Career Path to SAP Consultant

 1. What is SAP Consultant?

SAP Consultant is a person who is responsible for consulting and implementing ERP Solutions (Enterprise Resource Planning) on the basis of SAP system platform to help these solutions to promote their highest effect. In other words, SAP Consultant is the one who supports and accompanies businesses and optimizes maximum benefits of SAP ERP for clients.

Currently, most people still do not have a clear knowledge of how SAP Consultant is different when compared to Business Analyst (BA) and what tasks they undertake. In essence, BA is a general term in the IT industry to refer to a job position with roles such as Management Analyst, Systems Analyst, Data Analyst. BA's professional knowledge is based on an existing technology solution on the market or can be built by themselves.

The role of a SAP Consultant is similar to a Business System Analyst. However, instead of building a new system from scratch, SAP Consultants rely on solutions of SAP - the superior solution system in the world today. From there, they configure or customize these solutions for mapping the specific requirements of clients in order to tackle the issues faced by the business.

SAP Consultants take an important role in SAP implementation because they can support businesses in many terms:

► Consulting solutions: Consultants will find out difficulties in demand or using processes that business has not been able to solve. From there, they analyze the problems business is facing, locate the business and give appropriate advice.
► Collecting and recording the requirements of the departments: SAP Consultant works directly with business representatives, grasp the difficulties they are facing in order to have enough system configuration basis, and support the recommendation of working standardization and digitization processes to meet the needs of departments in the businesses.
► Solving problems: During the implementation process, businesses will inevitably have problems arising, unknow how to collect and store data effectively. The mission of SAP Consultant is to provide solutions to solve problems and troubleshooting for business.
► Guiding user: SAP Consultant is responsible for guiding direct users as well as data managers (admin/key users). Therefore, they can quickly become proficient in using and organizing how the system works. Users can not only implement and guide in direct, but also ask and answer directly through formal training classes, thereby capturing better software knowledge.
► Continuing to accompany business after implementation: Continuous use and development of SAP software is a long process. Therefore, after the successful implementation of the project, SAP Consultants have the duty to continue accompanying the businesses in case they need support.

2. Mission of SAP consulting and implementation team

SAP Consultants do not work independently. They tend to establish a team to ensure the work goes smoothly, meeting the needs of the business. Each factor will have its own role and task, which requires natural job understanding to complete the job with high efficiency.

An ideal SAP implementation consulting team will include two factors:

⚫  SAP Functional Consultant
SAP Functional Consultant is a person who specializes in consulting of business processes, implementations, user guides, etc. They act as a bridge, helping to ensure that the system is best adjusted and the users of the system all know the operations on the software.

According to the SAP Community Wiki, the main duties of an SAP Functional Consultant are:
- Work directly with representatives of businesses, determine the requirements and business goals of the system. Then convert them into logical and technical perspectives.
- Customize the respective business area and make sure the system responds to the project requirements.
- Establish records and preparation documents to enable other consultants to make changes or corrections in the future.
- Ensure support and training for internal users of the business.
- Support to make a list of questionnaires, functional tests to help businesses, key users and end users check and in-depth evaluation of the system.
- Support the technical staff to check the operation of the system during the go-live process.
- Evaluate and analyze the system's performance after deployment. At the same time, orient the system in the future and optimize the efficiency of SAP in the future.

⚫  SAP Technical Consultant
SAP Technical Consultant is a person who consults about technical terms in order to customize the SAP system such as: Designing reports, forms; Developing AddOns, ect. It can be seen that SAP Technical Consultant has a key role in actualizing the specific needs of the business and each department through ERP.

The main duties of an SAP Technical Consultant are:
- Meeting clients and related parties to receive information and requirements of the project. Then, determine the relevant information and data, plan the resource allocation and the process of implementing and distributing the product.
- Set up configurations for the modules to meet the needs of the business.
- Use data modeling and analysis to find the right solutions.
- Participate in the improvement and modification of existing interfaces to increase interoperability with external systems through text or XML documents.
- Work with relevant individuals and groups to instruct how to use and provide training materials.
- Ensure that the ERP ecosystem (including SAP and third-party connections) operates stably and is always available for direct or remote support after the project ends.

3. The role of SAP Consultant in project deploying phases

A professional SAP Consultant not only needs to understand the nature and role of his/her position, but also needs to clearly grasp the project implementation stages. With the specific work of consulting and implementation, SAP Consultants must participate in the project from the very first stage to ensure the progress and efficiency achieve the set goals.

► Phase I: Project preparation
During this phase, SAP Consultants need to plan the project, structure the project organization, and prepare the project infrastructure. Then, starting the project.

► Phase II: Survey, Analysis and Design
In phase 2, SAP Consultants need to use analysis and design ability to embark on research and propose possible solutions to solve problems for businesses, such as:
- General training
- Collect request
- Analysis of responsiveness
- Collect list of forms, reports, development programs, data conversion programs, system integration programs
- Design future process document

► Phase Ill: Implementing the Solution
During phase 3, SAP Consultants will embark on project implementation based on the solution which has been approved by clients, including:
- System configuration
- Build test scripts
- Develop development programs, integrated programs
- Functional testing
- Integration testing
- Prepare training materials
- Decentralized design

► Phase IV: Final Preparation
SAP Consultants in phase 4 need to conduct system testing, prepare for the official operation phase. The specific jobs are:
- Train key users
- Main user testing
- Try conversion
- Detailed transformation plan

► Phase V: Official Operation & Support
The main task of SAP Consultants in phase 5 is to put the system into official operation, evaluate its effectiveness and hand it over to clients, support them if needed. The jobs include:
- System switch
- Data collection and cleaning for operating units
- Operating system
- Operational support
- Hand over the system

4. Essential qualities to become a professional SAP Consultant

Currently, SAP is an enterprise resource planning software which is leading interest not only in Vietnam but also around the world. Therefore, the demand for human resources to consult/deploy SAP solutions is very high. Salaries for SAP Implementation Consultants are among the top in the market, with plenty of opportunity in terms of job growth, salary, quality of life and other benefits. Therefore, SAP Consultant has become a desirable profession in the eyes of many people.

However, the journey to reach the dream of being SAP Consultant has many challenges. There are two top important factors that candidates need to pay attention to become an expert in the field of SAP consulting and implementation, are: High professional qualifications and good soft skills.

► High professional qualification
SAP Certification is one of the most honorable certifications in the field of implementing and consulting software. It helps to increase the prestige and qualifications of SAP Consultant. There are 2 types of SAP certifications which are highly regarded today: SAP Certified Application Associate and SAP Certified Development Associate. The achievement of these two certifications is a testament to the qualifications of an SAP Consultant, ensuring wide career opportunities for candidates.

► Good soft skills
With the specificity of needing to work directly with customers, SAP Consultant needs to have soft skills to ensure a smoother communication process. According to the UK SAP Expert site, a SAP Consultant should have the following soft skills:
- Negotiation skills to accurately define user requirements
- Analytical skills to systematize user requirements for SAP capabilities
- Creativity and design skills
- Logical thinking ability combined with strong intuition
- Deployment skills with high accuracy
- Pedagogical skills to train users
- Organizational and teamwork skills
- The strong ability of enduring
There are also some other basic soft skills such as: Office informatics, Foreign languages, Presentation,....

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➼ In conclusion, SAP Consultant is a career with a lot of potential for development, creating attractive job opportunities suitable with the industrialized and modernized orientation of the world today. However, the journey to become an expert in the field of SAP consulting and implementation is extremely arduous, requiring candidates to be trained in a professional environment to learn and hone more professional skills.

As one of the top reputable implementation providers has been certified by SAP ERP in Vietnam as well as SAP Gold Partner with 30% market share and over 14 years of experience, CMC Consulting (Successor company of CMC Ciber) has more than 150 leading and experienced ERP consultants and successfully implemented ERP system for many businesses in the domestic and international market. That is the reason why CMC Consulting  promises to be an ideal working environment that gives candidates opportunities to learn through real projects. From that, they can successfully achieve a dream to become an expert in the field of consulting and implementation SAP.

Currently, CMC Consulting still recruits SAP Consultants with attractive salary and benefits regime to build a larger and stronger implementation consulting force. Candidates who have interest, please contact:

Hotline: 024 7106 5555- Ext: 8700
Email: hr.cmcconsulting@cmc.com.vn 
Or sending us CV here: