Why to provide consulting services as an engineer?

This is simple: because your and my goal is location independence. One of the easiest ways to gain this freedom is to provide consulting services to companies in your area of expertise. Actually engineering is one of the easiest fields to do this in. I guess there is a benefit to those four years at the uni.

Remember, if you are being payed a salary, you are typically making at least twice that amount back for your employer. This means that you should approach any other companies in your field that could benefit from your experience for a few hours or days per month, especially smaller ones.

Focus on web-based services for location independence

My goal is location independence, so I am going to focus on projects, jobs, and clients that I can do a majority of the work for with my laptop and from anywhere I want.  Of course, you have to be willing to meet in person every once in a while, that’s just the nature of an engineering consultant role.  But if you focus on giving amazing value to your clients for the money, then they can’t complain much about your location. Remember, if you take advantage of economic arbitrage, you don’t have to charge as much for your services.  Don’t sell yourself too cheaply, but focus on giving tremendous value for the money.
Having a good wi-fi connection will be key to success when you provide consulting services. This will allow you to talk with your customers on Skype, perform webinars, and to transfer files using Dropbox.

This gives you an unlimited runway

Your cash runway is defined as the amount of cash you have in the bank divided by your cash burn rate. Of course this tells you how many months you have left until you’re out of money. If you get enough consulting (or other) income coming in to cover your monthly expenses, then your runway is indefinite. Even with a couple of consulting customers, you should have a bit of a cash runway built up. This is a good idea just in case that part of your business drys up. Having six months living expenses available to you will help to ensure you never have to get a job again.  If you are much of an engineer, it should be simple to pay for your rent when you provide consulting services on retainer.

This is an escape, not a replacement for your job

It is possible that you could make your entire living by consulting over the web, but that’s not the path that I want to follow myself. To me, that’s essentially trading one job for another. No, I will try to stop my consulting services – for the near term – at $2000 per month. In that case I will have enough income to cover my basic costs, but still enough free time to build the products and businesses that I am dreaming about. The engineering escape that I talk about diversifies and makes use of multiple streams of income. This includes consulting and remote work agreements. Remember though, this makes you a location independent employee, but an employee none-the-less. Once free of cubicle life, you should focus on building a business of your own – that is the only way to propel yourself towards comfortable wealth. Both online and offline businesses are viable, with the best opportunities taking advantage of both worlds.

Possible Clients to provide consulting services as an engineer

You should approach companies that have work in your expertise, but maybe not direct competitors to your current company. This is because I am going to recommend you approach your current employer to be one of your consulting clients as well. That is if you don’t want to or aren’t successful in negotiating a remote work agreement.

Possible companies to approach:

• Small companies in your industry that cannot afford to employ an expert full time. This situation may allow them to employ a junior engineer and consult you on the difficult questions.
• Similar companies in a different territory. Perhaps there are similar companies to yours working in different provinces, states, or countries. this is not likely to be a conflict of interest if your clients work in different geographic areas.Your current employer. Maybe they won’t give in to a remote work agreement, but if you are currently valuable to your boss full time, then part time should be a possibility too. That’s especially true if you are an expert in your area. Another reason to keep you on payroll may be to ensure you don’t go to the competition out of desperation – hint hint…

My personal plan to provide consulting services

I do plan to do engineering consulting to some clients in my industry. I need only a couple of clients paying me a $500 per month retainer and I have my living expenses covered! My plan is to approach some smaller ventures in my area of expertise and offer a lucrative package in return for some guaranteed income. It may not be awesome money to start, but I plan to offer two days of work for $500. This will allow me to cover my monthly costs with one week of work. I will offer CAD design, component specification, technical documentation, and troubleshooting services to industry.  I also plan to provide consulting services to my current employer – that is if they don’t agree to my remote work proposition.  I’m confident that I can make that work instead though.

If I move to Asia or south America, I hope to bring in $1500 per month either through consulting or remote work agreements. I may bump that up to $2000 per month when I move to Europe or elsewhere in North America. This is a good baseline number that will keep my stress low and bills payed, but will afford me a lot of time to work on my own business ventures.  Best of all this will allow my girlfriend to quite her job and just enjoy life!

Tags: Consulting, Freedom, Income, Location Independence