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Well, then you had a fair share of what you need as a freelancer, for sure. Out of curiosity: why did you make the switch? Is it worth it, as opposed to working

by atleta 6y ago

Well, then you had a fair share of what you need as a freelancer, for sure. Out of curiosity: why did you make the switch? Is it worth it, as opposed to working as a solo/freelancer PM? As an engineer, I feel most of the value I bring is not actually writing code but managing the whole process and consulting the client on what to do and how to do. (So product and project management, sometimes with discussing the business side, agile/lean coaching. I.e. explaining that we don't want to build all features that sound cool, don't want to build every feature to its best version for a start, etc.) Though I'm not sure if I could make a living trying to sell this on its own (as opposed to doing it as a full stack engineer and tech lead).

arcturus17 6y ago
I made the switch because I started coding and studying CS in my free time and realized that I loved it, and that taking a detour was not so risky since software engineering would be a good complement to the skills I already had (it essentially meant "closing the loop" of the dev cycle). I've worked as a freelance PM once, right after finishing my SEng masters actually, and the experience wasn't great - the choice of tech and the team in that particular project were terrible, the customers were really clueless and it was a fight against the elements. There are also not that many freelance PM jobs, at least where I live. There is a massive market for companies who want to build stuff - and in most cases they want everything handled end-to-end, so being able to do everything responds greatly to this demand. The projects I've coded have turned out great thus far. In particular I have built an internal product for a global leader in its industry and it's really taking off. > I feel most of the value I bring is not actually writing code but managing the whole process and consulting the client on what to do and how to do I feel the same. In fact I may need to outsource the coding on a couple of my projects very soon... Still the SEng experience would be invaluable in this regard as I can act as both PM and engineering manager. And I will keep coding the projects I'm interested in - I'm not sure if I'd like to turn into an agency for the foreseeable future, but rather look forward to improving my coding skills for at least another 3 or 4 years.

by atleta 6y ago

arcturus17 6y ago

I made the switch because I started coding and studying CS in my free time and realized that I loved it, and that taking a detour was not so risky since software engineering would be a good complement to the skills I already had (it essentially meant "closing the loop" of the dev cycle). I've worked as a freelance PM once, right after finishing my SEng masters actually, and the experience wasn't great - the choice of tech and the team in that particular project were terrible, the customers were really clueless and it was a fight against the elements. There are also not that many freelance PM jobs, at least where I live. There is a massive market for companies who want to build stuff - and in most cases they want everything handled end-to-end, so being able to do everything responds greatly to this demand. The projects I've coded have turned out great thus far. In particular I have built an internal product for a global leader in its industry and it's really taking off. > I feel most of the value I bring is not actually writing code but managing the whole process and consulting the client on what to do and how to do I feel the same. In fact I may need to outsource the coding on a couple of my projects very soon... Still the SEng experience would be invaluable in this regard as I can act as both PM and engineering manager. And I will keep coding the projects I'm interested in - I'm not sure if I'd like to turn into an agency for the foreseeable future, but rather look forward to improving my coding skills for at least another 3 or 4 years.