get a software dev job.

This allowed me to hone up my rustier coding skills and make good money without needing to worry about clients/big picture deliverables.

3) After 1 year, move to FANG.

I needed a year to get back into the IC mindset and skillset at a level where I could be hired as a senior/principle level at FANG.

[rhlsthrm]

What's the best way to get consulting clients? I want to start building a pipeline now in case I end up in a similar situation.

[optemization]

I just started actively consulting two months ago. So far, 8 projects and five clients.

Before doing this, I built a pretty strong startup network in New York City. Through starting a company and running an entrepreneurship club at New York Univesity, I got to know a lot of relevant people on the scene. entrepreneurs, investors and community builders. Once I was sharing with people that I was working on. I got introductions to potential clients. My biggest client right now is a person whom I knew from the first year at the University.

If you are good at hosting events or bringing up ir target audience together, I would suggest looking into that.

[throwaway875u58]

What worked for me was through word of mouth/utilizing the relationships I'd built up while trying to build a business.