For this SearchSAP.com feature, I have pulled together the SAP market outlooks of two respected professionals from B2B Workforce, Brad Elster and Ray Kelly.

Brad is the Vice President of Sales and Ray is the Vice President - B2B Solution Center for B2B Workforce. Currently, B2B Workforce, one of four SAP Premier Partners, has more than 250 SAP Professionals actively working on SAP project engagements, so Brad and Ray know firsthand about the skills you need to get action in today's SAP market.

Why is SAP Consulting Demand as High as It's Been in Years?

Before looking at the demand for particular SAP skills, it's a good idea to identify the forces that are driving the overall market. Ray Kelly sees three factors driving SAP consulting demand: SAP software license sales, major technology changes (related to new product versions and upgrades), as well as new product introductions, either internally or through acquisition. And, as Ray points out, "The last three years for SAP have seen unprecedented growth in all three categories."

Ray spelled out how these market factors are impacting us: "SAP license sales are higher than ever - with 2007 as another record year for license sales growth. As business process automation moves into the SOA era, SAP has introduced newer versions of their technology platform (NetWeaver 2004/s/7.0/7.1) and ECC, all capable of running dual stack environments (ABAP and Java) which easily support new product introductions."

What are The Areas of Greatest SAP Consulting Demand?

Brad Elster has this to say about SAP consulting needs in 2008: "The landscape of SAP skill-sets that are most in demand is ever-changing; however from the tone at FKOM and my contact with our clients, I foresee high demand for NetWeaver, BW, Enterprise Portal, and HCM in the coming year. There is also likely to be a strong need for core ERP skills like FI, MM and PP."

Ray Kelly spelled out three areas of SAP skills demand for 2008. First, he also continues to see demand in the core SAP ERP areas, such as FI/CO, SD, MM, PP, and HCM (formerly SAP HR). However, as Ray points out, "ECC experience is mandatory, so if you are behind in your training now is the time to ‘take the leap' and earn those extra dollars. Of those traditional ERP skills, we see the highest demand for HCM skilled resources or consultants with upgrade experience. Traditional ERP skills combined with upgrade experience will put you in a premium class, earning you a higher rate."

Ray and Brad are looking for resumes with "ECC" ERP skills. For anyone who isn't clear, the "ECC" is what SAP now calls the Enterprise Core Components. Starting with the ERP 5.0 release, and continuing with ERP 6.0, what we used to call "R/3" in terms of the core modules is now referred to as ECC. Now that SAP is emphasizing ERP 6.0 as the "go-to release," what you are really shooting for is exposure to ECC 6.0. ECC 5.0 also looks nice on the resume, but it's all about ERP 6.0 from this point forward. If these terminology changes make you a little dizzy, you're not alone, but ERP 6.0 should remain the standard SAP release through at least 2010.

The next area of demand Ray foresees relates to the technical innovations of the eSOA-enabled NetWeaver technology platform. Ray points out that SAP actually began to introduce major changes to their underlying architecture in 2004, with the release of NetWeaver 2004s (the technical underpinnings of ECC 5.0).

But it's not enough to focus on "getting NetWeaver experience." NetWeaver is actually a broader term for a number of components. We asked Ray which areas of NetWeaver had the greatest level of demand currently: "We see extremely high demand for NetWeaver Architects, NetWeaver Basis (BI and Portal) and NetWeaver Developers (BI and Portal), all of whom must be skilled in the latest versions of the NetWeaver Platform (2004s, 7.0, 7.1)," said Kelly.

"Achieving a NetWeaver Upgrade certification offered by SAP America will put you at the top of the class," he continued. "At minimum, most customers will perform a technical upgrade (not introducing any additional functionality) of ERP (to ECC) and/or the NetWeaver Portal/BI platforms. Over the course of the three day FKOM event, we were told a number of times that SAP's internal bench is drained of these resources."

The third area of demand that Ray sees is also related to upgrade trends. As SAP customers upgrade to the latest NetWeaver releases, they look to SAP's SOA capabilities, now called Enterprise SOA (eSOA for short), to leverage the technical investment they have made. As Ray points out, the latest SAP upgrade wave is really driven by two other factors, SOA and business process transparency. "SAP has dramatically changed the integration layer of their platform to support SOA enabled business processes, which will primarily consist of one or more business functions spanning across multiple technology landscapes."

Given this emphasis on integrated business processes (which SAP trumpets as the "Business Process Platform"), two new product areas within NetWeaver that Ray sees as especially significant are PI (Process Integration, formerly XI), and MDM (Master Data Management. I asked Ray to say more about how PI (formerly XI) and MDM fit into the eSOA platform. "In terms of PI/XI and MDM, think of those components as ‘repositories' which provide SOA enablement to seamlessly take place at the business process level," said Kelly. "The technical infrastructure for Web services (primarily Java-enabled) is the NetWeaver Platform in a nutshell."

So how does this lead to consulting demand? "Unfortunately for customers, but good for consultants, the PI/XI and MDM ‘rules of engagement' have not been shared in the public domain," said Kelly. "Getting the most out of NetWeaver is nowhere near as easy as how our PC works today when we plug in our iPods or BlackBerries." And that's where the consulting demand comes in! As Ray points out, there's a lot of rolling-up-the-sleeves work involved here: "We will need to build these rules of engagement, individually by company and for each disparate system platform within each company that supports their business processes."

Ray boiled it down simply: "Go re-tool yourself on PI/XI and MDM; they are here to stay and will be mandatory for all of SAP's current and future new product introductions."

Tips on Keeping Your Skills Marketable

So what should SAP professionals do to keep their skills marketable? Ray Kelly sees opportunities in the NPI ("new product introduction") space, especially in areas where SAP may be tying in third party acquisitions such as Business Objects. More than ever before, SAP has focused on purchasing best-of-breed products to further its market growth and expand its functionality, and savvy SAP consultants can position themselves nicely in these new "crossover" areas.

As Ray puts it, "Get a Crossover (not the vehicle!). Not all of SAP's NPIs will be fruitful (some will be a dud, others will have small markets), but getting yourself tooled in crossover NPI's should provide substantial earning increases. If you are BI/BW skilled, go learn Business Objects, if you are PS skilled, go learn xRPM, and if you are SEM skilled, go learn Outlook Soft. Those three are, and will be, in high demand by mid-to-late 2008 - if not sooner. At FKOM, time and time again, we heard increased license sales in this arena are mandatory to support SAP's 2008 growth plans."

Ray also emphasized the value of industry focus: "Learn a specific industry," said Ray. "The time has long passed when a Consumer Goods client will accept an FI/CO consultant who only worked on manufacturing clients. Restructure your resume to show specific industry experience gained. Our clients are consistently asking us to not only align the SAP function, but to bring industry-skilled resources to bear."

Brad Elster had an important piece of advice for consultants of all SAP disciplines: don't play hardball with rates. "My number one tip to SAP consultants is this: in order to stay current in today's SAP marketplace you have to stay flexible with your rate," said Elster. "For example, even with an excellent track record, if your most recent experience is on version 4.7, you will have trouble getting work on an ECC 5.0 or 6.0 implementation without some rate flexibility. We are much more successful in placing consultants on implementations of the latest SAP software and helping them get that cutting-edge career growth experience when they have some rate flexibility."

Last but not least, Ray and Brad both noted the importance of Solution Manager. You can't run from this tool; virtually all SAP skill areas now tie into Solution Manager in one way or the other. SAP is positioning Solution Manager as a key component for managing your upgrade, building out your eSOA projects, and optimizing your SAP environment. There are consulting opportunities in all of three of these areas for those with Solution Manager exposure.

The Market Outlook is Good - but Economics Matter

The SAP consulting outlook for 2008 is looking fairly promising as of this writing, but Ray advises us to monitor the "macro-economic" factors that can influence SAP project spending. Brad Elster agrees, but he doesn't think the current economic slowdown will significantly impact the level of skills demand noted in this article.

However, in the event of a bigger economic downturn, we will see IT budget cutbacks that will, in turn, affect SAP project activity. That's why it's always a good idea to combine a core, "bread-and-butter" skill with an emerging SAP area. The emerging skill will provide the best rates when the market is hot, and the core skill, hopefully located in a mature area of the SAP product line, will provide more security when project managers get a little gun shy in their spending.

As of this writing, signs point to a strong 2008 consulting market for those who are able to capitalize on the SAP growth areas Brad and Ray have highlighted. While at FKOM, Ray and Brad got the ultimate proof of skills demand: firsthand reports on how the major systems integrators are dealing with the level of work they are getting. As a rule, when the big Tier One firms are tearing their hair out over how they are going to staff their projects, that's good news for the market as whole.

Fortunately, that seems to be the case currently. "The Top three systems integrators all mentioned a heavy pipeline, sold work with unoccupied seats, and a willingness to hire at a capacity that equals demand. Implementation work typically lags eight to twelve months behind license sales. When you take into account that 2007 SAP license sales were at an all time high, you know you have a healthy market."

The SAP market is not unlike a Hollywood cliffhanger, and there are plenty of plot twists to come. But with the skills map provided by Ray Kelly and Brad Elster, we should be well prepared for whatever the market brings us in 2008.

Brad Elster is the Vice President of Sales for B2B Workforce. He has been working in the SAP field since 1997.

Ray Kelly is the Vice President - B2B Workforce Solution Center. He has been working in the SAP field since 1995.

Jon Reed is an independent SAP analyst who writes on SAP consulting trends. Jon is the President of JonERP.com (http://www.JonERP.com), an interactive web site that features Jon's take on SAP career trends.  Jon is also the author of the SAP Consultant Handbook, and he serves as the career expert for SearchSAP's "Ask the Expert" panel

Site Manager's Note: This article originally appeared on SearchSAP.com in an edited and abridged format. What you have just read is the complete and unabridged version, released for the first time for readers of JonERP.com.

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