What does an SAP consultant do? What is the scope of his/her duties? What salary can I expect? Is it worth considering a change of career? We answer these key questions here.
Let us start by explaining what SAP is, in general, and where it is used. SAP is a grateful acronym for Systems Applications and Products in Data Processing. It is an integrated system, created by the German company, SAP SE, which streamlines company management. Thanks to the system’s various tools, processes in accounting, logistics, HR, and much more, can be handled. However, the system itself is not everything, as you also need a person, who can handle it.
While a junior SAP consultant is unlikely to have direct customer contact, his or her senior colleague will already be responsible for varied projects, which involve dealing with customers from different sectors. For senior SAP consultants, who are already specialists in their field, it will also be their responsibility to introduce their junior colleagues to their newly-found responsibilities.
Before you start your first job as an SAP consultant, you should already have a certain range of skills. The most important of these, include:
Of course, the mandatory skills for starting your first job as an SAP consultant can be much more, with the exact requirements being described in the job offers of individual employers.
To become an SAP consultant, a degree in technical or IT studies is welcome, but it is not a mandatory requirement, as knowledge and hard and soft skills, count above all. As in all IT professions, experience is important. Sometimes, back-end developers who know the IT industry inside out and also understand the business perspective, become SAP consultants.
How looks SAP consultants work
Job offers as an SAP consultant can be obtained from many companies. The industries that currently most desire to work with SAP consultants, are consulting, finance, accounting, and logistics.
As far as the working model is concerned, it is mostly stationary, although hybrid also happens. Unlike most IT professions, in this case, there is unlikely to be any chance of working completely remotely. Importantly, working as an SAP consultant, most often involves a willingness to travel, in order to oversee the various stages of SAP implementation on the client’s site.
Many people, who want to start their career as a SAP consultant , are primarily interested in the salary. This is not surprising, after all, as for the last few years, the IT industry has been attracting swarms of recruits, mainly due to high salaries, in an almost incomparable manner to other non-IT industries. The salary of an SAP consultant depends, of course, on his or her experience in the profession. A SAP consultant in a junior position will earn PLN 13,000-22,000 gross, the earnings of a mid-level consultant start at around PLN 17,000 gross, whilst a senior consultant in this position, can already count on a salary starting at around PLN 26,000 gross. In the case of B2B contracts, earnings range from PLN 70 per hour to PLN 350 per hour.
