As an ex-owner of an outsourcing company, I've been on the other side of this. Without any disrespect intended in asking this, is it possible you've been without a project for so long because you don't have the most flexible skillset?<p>I can say that, in my company, when business was slower, we would often see the same few people constantly without work because they were either too inexperienced, too limited in their capabilities, or too inflexible in what they were willing to do.<p>We worked hard to try to give them opportunities--having them shadow more senior engineers on projects (the extra project help also gave our clients more bang for their buck and made us look even better as a group), getting them training, having them work on internal projects, etc. Not all companies will or can go this extra mile to find opportunities for you, but might be receptive if you structure and propose something that uses your down time to your mutual benefit.<p>If they're not receptive, or if you can't structure something like this in your environment, then you might consider moving on.<p>Edit: Actually, as others are mentioning, it was also way easier to staff people who were actively involved in the sales phase of a program. Volunteering to do research, prototypes, etc. was a great way for motivated people to help out during this phase. Since they were effectively already working on the program by the time it started, they were usually the ones who would wind up staffed on the program.