My personal short story: I became so disillusioned with big tech that I quit and took an 8mo sabbatical until contract work dropped itself on my lap. I was rea

My personal short story: I became so disillusioned with big tech that I quit and took an 8mo sabbatical until contract work dropped itself on my lap. I was really lucky that I didn't have to do any selling of myself which everyone claims to hate (I wasn't in the solo game long enough for any of my wells to dry up). I got my leads from friends working as full-timers at companies looking to hire. They were desperate enough for above average talent that I could negotiate a part time deal: essentially 20h of my week. I charged about what I was making as a full-timer, but padded my hours. Typically work 2-3hrs, bill for 4. In retrospect, this wasn't enough for no other reason than it was a better deal for them than for me. I overlapped these gigs for a few weeks and absolutely hated the full allocation of my time. Also the context switch was painful. I'd go from an archaic MSVC++ codebase in a windows VM to an unorganized startup working on iOS/Android. Eventually I quit one and kept the higher paying gig. I liked neither of the jobs. I was sometimes asked to do more than just fix bugs, like start architecting a way to a modern stack or think about how to integrate a revolutionary feature. But when I came back with a plan, their ambitions vanished. They thought they could get something magical for nearly free. So I became disillusioned with contract work :) The jobs often exist because an employer wants to pay less than hiring a full-timer to do the job. Or the work they want done is inherently unattractive. It was isolating too since you're never really part of a team. Ultimately I made the pivot back to big tech. Work is more interesting, I obtain more valuable knowledge. My isolation problem wasn't fixed due to pandemic =\ And I feel a lot more freedom to screw off in the middle of the day when I'm frustrated. As a contractor I felt guilt (or I just never billed for the hours I took off to go on a bike ride and clear my mind). Good luck! I'd send personal emails to your network of engineers working at small-medium companies that are less flashy and don't have a flush hiring funnel. They always need good folks (you'd be vetted by your contact) and you may have the leverage to set the terms of contract employment.