
Ask HN: How to become a remote contractor? - zerego
I&#x27;m a javascript developer working in London and I want to become a remote contractor so I can travel the world while working remotely.
Where can I find people or companies that can help me getting into the world of contracting and even be a intermediary?
Is anyone in this situation that want to share how they did it and how is going?
======
1_player
I've quit my day job in 2012, found a contract with a great client on Upwork
(forget how it was called at the time). Initially a 6 months project, I've
worked with them for 2 years.

Got a few other contracts off that site, until one day I've asked one of my
main clients to move out of that platform and work with me directly. Worked
with them 2 years, until I got an offer in January to become a full time
technical director and shareholder.

What I've learn contracting:

1\. Increase your rates. Make them non-negotiable. There's people that are
ready to pay for quality. If a client asks you to lower your rate, they
probably aren't a good client in the first place.

2\. Increase your rates every year, as you get more experience and technical
knowledge.

3\. Upwork was bad, and now is even worse. Move out of those kind of sites
ASAP, when you can trust your client.

4\. If you do good work, you'll have old clients pinging you once in a while
with new opportunities. So, do outstanding work, and you won't have to look
for new contracts as much.

5\. Don't be afraid to learn. Try not to specialise too much. Generalists/full
stack devs are very sought after. You'll start a contract as a web developer
and soon you'll be doing DB optimisation and securing their infrastructure.

6\. Increase your rates.

~~~
Kluny
> 1\. Increase your rates. Make them non-negotiable. There's people that are
> ready to pay for quality. If a client asks you to lower your rate, they
> probably aren't a good client in the first place.

What if you're mediocre, though?

~~~
mikeleeorg
It depends on which vector you deem yourself mediocre. If you think your
technical skills are mediocre and want to be a technical contractor, then
focus on being a great solutions provider.

And by "solutions provider," I mean take the time to deeply understand the
root causes of your clients' problems, then help them find the actual
solutions. Sometimes these solutions are not even technical, which is totally
okay. Clients will love that you're helping them solve problems in addition to
providing technical services.

~~~
Kluny
I can write code that works, finish features, and I'm pretty good at
debugging. I can also teach/encourage others without condescending, ask good
questions, and explain a problem clearly technically and non-technically (once
I understand it myself).

I guess I'm mediocre in that it consistently seems to take me 8-10 hours to
finish jobs that come with a 4 hour time estimate (my company is big on
estimates). I'm also pretty sloppy - code reviewers routinely catch minor
errors that I should have known better than to commit.

I have the experience, way too often, of using some feature that I pushed
months or years ago and learning that it's, like, haunted or something.
Doesn't work the way it's supposed to at all. Obvious failures that I should
never have called "done".

When it comes to building a complete product, from start to finish, I mostly
can't get past MVP stage (talking about personal projects in this case). And I
once spent over a month trying to update the version of TinyMCE for a CMS that
I was working on, and did not succeed. I literally got another job and left
the company with that task unfinished. The new job pays double, and I still
feel like a bit of a fraud.

And yeah, I'm writing "bog-standard PHP" as the other commenter put it. I've
tried to get work in other languages to diversify my skillset, and haven't
succeeded. At this point I'm starting to not care anymore - I like PHP just
fine, loose typing be damned, and I'm starting to think I want to move out of
technical roles rather than improve my language skills.

~~~
mikeleeorg
If you like dealing with clients (and it sounds like you may be patient enough
to be good at doing this), you could try your hand at being a project manager
and managing several development contractors for the projects you get from
your clients. I built a web development agency like this several years ago.

Basically, you start with the same clients that have been hiring you, then
tell them you can assemble a team of developers to help get their project
done, and all they have to do is work through you as the main point of
contact.

This is easier said than done, of course. Starting with existing clients is a
nice way to jump-start this kind of a business, but you'll need to find more
clients eventually. There's also a whole arena of skills you'll need to
develop in terms of recruiting, account management, and project management
too.

This isn't for everyone. But someone with technical skills has a vast
advantage in such a role over someone who doesn't, with all other skills being
equal.

Just an option to consider as you think about moving out of a technical role.

~~~
Kluny
I think I'd like to be a project manager, but honestly I'd be happy doing it
at my day job. Any suggestions for how to show people that you can do that
kind of job?

~~~
brandall10
I suggest checking out the book "The Passionate Programmer".

There's a general focus in that book about building your personal brand in an
organization so you basically have leverage to do what you want.

Beyond that, the short answer is to assume the role. Take on a PM-like
presence amongst your team if you haven't already - ie. help any PMs you're
currently working with on small tasks, ease their burden where you can - then
have a candid discussion with your supervisor at some point about how you can
see yourself in such a role.

~~~
mikeleeorg
I totally agree with everything brandall10's written. I've always found that
"act as if" can be a powerful tool, except perhaps in dysfunctional
organizations. In other words, "act as if" you're already a project manager.
And you'll definitely need to let your manager know about this career
aspiration too.

If you want to do this as a remote contractor, then I think your options are:

1) Look for an existing dev agency that needs remote project managers.

2) Start your own dev agency.

------
philip1209
I'm a digital nomad who as in the same position. I couldn't find contract work
for high-skill engineers. So, I started building a marketplace for it. Today
that's Moonlight - we are still small, bootstrapped, and growing, but we have
companies ranging from startups to a publicly-traded company hiring through
the site. Hourly rates average a little over $100US.

[https://www.moonlightwork.com](https://www.moonlightwork.com)

~~~
acconrad
I've been on Moonlight since it has launched and has not panned out very well
for me. I'm in that ballpark of rates and most projects have been duds. Only 1
lead to a prospect and he balked on the rate (again, in the ballpark of what
Phil is advertising here).

~~~
philip1209
Thanks for being on Moonlight! We have been working hard to increase the
number of jobs. It's been about doubling month over month and has been our #1
focus. We are working on a lot of product and marketing initiatives focused on
that.

It looks like you've submitted a few proposals - unfortunately, half of the
jobs stopped before selecting a developer. If we had more posts on the site,
getting declined would be more of a numbers game and less noticeable. Still,
keep at it - looks like you have two open matches right now!

The good news is that, among people who get selected for jobs, they often get
rehired again and again by the same client.

~~~
acconrad
I'll give it a shot again in 6 months. I've since landed a contract (not
related to the platform) but my gut is that my effort was not worth it. I got
much better results from my own local networking at higher rates.

------
miesman
I 55 and have worked remote many times during my career (including currently).
The best way I've found is to work onsite initially and dazzle them. Then when
the contract is up tell them you are willing to continue remote.

~~~
borplk
If the organisation is not setup for remote work you will sign yourself up for
hell.

I guess it can work if you work alone and with high autonomy.

For many jobs just having someone say "yeah fine" is not good enough for
success.

~~~
imhoguy
I agree this way is difficult to help you catch truly remote-first job, as
requirement of sitting butt in an office contradicts it.

I recommend screening company with Glassdoor (WFH hints etc.) and at interview
asking about communication/collaboration tools in use, remote teams etc.

Nowadays there is a large middle ground of companies which have globaly
distributed offices. They may ask you to show up for some initial period to
gain trust and mix into culture - definitely important for a long-term
cooperation. Afterwards switching to remote is like relocating to different
office but staying in the same project, which is pretty common practice.
Tested myself several times.

------
raleigh_user
I did this building a small agency in the marketing and ad space.

Happy to advise on specifics but in general here’s how we did it:

Build up a portfolio of content (since we develop content) that shows we know
what we’re doing.

Go on speaking circuit for your niche and give lectures on your expertise.

Take whatever comes your way for first few deals. Always get a solid statement
of work & contract.

Rinse and repeat. If you’re ok with going slower this works well. I manage a
team of 9 now and after some serious time spent training them I mostly just
approve work and put out fires with clients.

~~~
BrentOzar
> Build up a portfolio of content (since we develop content) that shows we
> know what we’re doing. Go on speaking circuit for your niche and give
> lectures on your expertise.

Cannot emphasize this enough. I started a database blog years ago, and built
it up into a 5-person remote consulting firm. Inbound marketing is king: build
up your brand and people will bring you exactly the projects you want, for
life (rather than you having to seek out work and settle for stuff you don't
really want to begin with.)

~~~
osrec
Mind sharing a link to your blog (if it's still active)? Thanks :)

~~~
elephant0xffff
> Mind sharing a link to your blog (if it's still active)? Thanks :)

It seems to be there:
[https://www.brentozar.com/blog/](https://www.brentozar.com/blog/)

Bam. Inbound marketing seems to go well, a HNer just linked to the blog by
inspecting the HN profile the consultant put on HN ... ;)

~~~
BrentOzar
Hahaha, it’s true.

------
boffinism
It may make you feel dirty, but get on LinkedIn and connect with a bunch of
recruiters. This is literally what they are there for. My LI feed and inbox
are a constant stream of contracting opportunities in London, and a (small,
admittedly) percentage of them are remote.

(Of course, they're no use to me, as I'm very happy as a mostly-remote startup
CTO, but these opportunities are out there.)

Contracting tends to be something that's hard to break into but easier once
you're there - what people want to see on a CV is previous contracting
experience. So even if your first gigs aren't remote, they may help you in the
long run.

~~~
mancerayder
I do this, too. Unfortunately, recruiters suffer from two really big problems
for a contractor:

1\. They take a cut, a very big cut, of your hourly or daily rate. Thus, to
the client, you seem very expensive, and to you, you seem cheaper than you
should be. It becomes a new effort to maneuver a proper rate.

2\. Recruiters suffer from the fact that they are salespeople, and salespeople
often intuitively omit information for fear they'd lose the deal. So they
operate the same way as they do for employee recs. Here's a concrete example:
several times in the last several months, I received offers of "contract to
hire" even though the recruiter told me it was contract only. They failed to
tell the client I was contract-only, and they failed to tell me it was a
contract-to-hire. Believe me, they knew. Then the inevitable question, where I
have to be careful not to be too mean in the response, "Can I ask you why you
want to stay as a contractor? It's a really exciting company and there's stock
opt... yadda yadda." For a contractor doing it right, every invoice is a bonus
or an opportunity to purchase stocks with no vesting and no strings. :-)

~~~
HillaryBriss
> Recruiters suffer from the fact that they are salespeople ...

reminds me of the real estate agent trick of posting a listing for a home
that's too good to be true. when a potential buyer calls that agent, the agent
says the home is no longer available, but asks "are you currently working with
an agent?"

~~~
52-6F-62
God I've had people do that to me with _dogs_. No, I will not be conversing
with you further about spending $1000 more on a dog I don't at all want.

~~~
Can_Not
I heard you can go greener and get the best deals on the used dogs market.

~~~
52-6F-62
I (think I) 100% understand the snark, but that’s usually where I’m looking.
Not in the aforementioned situation though. So good call?

On a side note— with Toronto salaries we can’t afford a dog anyway outside of
getting to come home midday to walk it. Walker fees run close to $500 a month.
I’m in love with the rescue Korean Jindos though. They’re like goofier
huskies. I just can’t help but look.

------
arrtz
We actually have a few interviewers at Karat who are doing exactly what you're
doing. (Disclaimer in case it wasn't clear: I work at Karat :)) It's remote
contract work, but we find the work for you, so you don't need to spend any
time finding clients etc. This can be really helpful for contractors who are
just starting out like yourself, or for existing contractors who are looking
to supplement their work.

At a high level how it works is: You put availability on your calendar; we
schedule you for interviews in those slots. You can set as much or as little
availability as you want week to week, at any time of day. The interviewing is
all online, so you can do it from wherever you want as long as you've got a
quiet location and a reliable high-bandwidth internet connection.

All we look for are solid technical chops and interpersonal skills, though
prior interviewing experience is great. We train you on how to conduct
interviews (generally takes about 25 hours including mentoring and practice
interviews); training is paid and again on your own schedule. The only real
restriction is that we ask that you be able to interview 10 hours a week on
average, just because otherwise the time investment and ongoing training stop
making sense.

If that sounds interesting you can apply here:
[https://jobs.lever.co/karat/d44ab283-c7c0-4bbd-b8c3-4dc0ced6...](https://jobs.lever.co/karat/d44ab283-c7c0-4bbd-b8c3-4dc0ced64c86?lever-
origin=applied&lever-source=HNTHREAD)

Also happy to answer any questions about it here or via email: josh@karat.io

~~~
mcjiggerlog
I don't quite understand the proposition. Why would I need to do 10 hours of
interviews per week?

~~~
arrtz
First, I think my first post left out some context so I should be a bit more
explicit that the job is being an interviewer: You interview software
engineering candidates on behalf of our clients. (Possible you already get
this, but mentioning it just in case.)

As for the 10 hours, we spend a lot of time onboarding and then continuously
training our interviewers. Between that and the overhead of managing the
relationship with the interviewer, we find things work best with interviewers
above a certain activity level. Put another way, it's easier to work with 10
interviewers doing 10 hours a week each than 100 interviewers doing 1 hour a
week each.

Does that make sense?

~~~
gremlinsinc
What kind of pay does it involve? I'm always open to some steady
gigs/moonlighting things as I find software clients for myself.

~~~
arrtz
I'll double check with our interviewer team on Monday but I believe it's
$70-100/hr.

------
acconrad
Here's my master list of remote job sites - you should be able to find
something through here (my first remote gig was from HN who is hiring thread):

HN - [http://hnhiring.me/](http://hnhiring.me/)

Remote OK - [https://remoteok.io/](https://remoteok.io/)

Stack Overflow -
[https://careers.stackoverflow.com/jobs?allowsremote=True](https://careers.stackoverflow.com/jobs?allowsremote=True)

LiquidTalent - [http://www.liquidtalent.com/](http://www.liquidtalent.com/)

Working Not Working -
[http://workingnotworking.com](http://workingnotworking.com)

Hired - [https://hired.com/contract-jobs](https://hired.com/contract-jobs)

Gigster - [https://gigster.com/](https://gigster.com/)

Mirror - [http://mirrorplacement.com/](http://mirrorplacement.com/)

Metova - [http://metova.com/](http://metova.com/)

Mokriya - [http://mokriya.com/](http://mokriya.com/)

HappyFunCorp - [http://happyfuncorp.com](http://happyfuncorp.com)

Savvy Apps - [http://savvyapps.com/](http://savvyapps.com/)

Clevertech - [http://www.clevertech.biz/](http://www.clevertech.biz/)

Workstate - [http://www.workstate.com/](http://www.workstate.com/)

AngelList - [https://angel.co/jobs](https://angel.co/jobs)

Authentic Jobs: [http://www.authenticjobs.com/](http://www.authenticjobs.com/)

Github Jobs: [https://jobs.github.com/](https://jobs.github.com/)

\- [https://www.workingnomads.co/jobs](https://www.workingnomads.co/jobs)

\- [https://remoteworkhub.com/remote-jobs/](https://remoteworkhub.com/remote-
jobs/)

\- [https://www.crossover.com/](https://www.crossover.com/)

\- [https://remote.com/](https://remote.com/)

\- [https://weworkremotely.com/](https://weworkremotely.com/)

\- [https://getbetterluck.com/](https://getbetterluck.com/)

\- [https://remote.co/remote-jobs/](https://remote.co/remote-jobs/)

\- [https://remotive.io/find-a-job/](https://remotive.io/find-a-job/)

\- [https://www.skipthedrive.com/](https://www.skipthedrive.com/)

\- [https://www.outsourcely.com/remote-business-services-
jobs](https://www.outsourcely.com/remote-business-services-jobs)

\- [https://www.wfh.io/](https://www.wfh.io/)

\- [http://jobscribe.com/](http://jobscribe.com/)

\-
[https://www.remotelyawesomejobs.com/](https://www.remotelyawesomejobs.com/)

\- [https://landing.jobs/](https://landing.jobs/)

\- [https://remotebase.io/](https://remotebase.io/)

Crew: [https://crew.co/](https://crew.co/)

NoDesk - [https://nodesk.co](https://nodesk.co)

FreelanceDevLeads:
[https://freelancedevleads.com/](https://freelancedevleads.com/)

FlexJobs: [https://www.flexjobs.com/](https://www.flexjobs.com/)

~~~
mancerayder
Thank you for generously sharing this! I wonder if we should have an HN
contractor github wiki or something similar.

------
esaym
> so I can travel the world while working remotely.

I thought the same thing. Perhaps it is because I work for someone else
instead of for myself, but since I've been full time remote for the last 2
years, I've had 0 free time for anything. I rarely leave the house. Pretty
much everything I need comes from online purchases or grocery delivery as I
don't even have time to do that.

~~~
johnvanommen
This x 1000

Before I worked remotely, I thought that working remotely would allow me time
to exercise and eat better. I had dreams of going on a daily bicycle ride,
instead of being stuck in my car.

The reality is that working remotely just allows me to put in insane amounts
of hours. About once or twice a week I'll start my workday at three in the
morning due to insomnia, and just work 12-16 hours straight.

I think this is particularly prevalent when the entire team is working
remotely, because ALL of us are wrapped up in this crazy schedule.

~~~
elliotlarson
Wait. You've made a choice to engage in unhealthy work habits. It may not seem
like it, but this _is_ your choice. I've been working as a remote contractor
for almost 20 years. If you want to remain sane and happy, you need to set
boundaries, both with clients and yourself.

~~~
badatusernames
yeah I think it takes time to realize you need to actively develop these
habits. I've been working remotely full time for 2 years and it wasn't until
about a month ago that I realized that I wasn't exercising and doing the
things I said I was going to do because I didn't prioritize them or make them
a habit. I'm just as busy now with my work as I was when I was in an office,
but during the day my office mates and I would take afternoon walks
regardless. Also, I got a lot of steps in by walking to and from the office to
where ever I parked my car (city jobs amiright...). So yeah, I've finally
started a routine to go to the gym in the AM before work and/or go for
runs/walks around my neighborhood at some point during the day.

tl;dr; you have to actively work to develop these habits because it's easy to
just sit and work the entire day

------
isalmon
It's funny how with all the job sites and modern tools we still live in the
world where employees and employers can't find each other. I'm the CEO of a US
based startup, but we're hiring everywhere. We actually have a few digital
nomads at the company. Somehow we still have troubles finding more talent.

There are a few job boards dedicated to digital nomads, but the volume there
is surprisingly low.

~~~
JustSomeNobody
You should have a link or something in your profile.

------
chasd00
network and get to know directors/upper management at very large companies.
You can do a lot of this by just hanging out at happy hour spots near a large
corporate campus. Those people are the ones that get tasked with implementing
large programs or processes. If you they know you and your skills are even
remotely relevant then they'll reach out to you when they can't get anyone in
the internal IT/tech department to give them the time of day.

Also, huge veins of money run through these places you just need to stick in a
needle. Cutting a check for $150k means absolutely nothing to them. I've seen
million dollar budgets burned with absolutely nothing to show in the end and
the business team just shrugs and moves on.

Those are the gigs you want.

~~~
lifeisstillgood
How close to stalking are you suggesting ?

~~~
csomar
Don't stalk. If you hang out _very_ frequently, you'll get multiple real
_random_ encounters.

------
lbutler
I lived and worked in Edinburgh for 2 years working as a contractor for an
engineering consultancy, I had to eventually leave the UK because my visa was
going to expire.

They were so desperate for skilled engineers in Scotland when it was suggested
I could keep working remotely they jumped straight on it. I'm now working 100%
remotely for them in Canada.

As others have suggested getting yourself into the contracting market in
London and then going remotely can work if you're a developer with the right
skills though it may be slightly slower then trying to find remote work first.

~~~
isp
May I ask which consultancy this was?

I have found that there is not a huge amount of remote work for companies
based out of Scotland.

------
mrleiter
I am a remote executive recruiting contractor. Applied through a job listing.
They liked me. They hired me. Now I look for senior and executive people
online, remotely.

~~~
hbcondo714
What’s the best way to contact you? I’m in the market for a remote tech exec
role but found all these remote job boards cater towards engineering roles.

------
stephenr
Is there a specific tie for you between being a contractor and working
remotely?

I started contracting on-site for a Federal government department (leaving a
salaried state government position for it), through an agency, then moved onto
more on-site contracting for a telco, through a different agency (in a
different state), before finally starting to take on clients directly.

For several years I worked primarily with a single company, effectively as a
regular staff member, but paid based on invoiced hours.

I moved overseas while still working for them, started a new company ( I
operated as a sole-trader before ) to allow me to invoice from my new country,
and then started working with companies initially through word-of-mouth from
existing acquaintances/former colleagues, and more recently through HN's
"Seeking Freelancer" threads.

If you just want to travel but dont want the hassle of finding new clients,
I'd suggest looking into a company like X-Team
([https://x-team.com](https://x-team.com)) - the company I was working
for/with when I moved overseas - as they're 100% remote, and have (or had) a
number of nomad-ish staff already.

------
scruffyherder
Just ask them. I had this world thrust uppon me, as I offered to help with
night time, so now I live in SE Asia.

It's not all roses, internet connectivity and being available is a must.
Travel is incredibly stressful as you need to be always online, so that means
always having batteries, cables multiple phones, tools and travel SIM cards.
You cannot leave anything to chance.

Get ready to be cut out of the office politick, which is great, but also means
I didn't know our SVP walked out as he was signed onto the online
collaboration tool for another 3 months after he stormed out. And it didn't
help that he would ignore me from time to time.

Devops has more opertunity just because of the following the sun model.

So yeah, be flexible, add value and just ask, create the crissis and the
solution. If only people were fully awake and always available and knew the
infastructure@3am....

------
kinnth
We run a mobile game design agency -
[https://mobilefreetoplay.com](https://mobilefreetoplay.com) helping people
create apps. Some tips from me

    
    
       1. Get yourself an account on Transferwise.com so you can accept all currencies. It then works well to bill people in their local currency as they pay quicker.
       2. We use Xero for all accounting and invoicing. It works and saves time at end of year.
       3. Slack. I am on 9 different teams. I binned off email a long time ago.
       4. Write content on a blog and blog posts, this is the single best way we get new clients.
       5. Keep your prices high. We work with Google, Amazon, Warner Brothers and we got that through recommendations. High prices = top quality.

~~~
csomar
> We work with Google, Amazon

What kind of work do you do for Google/Amazon?

------
chrisa
I recently started posting about this here:
[http://www.breakintoconsulting.com](http://www.breakintoconsulting.com)

My basic advice is: become a visible expert in the space by starting a blog,
posting articles, and go to meetups and speak. Then, start with your network
(old jobs and coworkers) to look for work, and expand out from there.

The good news is there is a ton of work for javascript developers right now,
so that’s one advantage you have.

------
dvdhnt
Consider finding a reputable and talented agency to work for. I some people
automatically reject working for an agency, but when your goal is to travel,
it's nice to have someone else maintaining the infrastructure for you e.g.
generating leads, signing clients, and taking the liability.

That's what I did, I took a job with a great _local_ agency who is actually
remote first. It has allowed me to spend more time with my family and plan
actual world travel.

------
gremlinsinc
Best thing to do is look on r/forhire on reddit, build up a portfolio on
upwork/etc, and check all the remote job boards like remoteok, weworkremotely,
etc..

Freelancing is hard to start - -you need to be part marketer, you don't get
paid for the time finding new clients, but AFTER you have a steady stream of
good business, it gets a bit easier to keep filling your pipeline with jobs
through word of mouth / etc.

~~~
laurent123456
About how much can a relatively skilled developer get on upwork or similar? My
feeling when bidding for projects there was that I needed to go incredibly low
to compete with businesses in India or Pakistan. Or does it get better as you
get more clients?

~~~
gremlinsinc
I'm still aiming a little low, but I've seen a lot of profiles of devs who
charge 80-100/hour and seem to have a solid history on there.

My thinking is you need to start low till you build rep/reviews then you can
start charging more per hour.

Edit: Also there's a lot of people who want u.s. or english native speakers.
I'm in u.s. not planning on traveling much but I like working out of my
basement and not wasting time commuting.

------
thrawaylost112
1\. Get foot in the door. Bid lowest and touch the codebase, oh now it's dirty
and you've access to their secret.

Tell them, oh it's dirty code - it's unmaintainable crap. I quoted you the
wrong rate, to deal with this I'll need $500 per hour I've other contracts
waiting for me. But yeaa this is something which I had done last month for a
different client. Now, I am busy, so just drop me a line on whatsapp if you
don't find anyone else to do it. Leave this, "Anyone who can really do, will
charge at-least 2x of what I am quoting"

2\. Wait

3\. Wait

4\. You get the contract.

Don't regret for the ones who never get back to you, you'll make plenty from
the one who tickle you the second time!

At $500/hr even if you are not the expert of the task you are undertaking,
you'll find plenty of people on upwork to do it for 100-200/hr. Why? Those
people just want to talk with a technical person who has clearly defined the
scope of work! Most of those people are technically good from Russia.

~~~
ryanwaggoner
So lie, cheat, and steal, basically.

You sound like the type who makes contracting and consulting so much harder
for everyone else, because you exploit your clients ignorance and trust for
your own personal gain.

Ironically, you'd make a lot more in the long run if you had a more long-term
outlook instead of being so transactional.

~~~
thrawaylost112
I don't force them to make any decision. How am I exploiting them?

Most people end up with less money, not because they lack skill but because
they've not used their skill at the right place at right time.

Buffet advise doesn't work for everyone.

~~~
NullPrefix
>How am I exploiting them? By entering into an agreement with intention to
terminate early and not telling about it beforehand.

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pknerd
Copying the part of my old comment on a similar past post:

> I (re)started my tech blog after several years and made it more active and
> discussed things which were kind of like a "niche" that is web scraping and
> automation. I wrote posts how things are done and put the code on Github. At
> one side I was building my Github and in other hands, my SEO optimized posts
> attracted Google and eventually developers and..site/business owners too
> that helped me to get contractual work.

The biggest issue with us, techies, is that we don't know how to sell
ourselves. Blogging could be pretty effective to get consulting work.

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dep_b
Working remote only with a mix of direct customers and customers through
TopTal. To have TopTal as a backup is great. Land a new gig in a week perhaps
two if you're picky (and your reputation is good).

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rbitar
We help senior remote developers around the world contract with companies here
in the US, mostly Startups, for freelance work. Feel free to check us out at
Skillhire.com

You’ll have to go through a technical interview process but most jobs are
seeking JS developers, especially Node, React-Redux and React Native devs.

Hopefully we’re one more resource to help devs like yourself who want to
travel and work.

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hbcondo714
I just got contacted from a company called NewtonX that connects tech leaders
with companies that need an initial phone consultation. I haven't gone through
with it but it looks like a decent way to do remote work.

[https://www.newtonx.com](https://www.newtonx.com)

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thibaut_barrere
Here is exactly what I do to get quality remote work:

[https://www.wisecashhq.com/blog/how-to-have-clients-find-
you...](https://www.wisecashhq.com/blog/how-to-have-clients-find-you-rather-
than-you-chasing-them)

------
vemv
Become a contractor in London first, which I assume you aren't. That should
get you started into this world!

It has world-famous daily rates even for generalistic sectors like JS/React.

Try to save some money, so you can afford the luxury of choosing clients
later.

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cheez
Surprisingly, you have to do a lot of meatspace visits.

~~~
3131s
And if you're half way around the world and can't meet in person, people are
really hesitant to work with you. I started out remotely with neither a
compsci degree nor any prior experience at a tech company, and I definitely
advise against being in that situation. The only good outcome was that it
spurred me to generalize more so that I could build and deploy something for a
client from start to finish on my own.

~~~
throw_this_one
Nice. How did you get the job? Did you build a complete application from front
to back on your own? Or was it through a connection?

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Axsuul
I'd like to expand more on this subject. Can anyone suggest the best
strategies or resources on how to raise your contracting rate?

~~~
jackgolding
doubleyourfreelancing.com is a great resource

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dsego
Join toptal.

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shishy
Check out www.moonlightwork.com

Saw them on www.indiehackers.com, think that might help you!

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sebleon
What's your email?

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dangero
Work on your social media reputation and presence. People pay more if you are
top of your field as determined by how many twitter followers you have, etc.
On one hand it’s a bad metric, but we all value social proof.

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neillyons
YunoJuno.com

