I consider myself a "consultant", which is just a fancy way of saying "freelancer" in many ways (I do more consulting that actual producing of code, though). I

I consider myself a "consultant", which is just a fancy way of saying "freelancer" in many ways (I do more consulting that actual producing of code, though). I usually rely on the company;s PMs - in my role, I'm helping them understand the technologies I know well and the strategies on how to implement and make money off of them, but they know product and project processes for their organization better than I generally want to. If you're a PM looking for a role as a freelancer, I'd consider taking the consultant route. If you're a PM with a deep experience either in a particular industry (e.g. finance) or a particular technology (e.g. APIs), you can easily pivot to a consultant to those types of companies, helping their PMs and teams figure out how to compete. But even when I was a full time freelance developer focused on producing code, though I would not question the value of having a PM, I specifically freelanced so I could manage myself.