Consulting for me; I work for a large firm but bonuses put me well over $250k. Most of my job is also not tech; I largely manage development teams these days. As a pure engineer, you should be looking at product companies selling SaaS.
To command that level of salary and industry, you need to have at least 10 years experience, with half of that at a “digital economy” product company. If you’re not at a larger product company working on production systems, your title will probably be a level below where you’re at now (so expect to come in making about what you do now, albeit with a higher ceiling for comp and promotions).
Startups aren’t necessarily the best entryway either. The job of working at a startup is very different from working on a relatively mature codebase. It takes a different mindset and a much more methodical approach. Less “move fast and break things” and more “readable code, complete documentation, good tests”.
To command that level of salary and industry, you need to have at least 10 years experience, with half of that at a “digital economy” product company. If you’re not at a larger product company working on production systems, your title will probably be a level below where you’re at now (so expect to come in making about what you do now, albeit with a higher ceiling for comp and promotions).
Startups aren’t necessarily the best entryway either. The job of working at a startup is very different from working on a relatively mature codebase. It takes a different mindset and a much more methodical approach. Less “move fast and break things” and more “readable code, complete documentation, good tests”.