When the bubble burst, the company I was working for went belly-up. I decided that it was the perfect time to become an independent consultant (you know: same time as 7000 other people looking for consultancy work in a business that no loner existed).

I floundered for a couple of years, trying to find clients, getting a steady stream of clients-who-don't-pay. To pay the bills I got a part-time job as a cashier at the local hardware warehouse and was totally bored.

Then I gave up. Best thing I ever did. Before I was a developer I was a graphic designer, so I went back to that. I found a job at a local printing company and quickly became the backbone of the company. I not only knew graphic design but was also able to run all the IT. I wrote software for the company to run the flow of projects from the client to the press to the accounts department and back to the client.

I'm now working full-time writing online software for them. It's a complete print management and procurement system (written in Perl) with full PDF artwork creation. It's so much better than the old cubicle job because I am the entire IT department. I don't go to meetings, the management respect me, and I go home happy.

So my advice? Someone said to marry a girl whose dad needs an IT department. That's some great advice right there. Although maybe don't marry a girl to do it. Just find a company with no IT department who you can do some other work for, then make their life better by doing some development work for them. Eventually you'll probably find yourself in a development role, but without the headaches of Office Space.

That way, you feel like an independent consultant, but have the guarantee of a permanent paycheck.