Comment by scarface_74

I submitted this a little while ago. I’m not the author

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42818169

Every level of software engineering above a mid level developer is based on “scope”, “impact” and “dealing with ambiguity”. Title doesn’t matter, if you are pulling stories off the board with well defined business use cases - you are a mid level developer.

https://www.levels.fyi/blog/swe-level-framework.html

> I would love to switch to being self-employed either via consultancy

“Consult” on what? If you don’t have a specialty and no “full stack developer” or “backend developer” is not a specialty.

There is a huge difference between “staff augmentation” and strategic consulting where you are bringing in specialized expertise and talking to decision makers.

more autonomy over my time and my work

Learn how to deal with “the business” and be more strategic, learn system design and architecture and some project management.

> more money

This is a different optimization. It might sound reductive. But to make more money, work at companies that pay more money. You are never going to make the eye popping comp that you are seeing on levels.fyi as an “enterprise developer” - ie non tech companies.

In the words of r/cscareerquestions “grind leetCode and work for a FAANG (or equivalent paying company)”. That’s the first step and then see the first part about getting ahead.