What is the Biggest Mistake SAP Job Seekers Make? (#2)
To say the SAP job market is competitive right now would be an understatement, so it’s time to revisit the subject I posted on late last year: mistakes SAP job seekers make and how to avoid them. The first mistake? “Chasing dollars, not skills.” The latest mistake? Trying to make more than one SAP job change at a time. To understand how this works, I’ll draw on emails I receive from frustrated SAP job seekers who are trying to improve their strategy.
Whenever you’re on the job market, it makes sense to go after your dreamiest job first. But if that doesn’t work out, you’re stuck with plan B. That’s usually when the emails start flying as people vent in my inbox. Often, the problem isn’t skills but strategy and/or expectations.
Let’s take a look at how this works. In reality, when people try to move to a new position, they overlook that their dreamy new job role is actually several job moves away. Here’s some examples a job change in SAP:
- moving from a hands-on SAP person to a hands-on team lead
- moving from technical to functional (in the same area within SAP)
- moving from an experienced end user to a consultant role
- moving from a super user to part of the implementation team
- moving from a team lead to a project management role
- moving from one functional area of SAP to another
- moving from a Basis role to an Enterprise Architect role
- moving from a DBA role to an SAP Basis role
- moving from “legacy” ABAP to ABAP OO/Web Dypnro ABAP
- moving from ABAP to SAP Web/Java development
- moving from SAP version 4.x functional to ERP 6.0 functional
- moving from SAP R/3 technical to NetWeaver 7.x technical
- and yes, significantly increasing your salary (or rate) also counts as a job change.
Generally, to increase your salary, you have to agree to do largely the same thing you have previously been doing. That’s really the essence of “free agency” – cashing in on existing skills. To get a big boost in salary while also getting a boost in skills exposure is not easy to pull off. That’s why most job changes involve choosing between boosting skills and cashing in.
All of the above are significant job changes. You can accomplish one of these per job search, but it’s hard to do more than one. People get into trouble when they try to combine more than one job change into a single career move. I see examples of this on a daily basis.
Example 1: moving from having no SAP experience to being an SAP consultant is actually three job moves in one:
- moving into an SAP user role (1 job move)
- getting SAP configuration experience (another job move)
- becoming a full fledged SAP consultant (another job move)
Example 2: moving from a non-SAP Java programmer to a technical SAP consultant is two job moves:
- moving from non-SAP Java to SAP Java (one job change)
- moving from SAP technical programming to technical consultant (one job change)
Sometimes you can pull this off in one move, but often, acquiring the consulting skills is a separate undertaking once you establish your Java skills in an SAP environment.
Example 3: moving from a salesperson to an SAP CRM specialist is at least two job moves:
- from salesperson to CRM specialist (one job move)
- from CRM specialist to SAP CRM specialist (one job move)
- from SAP CRM specialist to SAP CRM consultant (at least one job move)
In some cases, the first two of these can be combined (meaning you move into the CRM software side and the SAP CRM side in one move). But then there are more moves to make.
The three most common SAP job moves that people underestimate:
1. The move from hands-on SAP user to part of the SAP implementation team MUST happen before you can make your hay as a consultant. On the functional side of SAP, full life cycle experience on the implementation, including product configuration skills, is necessary prior to becoming a consultant. In most cases, multiple years of such experience is needed. On the technical side of SAP, performing mission critical projects on live implementations is the key.
2. Once you have acquired significant SAP implementation experience, you’re not yet a consultant. Becoming a full-fledged consultant requires another set of skills centered around a range of “soft” SAP consulting skills, as well as experience on multiple SAP implementations. Increasingly, industry expertise and business process know-how is becoming an essential part of that SAP consulting skills package. Acquiring general consulting skills is a big part of the equation, and many job seekers seem to want to bundle this into another career move into SAP, or a new part of SAP, not realizing that you can’t overcome your consulting inexperience unless you have a very rare and sought after skill already. The consulting transition is almost always a separate transition once you have established your hands-on SAP project skills. (If you’re really interested in the SAP consulting piece of this equation, you may want to be tracking my new podcast series, The ERP Lounge: Misadventures and Opportunities in SAP Consulting. We’ll delve into the realities (and skills) of SAP consulting in each episode.)
3. SAP version experience matters. On the technical side, it’s about NetWeaver-related project skills, on the functional side, whether you are 4.x or 6.0 is a big deal in many cases. Of course, if you are a 4.6c person applying for a job in a 4.6c environment, this is not a problem. But if you’re looking at a different version environment, it does matter. Version experience can be a huge source of frustration, even for experienced SAP professionals. In some cases, the functionality differences between 4.6 and ERP 6.0 are not that great – it depends on your specialization. The unfortunate reality is that version exposure is about customer perception, and the vast majority of SAP customers want to hire folks who have previous working experience in the version number they are running on. Even if you could hit the ground running immediately or with just a few days of retooling on the new version, your resume will end up underneath those who already have the version experience the hiring manager is seeking. This is not necessarily a hiring tactic I agree with, in some cases, it results in the hiring of inferior talent, but it’s a reality that should be understood.
Let’s look at a couple more real-life examples: I recently heard from a .Net programmer who wanted to become an SAP functional consultant but was having trouble making it happen. There are several job changes wrapped up in this transition. One of the reasons I emphasize breaking down the job changes is that you are better off breaking into SAP (or moving into new areas of SAP) if you can sell the company on your existing skills. The facts are that an SAP consulting firm looking to hire an SAP Financials consultant doesn’t care much about .Net experience. An SAP customer that has a .Net development environment *does* care. So I advised this person to use their .Net skills as an entry point into SAP, applying to an SAP user site that could use a strong .Net developer. Once inside an SAP environment, over time, a move to a functional SAP role is much more feasible.
I see this come up a lot with ABAP programmers who want to be functional SAP consultants. Not long ago, I heard from an ABAP person who wanted to be an SAP Financials consultant. However, some digging revealed that this person was actually an ABAP-HR expert with a pretty deep knowledge of HR business processes. Unless this individual absolutely can’t stand working in HR, they have a much better chance of crossing over into functional work by staying on the HR side where they have skills that are useful. There are several job changes here: first, from ABAP-HR to functional HR, hopefully within the same organization (your chances of making that first skills push are often better in the same company where you have paid dues).
This is where the technical HR abilities come in handy, making this person useful as a functional expert who can work very effectively with HR technical teams. The next change this person needs to make: from functional HR employee to functional HR consultant (I’d probably make the move to consultant first, before shifting to financials, though it depends on where the opportunities present themselves). During this period, every effort would be made to get hands-on experience involving the integration points between the HR and FI modules. From that point, the transition into Financials from HR (HCM) might be a smooth, gradual one.
I have never seen anyone talk about the misconceptions of making multiple SAP job changes at once, so I hope this was useful. This piece was not intended to discourage anyone who is trying to make aggressive moves in the market. By all means, chase that dream job. But if the approach you are taking stalls out, then more likely than not, you are trying to make too many job changes at once. In the process, you may also be falling into the trap of asking for new skills as opposed to selling employers on the value of your existing skills. When you make job changes gradually, your existing skills have much more relevance.
By the way, for those who are reading this on an existing RSS feed, I now have a “super feed” on Feedburner that puts all of my SAP blog and podcast feeds on one stream. You may want to subscribe to that also, or instead.
July 30th, 2009 at 7:53 pm...
Nice blog, Jon.
I think one of the reasons multi-step career transitions are hard to pull off is that employers and recruiters lack the tools to connect the dots. Let’s face it; even if the consultant has all the skills and experience required, those particular attributes don’t exactly jump off the page — not the way most resumes are written or most resume search tools are designed.
One way to empower the consultant is to give them a resume that can be searched on skills, years of experience in a particular module, and other key criteria. That’s the idea behind a project we did at the SAP Consulting Exchange. You can find more here: http://sapconsultingexchange.com/blog/?p=143.
Herbert Goertz, CEO
The SAP Consulting Exchange, Inc.
August 1st, 2009 at 8:31 am...
Herbert,
Thanks for your comment. I like what you are doing at the Consulting Exchange and your resume project is very cool.
In my view, what you are referring to is almost a separate problem. Even when an SAP professional does have all the skills needed to make a move, if they have flaws in their resume or in their marketing efforts, then all the skills in the world won’t make a difference. So yes, the presentation (and searchability!) of skills is important and the work you are doing with that is vital. And you’re right - sometimes the problem is not in the job seeker’s resume at all, but in the search tools that the hiring manager is using. There is plenty to work on there.
However, it remains a fact that no matter how good your resume is, or how searchable, it is extremely difficult to make more than one of the “job moves” I mentioned above in one job change. It can be done, but it’s not common. The reason is pretty clear: when you venture too far from your existing skills and reach for a huge job and skills leap, then you don’t bring enough relevancy to the employer, who is less interested in helping you make a dramatic move than in getting a benefit from your involvement from day one.
There are many pieces to a successful SAP career, perhaps I’ll get more into the process of self-marketing and the obstacles there in my next entry on this topic.
- Jon Reed -
August 2nd, 2009 at 11:19 am...
Thanks for the information. It has been interesting reading it. My problem lies around this senario, using myself as an example. I recently did a 6 week course in SAP HR. I am a Snr Support Analyst who is looking for a career change and hence took this SAP HR cousre. I have no experience and have never worked with SAP before.
my questions are:
1. how do i construct my CV to enable me to be employed
2. with any reference to experience on my CV, my feeling is that job agencies will automatically delete my CV…how do i prevent this?
3. i have been told on a cuople of occassions by people already in SAP, to exagerate my CV, i.e, mention that i have experience even though i dont. the logic being that without the mention of having experience, recruiters wont look at your CV…
August 3rd, 2009 at 4:22 am...
Hi Jon,
Having put myself ‘out there’ as a bit of an SAP expert, I’m starting find myself being asked the same sort of questions that you’re answering with this and the previous post.
Previously, I had found these question rather uncomfortable, because I didn’t even know how I had got into SAP - After reading this post, I was following your multiple job change process, without knowing it, .
I’ve also found it difficult to explain how I managed to get interesting SAP work so easily, but after reflecting on these posts, I think that it is passion for my particular field (BASIS / Netweaver technical), combined with a healthy regard for the enjoyment and fun I get out of my work - the people paying $XYZ for these wonderful toys I get to play with need to get $XYZ + 1 value in return, or I lose my toys !!!
These attributes are obviously useful on projects, especially the ‘harder ones’, and the people who have them ARE obvious (and the people possessing them are probably well known in any organization) to the people who select these teams (project leaders and so on).
BTW, I found your site very useful, and I’m passing links to this and other pages on your web site around our company.
August 6th, 2009 at 3:18 am...
hi, Jon:
You suggustion is quitely useful. I can share my experience as an example.
I started to my career as industrial engineer (IE) in a semiconductor plant 6 years ago. Then start to move
1) moved to the system IE position and handle the IE related Application
2) moved to the system manufacturing engineer postion and work on a Non SAP planning application
3) then I moved to SAP team but work on an integration project to build the connection between i2 system and SAP PP/MM module
4) after that, I worked as in-house consultant to cover the PP/MM module and then promoted to team leader.
5) Now, I am a project manager to manage the all logistic modules as well as BW.
So Jon really pointed a reasonable way for us.
Thx!
Jeff
August 7th, 2009 at 4:35 pm...
Martin, thanks for the good words.
I think it’s tricky because those like you who are now senior in SAP broke into the field when it was a little more, shall we say, “open” to new talent in some ways - though there are always ways to get into SAP with the right emerging skills.
I hope readers will make note of your comment, “I think that it is passion for my particular field (BASIS / Netweaver technical), combined with a healthy regard for the enjoyment and fun I get out of my work .” That’s a point I emphasized in the “Chase Skills Not Dollars” post that was SAP job mistake number 1. I can’t agree with you more - all the most successful SAP consultants I know have a real passion for the field and a real commitment to excellence. That really shines through in your blog, which in turns gives people a way to get to know you in the field through your ideas and skills.
- Jon
August 7th, 2009 at 5:08 pm...
Joe, thanks for your questions to my piece.
I’m not going to repeat all my advice for breaking into SAP in this comment section, I have written about that in other blog entries (click on the “breaking into SAP” category tag to read more on this), and it’s actually a pretty involved topic not easily answered in a comment.
But with that said, your questions:
1. how do i construct my CV to enable me to be employed
Customize it to the expectations of the companies you are applying for, emphasizing proven experience that will be relevant to their particular industry or project.
2. With any reference to experience on my CV, my feeling is that job agencies will automatically delete my CV…how do i prevent this?
You can’t prevent it, but many agencies do hold onto resumes because they want to keep tabs on folks who will eventually broaden their existing skills. However, it’s highly unlikely you would get your first SAP job through an agencies. Agencies are hired to find experienced sought after SAP talent. You’re better off going direct to companies wherever possible.
3. I have been told on a couple of occasions by people already in SAP, to exaggerate my CV, i.e, mention that i have experience even though i don’t. the logic being that without the mention of having experience, recruiters wont look at your CV…
Terrible advice. Again, I don’t see you getting your first SAP job through a recruiter. Referring back to my post above, I think you are skipping some steps. You need to get deeper hands on SAP implementation experience, including SAP configuration skills, before dealing with agencies.
Exaggerating experience is never a good idea - if for any reason you got caught it could taint your entire career. Remember that most companies are pretty savvy with their technical phone screens. It’s not like you can jump from a resume to getting hired. There’s at least one, usually multiple interviews in between you and a job and the tech screening will take place.
Having said that, I do think there is value in emphasizing the right kind of experience on your resume, and even quantifying that experience in a way that brings out the best in you. As you may know I wrote a book on bad resumes (Resumes from Hell), and in the process, learned a lot about making a good one. For example, I can make a waiter or waitresses’ resume look good (and have done so) by quantifying the volume of customers served and tying their performance into customer satisfaction levels. This is not falsifying but tying performance to results. I have helped another restaurant manager get a bump of 20K in salary using the same techniques.
So, there are thing you can do to present yourself in the best light. Usually by framing the relevance of your current experience rather than by asking to get your first new experience.
Good luck.
- Jon Reed
August 7th, 2009 at 5:21 pm...
Jeff -
Thanks for sharing your step by step career progression, this is exactly what I was writing about. This is something many people have trouble understanding. I clearly grasp why people want to “shoot the moon” and get everything they dreamed of in their next job, but too often it is self-defeating. I hope others take a note of your progression.
- Jon Reed -
August 17th, 2009 at 11:29 am...
Hi Jon,
I have worked as ABAP programmer for nearly 3 years. This month we have upgraded to ECC 6.0. We have PI and Solman installed but no BI/BW implementation at all, in our company. I wonder how my ABAP skills can be incorporated into BI/BW area and what is advantage (globally, not for my current position in company) of doing technical skill improvement in that direction, rather than, say XI/PI or Solman?
Thanks for great articles!
Nihad
November 16th, 2009 at 6:11 pm...
Hi Jon,
I got certified recently in SAP ABAP. Ever since I enrolled for the course I’ve been checking out for opportunities in the same, but I can only find opportunities for experienced candidates. This has put me in a state of shock. I mean, the candidates who are experienced now would have been newbies at some point in time. Does no one require inexperienced certified guys? What should be my strategy? Please help.
Nandesh Nair