Basically I am in the same predicament as the poster of Breaking into SAP from July 9, 2004. However, I am in a pre-sales position involved in daily technical IT sales and supply chain management. I have done the SD course, because although a lot of what I do is technical a lot of it is also sales. So I enjoy the business process side of my position immensely, which is why I've gone down the SD route. But, sad to say, I still cannot break into the SAP market in the UK even after asking way below my salary, just to get a nod. Should I keep pursuing my dream?

    Requires Free Membership to View

    Login

Don't give up on those dreams just yet! I can't tell from your question if you're still trying to break into SD, or if you're only looking into BW now, but whatever your target area, you're clearly having some trouble breaking into SAP. Remember that you sometimes have to be pretty creative to break into today's competitive SAP market.

Personally, the strategy of reducing your salary to break into SAP is not one I recommend. It gives companies the impression you are "bargain merchandise," and the fact is when they hire SAP talent, they have certain skills requirements they are not going to bend on, no matter how low you go.

A much better approach is to go after SAP by drawing on your strengths. So, you have to figure out what skills you have that SAP users might need. Let me throw out one possible approach: since you already have pre-sales experience, why not get a job in a pre-sales capacity for a third party software vendor that targets SAP users?

There are so many SAP enhancement tools out there, and they all have to be integrated into the SAP product in some way. You could learn a lot about SAP by taking on such a pre-sales position. The best part of that scenario is that you would be attractive to such companies because you have the pre-sales background. They might well be willing to train you to fill in the gaps. Adopting this gradual approach to breaking into SAP might take you longer, but you won't get as frustrated, and you will be able to pay your bills all along the way.

This was first published in October 2004

Join the conversationComment

Share
Comments

    Results

    Contribute to the conversation

    All fields are required. Comments will appear at the bottom of the article.
    Back to top