Burned on Freelance Project, Ghosted After Interviews — Seeking Direction & Support

Hi,

I’m from a non-traditional Engineering background, a self-taught backend developer, and a former Artificial Intelligence Operations consultant (1 YOE).

I live in rural America, outside a major tech hub, and have been on the market for 20 months now - being unemployed is a rough spot to find yourself in.

Three months ago, I landed a freelance analytics project by chance. I built a PostHog dashboard to track email signups, trials, and conversions for a mind-mapping software.

I committed ~20 hours and tried to negotiate a fair rate. That client was impossible to please and hired low cost labor folks abroad. He made many degrading and passive-agressive comments to me as feedback.

He told me "this deliverable is useless", "you are not skilled in dashboarding", "it should've only taken 4 hours." He cited performance issues yet prides himself on "growing people" on LinkedIn. Alex's high-quality questions course helped during that rough call.

I got 8 screenshots of the dashboard I built.

Since then, I’ve had six interviews for full-time roles. I feel like I am losing momentum though.

One climate tech hiring manager told me that he would open a junior engineer role for me this month. I completed their technical challenge. And, then, I followed up twice with him. No response. And I think I am getting ghosted by another one.

I am continuing cold applications, networking, tailored cover letters to secure my career. I’m at a crossroads and am considering whether to go to grad school for an entrepreneurial endeavor instead.

Rahul’s advice to freelance when the scope, timeline, and payment structure are aligned was helpful. However, as an entry-level professional, I am struggling to find work in my network.

I’ve been volunteering for a circular economy startup's Engineering roadmap with LCA data. We may discuss another small scoped project —

Questions

• What recommendations do you have to speak to this in a way that shows growth?

• Would you advise to spin up the PostHog screenshots (signups, funnels, etc.) as a small scoped GitHub repo project with the circular economy startup? If so, how?

• I am feeling a ton of burnout from job searching. I am continuing to spiral out of control. Any advice on how to transition from 20 months and to get positive work experience under my belt?

I’m still showing up, learning, applying — and I am requesting career support.

Thanks for supportive comments in advance.