Does anyone have advice on how to start working in this space? I'm open to part-time consulting roles to start, with a long-term goal of contributing full-time to a forward-thinking Bitcoin company.
You have to take it easy and first try to learn first because if you are new to bitcoin, there is of course still many things for you to learn because even if you know other things, your knowledge may not apply here and a reason you need to first learn from people who know better about bitcoins from this forum. If you look to transition with your pride into Bitcoin, you may end up not learning enough and you can be scammed because of the danger you put yourself due to incomplete knowledge.
Even if you are the CEO of any startup you have to be humble enough to learn from people here.
From the information he provided, he can easily fit into the blockchain business because the industry is vast and not limited to buying and selling Bitcoin. I know of many Blockchain projects (startups and established) that are looking for skills such as his and just like @tabas said, exchanges are one of such reliable companies he can easily get a job to start from. Transitioning to blockchain might actually require some learning no doubt but he can learn on the job which is what I consider the most effective learning process. Simply consider his post as some kind of dropping his resume.
He might also need some form of learning or at least basic refining to get started with investing in Bitcoin. A lot of knowledge have already been shared in this forum with respect to how to effectively invest in and manage Bitcoin portfolio for optimal result. The DCA method is an example of such methods with the aspect of setting up emergency funds being one fine addition I learnt by being active in this forum.