The product I work with is making significant gains in the market now. The demand seems to be growing, judging by the new clients I see at work and recruiters that contact me after hours. I know the supply/demand is in favor of the applicants because it's a highly customized software and we were a tiny startup before being acquired by a tech giant. Not very many people have actual real world experience. I know a handful of ex-employees that want to start a consulting group but we are all really technical. We have people skills from being customer facing consultants but I really need a project manager / business person that can cut the deals.
I think their is a premium associated with the company's brand that allows them to charge more but I could probably charge 2/3 of their hourly rate. That would probably give me about 3x-4x my yearly salary now based on an estimate of not actually averaging 30 hours per week for 40 weeks out the year. I have no idea if those numbers make sense though.
Now that also means I take on the risk of finding and keeping clients, no paid healthcare or other benefits. I understand those things come out of my hourly rate at a company but it still doesn't to be a "fair" split to me. Especially when sites like glassdoor report much much higher salaries for people in my company, in my city, with my job title.
I'm already working with some 3rd party recruiters on contract gigs with government and quasi-government companies. The offers I have seen so far are 3x my current pay with a full benefits package. I'm trying to weigh the need for stability though as I have a significant debt to pay off and a child on the way. These offers also have paid overtime. I am figuring unpaid overtime and travel into my hourly rate because it's important to me. I used to include commute time but I work from home now.
Although I asked for a raise and got nothing. Either my skills aren't as valuable as I think or I suck at negotiating. I turned in my resignation once and was offered a much better salary. Leading me to believe I am valuable in someway to this company. I'm pretty confident they would offer a match again (or at least a decent increase) if I were to leave again but I don't know if I want to keep playing that game. I've been in the industry for 10 years. I'm pretty sure I'm underpaid. In the industry for 10 years. Revenue numbers to prove my worth company. I would think that I could cross into the 6 digit range soon but maybe I'm crazy. I'm not even close to the 150k number thrown out by the comment I quoted.
