Where SAP meets .NET
I have been working as a .NET developer for the last three years. Now, I want to make my career in SAP Basis or ABAP. I'm not sure this is good idea or not because I have three years on .NET.

I would like to go for certification. Will it be helpful for me to grow my career?

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If you've read my column regularly, you know that I warn folks not to put too much stock in SAP certification. It's more important to focus your time and resources on researching SAP companies and applying to relevant jobs at those companies. In the case of .NET, what you want to do is to find (and apply for) technical jobs with companies that are running SAP using a .NET platform. It may sound difficult to find those companies, and yes, it's not easy to get a list of such companies, but, if you take advantage of search engines on job boards, you should be able to type in combinations of .NET and SAP skill terms, and find some companies you can look into.

Now, as for your question about Basis or ABAP, you could really pursue either direction. Since you are a developer, you may have a better chance on the ABAP side. But at the same time, the ABAP market remains very difficult due to the impact of offshore on rates and the number of available opportunities. Basis jobs are a bit easier to come by. But, you could still find success on the SAP development side -- especially if you expand your focus from ABAP to include a range of Web-based programming tools and techniques. Those skills will help you to stay marketable inside AND outside of SAP environments.

This was first published in September 2006