I know a guy like this. He ended up a VP at a big company like Salesforce a few years ago, got laid off spent a year and a half blowing money on drugs and women. Came back and fudged his LinkedIn / resume to make it look like he was a consultant those years (no months only years on his LinkedIn) some company is back to paying him 300-500k salary. It mostly seems to be about selling yourself hard and interviewing a lot until you find the sucker who is desperate enough to hire you. Another thing he did when he was originally getting hired was to start a MBA class in a small town and never finish it so that while he was applying he could say he was getting his MBA. He does SAP and such. Not a route a lot of people will want to take.
Just to be clear: the guy I am talking about is very smart, knows his stuff and has a lot of integrity. My point is that the main factor that allows him to make the big money is not his technical skills but his ability to talk to people at all levels. Technical skills are needed but not sufficient.
