7 ms·

Ask HN: Machine learning contractors, how much do you charge hourly?

94 points by reiinakano 8y ago

Also, how many years of experience do you have? What are your credentials? Where do you live?

shishy 8y ago
Commenting so I can find this thread easily later... as I'm also curious :). I would also ask if you have a rough idea how much of the ML work is implementing basic models to production versus actual data scientific work in coming up with/tuning the underlying models themselves.
- ageitgey 8y ago
  My experience at a very high level: - 1% true research / original ML - 29% figuring out clever ways to apply existing approaches to new problems, understanding how clients business works and thinking of new twists on old ideas to solve those unique problems, etc - 70% helping the customer understand what ML can do, how to manage their data and how to convince the rest of the company and IT to let them actually do it
  - tixocloud 8y ago
    Interesting regarding the 70% - do they actually you bring you in as a consultant to help them map out their ML strategy?
aspectmin 8y ago
Okay. I’ll throw in. I live in the Pacific Northwest and have been in tech a long time, about the last 4/5 years with a heavy focus on data science and ML with a particular focus on cyber security (and robotics/IOT (think like datacenter energy system monitoring). Not a PhD. Pretty much self taught. Worked for one of the big tech companies for many years, which gave me a lot of cred to build on (and a great platform/environment to focus on learning). When I bill hourly, it’s somewhere around the 200-250 USD range, but I much prefer to bid by the project. I also do a fair number of talks around machine learning/security, AI and the future of work, and consult with policy makers on the impact of tech (esp. AI) to jobs and rural workforces. The latter generates me significantly more revenue than the hourly billing. As to the projects themselves, to use the adage, ML is probably less than 10% (maybe even 5%) of the actual projects. Most of the work is finding the data, cleaning, and doing things like figuring out how to get their IOT devices regularly reporting to the cloud or Messing with things like SNMP and monitoring infrastructure. Hope that helps. Feel free to ping if questions.
- cw_ds 8y ago
  The robotics/iot stuff is a pretty heavy interest for me. Where did you start, being self-taught, to get into the field? Or was working at a tech co enough already
krm01 8y ago
It’s been said numerous time here on HN and elsewhere (read patio11’s kalzumeus.com) but just to repeat what others and myself have found to work best: dont charge per hour. Charge per day/week or month. Your goal is to work efficiently and fast. When you do this, it means you get to make more money for less time and the client gets the benefit of getting work done faster.
- beagle3 8y ago
  This makes no sense mathematically - changing the unit of measurement (and perhaps rounding) cannot make a real difference unless substantially all of your results are between 0.5 and 1.5 unit. If you said “charge by project/milestone”, your reasoning makes sense. The people who charge a lot by hour (lawyers, tax specialists etc) will often charge in 15 minute increments. Even if you charge by day, tou’ll find you have to charge in 0.25 day increments or so.
  - joshuamorton 8y ago
    Another way of putting this might be "charge by the sprint". You don't track your time specifically, you do report back on your progress each week/two, and the company makes renewal decisions off of that. The point is to not subdivide the week.
    - seanwilson 8y ago
      Can you explain more how this works? So you get paid upfront for a e.g. two week sprint where you say what you think you'll get done in that sprint and the client picks if they want to renew for the next sprint based on a progress review at the end? How does this work out if you finish all the tasks in the sprint really quickly or barely finish any in terms of client happiness? What are the benefits over charging per day or week?
  - vannevar 8y ago
    You're assuming that in order to bill one day, you have to work 8 hours, which is more or less how hourly billing works, particularly in the cases you cite where the actual billing unit is 15 minutes. But a day rate works differently; it basically says that for the duration of the contract, you will get paid each day you're on contract, regardless of the actual number of hours worked. You might work more than 8 hours a day, you might work less. Either way, you get paid for the day.
ritoune 8y ago
250. Never had a client tell me it was too much. East Coast. PhD. 10yrs in semi-related industry before.
harvester5000 8y ago
As a follow up - how do you all find work? ML engineer here, working in Toronto for four years.
- tixocloud 8y ago
  What kind of work are you looking for?
  - harvester5000 8y ago
    Regular short contracts, less than 8 week projects.
- aspectmin 8y ago
  You're welcome to drop me an email. We do some work in Canada (I'm a displaced Canadian myself): jan @ghostbytes.com A good percentage of our work is remote (save for the robotics stuff, which is very hands on).
quickthrower2 8y ago
Contractor or freelancer? To me a contractor does short gigs 3-12 months with a daily rate and are usually being hired by a technically knowledgeable person, who says I need x,y,z tech skills.
vannevar 8y ago
You're probably going to get significant selection bias here. Few people are going to admit to a rate they're afraid is low, and other people who respond may be doing a bit of humble bragging. In my experience both contracting and hiring, $100-150/hr is typical for an experienced person.
- DamnYuppie 8y ago
  This seems WAY low to me. I ran many projects for companies. $150 is the rate they pay for 3-4 years experience from consulting firms. You should start at ~ $240 and let them negotiate you down. Never be afraid of letting them pay you more!
  - drugme 8y ago
    So after "letting them negotiate you down" -- what's the actual, final, median rate we're talking about here, please?
    - DamnYuppie 8y ago
      I would say $180-$200.
      - drugme 8y ago
        Noted, thanks.
      - aspectmin 8y ago
        I would agree with this. I have a number of friends doing Data Science consulting (PowerBI/Tableau/etc), and it seems like they average out around the $180-200 range. I think they're undercharging, and I've had no problems getting business/repeat business up to around $250. Beyond that and you're in the bailiwick of the Accentures and their ilk. The more projects you do, the more repeat business, the better you get, and the more you learn to not underprice you work (which helps you focus on the good projects where you can have the most impact). It pretty much compounds. For the hourly stuff, I've had very little pushback until I get much above $250. Most of that work is break/fix. As above, I much prefer to do project based work and bid on a project by project basis. (Gives me incentive to work harder/faster, and gives the customers a predictable price. I've found a lot of them are wary of open-top ended contracts).
snicky 8y ago
I'm wondering how one converts to a data scientist or ML engineer from a pure web development background without going back to school? I've been a backend developer for many years and I'm already a bit bored with working on software-only products. Would love to move on with my career to a point where I could have some more influence on what's happening in the real world off the web. Where did you start?
- aspectmin 8y ago
  I went from Cybersecurity (Infosec) to Data Science/ML. If you have interest/passion, it's totally doable. I get asked this kind of question a lot, so I created a listing of the stuff I've found most useful (books, online classes, etc). You can find it at http://www.atomicml.com http://www.atomicml.com If you have stuff you think I should add, please let me know! (jan @ghostbytes.com)
  - snicky 8y ago
    Good stuff, thanks.
wilshiredetroit 8y ago
I charge $10,000 per day. It would be silly to charge per hour.. Never really understood that approach - but that's just me

94 points by reiinakano 8y ago

Also, how many years of experience do you have? What are your credentials? Where do you live?

Commenting so I can find this thread easily later... as I'm also curious :). I would also ask if you have a rough idea how much of the ML work is implementing basic models to production versus actual data scientific work in coming up with/tuning the underlying models themselves.

ageitgey 8y ago
My experience at a very high level: - 1% true research / original ML - 29% figuring out clever ways to apply existing approaches to new problems, understanding how clients business works and thinking of new twists on old ideas to solve those unique problems, etc - 70% helping the customer understand what ML can do, how to manage their data and how to convince the rest of the company and IT to let them actually do it
- tixocloud 8y ago
  Interesting regarding the 70% - do they actually you bring you in as a consultant to help them map out their ML strategy?

aspectmin 8y ago

Okay. I’ll throw in. I live in the Pacific Northwest and have been in tech a long time, about the last 4/5 years with a heavy focus on data science and ML with a particular focus on cyber security (and robotics/IOT (think like datacenter energy system monitoring). Not a PhD. Pretty much self taught. Worked for one of the big tech companies for many years, which gave me a lot of cred to build on (and a great platform/environment to focus on learning). When I bill hourly, it’s somewhere around the 200-250 USD range, but I much prefer to bid by the project. I also do a fair number of talks around machine learning/security, AI and the future of work, and consult with policy makers on the impact of tech (esp. AI) to jobs and rural workforces. The latter generates me significantly more revenue than the hourly billing. As to the projects themselves, to use the adage, ML is probably less than 10% (maybe even 5%) of the actual projects. Most of the work is finding the data, cleaning, and doing things like figuring out how to get their IOT devices regularly reporting to the cloud or Messing with things like SNMP and monitoring infrastructure. Hope that helps. Feel free to ping if questions.

cw_ds 8y ago
The robotics/iot stuff is a pretty heavy interest for me. Where did you start, being self-taught, to get into the field? Or was working at a tech co enough already

krm01 8y ago

It’s been said numerous time here on HN and elsewhere (read patio11’s kalzumeus.com) but just to repeat what others and myself have found to work best: dont charge per hour. Charge per day/week or month. Your goal is to work efficiently and fast. When you do this, it means you get to make more money for less time and the client gets the benefit of getting work done faster.

beagle3 8y ago
This makes no sense mathematically - changing the unit of measurement (and perhaps rounding) cannot make a real difference unless substantially all of your results are between 0.5 and 1.5 unit. If you said “charge by project/milestone”, your reasoning makes sense. The people who charge a lot by hour (lawyers, tax specialists etc) will often charge in 15 minute increments. Even if you charge by day, tou’ll find you have to charge in 0.25 day increments or so.
- joshuamorton 8y ago
  Another way of putting this might be "charge by the sprint". You don't track your time specifically, you do report back on your progress each week/two, and the company makes renewal decisions off of that. The point is to not subdivide the week.
  - seanwilson 8y ago
    Can you explain more how this works? So you get paid upfront for a e.g. two week sprint where you say what you think you'll get done in that sprint and the client picks if they want to renew for the next sprint based on a progress review at the end? How does this work out if you finish all the tasks in the sprint really quickly or barely finish any in terms of client happiness? What are the benefits over charging per day or week?
- vannevar 8y ago
  You're assuming that in order to bill one day, you have to work 8 hours, which is more or less how hourly billing works, particularly in the cases you cite where the actual billing unit is 15 minutes. But a day rate works differently; it basically says that for the duration of the contract, you will get paid each day you're on contract, regardless of the actual number of hours worked. You might work more than 8 hours a day, you might work less. Either way, you get paid for the day.

ritoune 8y ago

250. Never had a client tell me it was too much. East Coast. PhD. 10yrs in semi-related industry before.

harvester5000 8y ago

As a follow up - how do you all find work? ML engineer here, working in Toronto for four years.

tixocloud 8y ago
What kind of work are you looking for?
- harvester5000 8y ago
  Regular short contracts, less than 8 week projects.
aspectmin 8y ago
You're welcome to drop me an email. We do some work in Canada (I'm a displaced Canadian myself): jan @ghostbytes.com A good percentage of our work is remote (save for the robotics stuff, which is very hands on).

quickthrower2 8y ago

Contractor or freelancer? To me a contractor does short gigs 3-12 months with a daily rate and are usually being hired by a technically knowledgeable person, who says I need x,y,z tech skills.

vannevar 8y ago

You're probably going to get significant selection bias here. Few people are going to admit to a rate they're afraid is low, and other people who respond may be doing a bit of humble bragging. In my experience both contracting and hiring, $100-150/hr is typical for an experienced person.

DamnYuppie 8y ago
This seems WAY low to me. I ran many projects for companies. $150 is the rate they pay for 3-4 years experience from consulting firms. You should start at ~ $240 and let them negotiate you down. Never be afraid of letting them pay you more!
- drugme 8y ago
  So after "letting them negotiate you down" -- what's the actual, final, median rate we're talking about here, please?
  - DamnYuppie 8y ago
    I would say $180-$200.
    - drugme 8y ago
      Noted, thanks.
    - aspectmin 8y ago
      I would agree with this. I have a number of friends doing Data Science consulting (PowerBI/Tableau/etc), and it seems like they average out around the $180-200 range. I think they're undercharging, and I've had no problems getting business/repeat business up to around $250. Beyond that and you're in the bailiwick of the Accentures and their ilk. The more projects you do, the more repeat business, the better you get, and the more you learn to not underprice you work (which helps you focus on the good projects where you can have the most impact). It pretty much compounds. For the hourly stuff, I've had very little pushback until I get much above $250. Most of that work is break/fix. As above, I much prefer to do project based work and bid on a project by project basis. (Gives me incentive to work harder/faster, and gives the customers a predictable price. I've found a lot of them are wary of open-top ended contracts).

snicky 8y ago

I'm wondering how one converts to a data scientist or ML engineer from a pure web development background without going back to school? I've been a backend developer for many years and I'm already a bit bored with working on software-only products. Would love to move on with my career to a point where I could have some more influence on what's happening in the real world off the web. Where did you start?

aspectmin 8y ago
I went from Cybersecurity (Infosec) to Data Science/ML. If you have interest/passion, it's totally doable. I get asked this kind of question a lot, so I created a listing of the stuff I've found most useful (books, online classes, etc). You can find it at http://www.atomicml.com http://www.atomicml.com If you have stuff you think I should add, please let me know! (jan @ghostbytes.com)
- snicky 8y ago
  Good stuff, thanks.

wilshiredetroit 8y ago

I charge $10,000 per day. It would be silly to charge per hour.. Never really understood that approach - but that's just me