I did consulting for 9 years.

The money was great. The projects were interesting. The people I met were amazing. The brands I worked for were world class. The travel kept me up my toes and so did client expectations.

I loved it but I also knew that I could do things smarter.

The bottom line: trading time for money whether as an employee or a consultant doesn’t have leverage. Once your time is up, you’re done. You hit the ceiling.

One thing you can do then is increase your hourly rate. I did exactly that and succeeded. But then again, your hourly rate is also capped. There is only so much that people are ready to pay for any given expertise.

You can of course hire more people like you and become a body shop. You then continue trading their time for money. Lots of overheads guaranteed and you got to find them enough work.

There are plenty of body shops out there that make less profit with lots of consultants compared to a better organised business that banks more profit...