How did you make the permie to contractor jump?

[BoredBloke]

So that's about £32K? 4x increase. I only went from £20K to £60K (1995).

I went from nothing (uni) to 30k (contracting) back in 91 when I started working. I did some seriously cr@p roles, all over the place to build up my skill set. In 2.5 years I lived in Aberdeen, Swindon, Bournemouth, Tunbridge Wells and Leeds. I started on a helpdesk, then did desktop support for a few years before getting into the VBA rubbish that currently pays my bills!

[norrahe]

Bored at permie gig,
Had some dosh after selling house in London,
Went travelling,
Trained as a chef for fun, ran a catering business briefly,
Did some more travelling
And after a year or so decided to look for work again, fell into contracting.

[Gibbon]

I was on a RAF software team when I came across my first subby, I decided there and then that’s what I wanted to be. Went to college and gleaned as much knowledge as I could. I had to put 18 months notice in or pretend I was gay but didn’t have the balls for that. Took a permie job at first to get some commercial experience in and left after a year. That was 12 years ago, never looked back.

[hyperD]

Worked in Oil & Gas as Process Engineer then focussed on software dev inside the industry. Realised it was niche, waited for redundancy, jumped into first contract after three days leaving clientco.

Then mostly fixed priced work to original clientco and others in similar industry without needing Dodgy Agent.

[SeekingIT]

The Jump

Back in 2001, thought I was the business, £25k, laptop, Co. Car & phone, permy at CompLand. Got sent to C&W, troubleshooting /support etc....Found out chap I reported to was on £461 per day.

Needless to say this readjusted my thinking, as I was as qualified as him (IMHO). did some research on contracting, knocked up me CV, got agents calling everyday............Had to give 4 weeks notice, as CompLand had been good to me, didn't want to do dirty and walk.........

In between the 4 weeks notice, bottom fell out of market - was looking for 2.5 months, had budgeted for 3 months.......then out of blue agent called, first gig........was at Client for 4.5 years...

Never looked back, interview yesterday, awaiting result hopefully today.....

[Scrag Meister]

I went from nothing (uni) to 30k (contracting) back in 91 when I started working. I did some seriously cr@p roles, all over the place to build up my skill set. In 2.5 years I lived in Aberdeen, Swindon, Bournemouth, Tunbridge Wells and Leeds. I started on a helpdesk, then did desktop support for a few years before getting into the VBA rubbish that currently pays my bills!

How can you say VBA rubbish!!

The BASIC language of different flavours has paid my bills both perm and contract for 25 years.

[d000hg]

I was already working 20 hours a week on the side on a remote contract, dithering whether to go for it full-time or not... the $50/hr I was earning seemed like a fortune compared to a £27k salary.

Then I got fired and it forced my hand... I'm glad.

[zara_backdog]

Redundancy then luck

Same here!

[MarillionFan]

I was born a contractor. I came out clutching a timesheet.

[Cliphead]

I was born a contractor. I came out clutching a script.