SAP Career Questions for B2B Workforce, July 2007 edition Does SAP certification matter? JR: This is an excellent question, and also a pretty complicated one. The importance of SAP certification varies based on a couple of factors: the experience level of the consultant and the level of demand for a particular skill set. Let's look at each of these issues. To get a handle on how SAP certification works in the SAP market, it's good to understand that SAP consulting is not driven by certification the way some other software and hardware markets are. Want evidence? Just look at the SAP positions on the b2bworkforce.com web site. I doubt any of them list certification as a "must have." Some may list certification as a "nice to have." Think of certification as a tie-breaker. If a hiring manager is considering two equally qualified SAP consultants, then, all things being equal, the consultant who is certified might have a bit of an edge. But all things are rarely equal, and other considerations like communication skills and relevant degrees and security clearances might come into play as "tie-breakers" also. But if you take the case of an SD consultant with five years of experience who is not certified, or an SD consultant who has six months of experience and *is* certified, the five year SD consultant is going to get the job offer at least 90 percent of the time (unless there is some other issue, such as budget limitations, that would dictate the need for a junior level person). So when can certification become more of a factor? When there is an area of SAP that is so new, or has so much demand, that there aren't enough experienced consultants. Consider the scenario of an SAP Financials job opening. The hiring manager is looking for someone who has experience configuring the new General Ledger in mySAP ERP 2005 (now called ERP 6.0). But the manager can't find a senior consultant who has that skill under their belt, since so few 6.0 projects have been completed. So, the choice comes down to a three year SAP FI/CO consultant with no 6.0 exposure, and a six month FI/CO person who is certified in Financials 6.0. In this case, despite having significantly less hands-on experience, certification might help the "junior" consultant land this position. For the most part, certification is not enough to get you a job in SAP. Hands-on project skills are a lot more important. But lately, because of the amount of consulting demand we are seeing, I do hear of occasional cases where a "certification-only" SAP consultant has landed a pretty good gig right out of the gate. It's not common, but it does happen. Of the two cases I ran into, one was in SAP Financials and one in SAP CRM. The arguably unfair aspect of SAP certification is that it seems to help established SAP consultants more than it does folks who are trying to break into the field for the first time. I find that certification can definitely help an experienced SAP consultant break into a new area of SAP. Take a real-life example: I worked with an SAP CO-PA consultant who wanted to move into BW and SEM. He got a BW certification, and it took a while, but eventually he was working on a CO-PA project that involved some BW-related work also. Because he had proven himself to this client already, and because his certification and BW classroom know-how gave him a head start on BW, he was pulled onto the BW part of this project. Over time, he continued to build on his BW and SEM expertise, and he was able to do this while being paid as an independent consultant. To utilize this strategy, it's important to pick a certification that extends beyond your current skills but also touches on your pre-existing expertise. Getting paid to learn is the best possible situation. It's not easy to pull off, but SAP certification can sometimes help to make this happen. So to give a final answer to your question: yes, SAP certification does matter, but not as much as many people think. And when certification does come into play, it often helps experienced consultants more than it does new ones. Question: Hi Jon, I am 25 years old with Masters degree in Manufacturing Engineering. I have three years of experience in manufacturing. If I learn SAP MM or any other modules related to manufacturing would I have any advantage over other non-engineers. And what is the pay scale if I go out and try to get a job in SAP with three years of Core Manufacturing Experience? JR: Here's the good news: I do think that when you have relevant industry experience in the area of SAP you are specializing in, you have a so-called "advantage" over consultants that lack that industry experience. This is true now more than ever, as more and more SAP customers are making it clear that they want consultants who know the "best practices" in their industry and not just how to configure some tables. So yes, you would have an edge in MM over those who don't have the manufacturing background. That's the good news for your situation. The not-so-great news: though you would have an advantage over those who don't have your industry background, you would have a disadvantage against senior SAP MM consultants who have three, five, or even ten years of MM implementation experience. Your industry background doesn't really help you when your resume goes head-to-head against those kinds of experts. Learning the MM module might be your best way into SAP, but even with a hot consulting market, there's no guarantee you would get into SAP easily. If you look at the SAP job listings from the clients on the B2B Workforce job page, you'll see that they all require significant SAP experience. However, you might be able to get a job working full time as an end-user for a company running on SAP. That's where your overall manufacturing and engineering background might help you to land an SAP-related role, and you could move further into SAP from there. As for the pay scale, if I were you, I would focus more on breaking into SAP and worry about the pay scale issues once you have more SAP experience under your belt. I find that when you're moving into a new field, you want to be flexible on the money side and be open to the opportunities you are given without as much regard to the salary. Once you have proven yourself and have an SAP track record, you can look more at the pay issues and get the salary appropriate to your SAP experience. One final thing about pay scale: it really varies based on the type of position. The kind of role I recommended for you, which is a salaried employee role as an SAP end-user, is probably going to be determined based on the pay rates of the companies you apply to. Those pay rates are influenced by the cost of living in that region. Typically, companies base their salaries on management tier levels, so your level of management experience would also have a major influence on your pay scale. I hope this answer clarified some your options. Ask the SAP Career Expert Archive