r2i forum

This is my New Year resolution, so I need some information from SAP guys.:))

I am thinking of taking hands on training in FICO. I am familiar with ERP basic concept but I have few questions and hope will able to get some answer.

How is the market in US (for FICO)? (e.g saturated/slow etc).
For functional consultant how much your strong domain US experience play role?
US citizenship plays role here or not much?
Fresher (in SAP) should get in via body shopper or should try independently?
Always traveling? Any perm Job? or 1099 only?
How difficult for fresher to get in this mkt without putting Christmas decoration in his resume?:)

Ok now what other questions I am missing.:e What else I should look for?

TIA

Domain experience plays a vital role in competency of an average functional consultants. Most of the technical consultants eventually graduate to become techo-functional to pure functional consultants as thats where most of the jobs are but the best functional consultants that I have met are those who have prior work experience in specific industry in some business role.

US citizenship will play a major role as you may have to do small consultancy gigs to gain experience. Freshers should always get via a hiring firm. It will be hard to get a footing in the market otherwise unless you have good personal contacts. Initially keep yourself open to travel. Once you have gain experience you can look for local permanent position. SAP projects are resource intensive and mostly local to the company so functional consultants have to travel to the location to interact with business users.

Its not difficult for a fresher to get a foothold in the market if one is using the right firm and economy is doing good. But its hard to built the expertise quickly. ERP are complex beasts and individual competency will eventually depend completely on type (nature/size) of projects one has been part of during his experience. Thats the reason people value end to end project experience (large end to end SAP implementations).

FICO consultants will also have more oppotunities on the SAP Audit side (big-4 type firms).

First of all Thank you:emrose:

[QUOTE]Domain experience plays a vital role in competency of an average functional consultants. Most of the technical consultants eventually graduate to become techo-functional to pure functional consultants as thats where most of the jobs are but the best functional consultants that I have met are those who have prior work experience in specific industry in some business role. If I understand correctly you can sell yourself better if you have good business/operational knowledge of your area. For e.g. in my case when I quickly looked FICO modules I found nothing new because I work in this area for various large corporation from long time and very much familiar with all concepts and also aware of what kind hiccups we end user face in operations.

[QUOTE]US citizenship will play a major role as you may have to do small consultancy gigs to gain experience. I did not understand this statement, citizenship play major +/- role.

[QUOTE]Freshers should always get via a hiring firm. It will be hard to get a footing in the market otherwise unless you have good personal contacts.Sorry I am non IT guy so this may be basic question. But what you saying is that one should use any middleman/layers to get first project and then try to look for something concrete.
[QUOTE]

FICO consultants will also have more oppotunities on the SAP Audit side (big-4 type firms).
Good to know this, I was not aware of that.


Ahirman

Thank you very much for your detail post. This post cleared my doubts, also gave me some confidence. Its good to know in-out from someone who has hands-on experience.

At present I have stable but boring job so before I jump to another job my idea is to get training in SAP and then try to market myself with US education-US functional experience. Well time will tell how much functional knowledge will helps you in interview and probably job.

Thanks a lot!

Yes you can sell yourself better if you can engage the business side better which is what a functional consultant is usually tasked to do in a SAP project. There is no better way of doing that if you have been on both side of the table. As I said earlier some of the best consultants that I have worked with came from some of these corporations where they were performing a related business role. The connection and resulting value is big differentiator vis-a-vis a experienced technical consultant who is planning to move to techno-functional or functional role as part of normal career progression.

Its easier to get a consultancy gig in IT if you are USC as most of the competition will be from consultants on H-1B visa which has all sort of restrictions. The first gig will be through a middleman..thats almost given as most of the IT organizations dont hire consultants from market directly but go through established vendors (middle mans) for short term staffing.

Lastly for firms that have SAP implemented in a big way, SAP audits are integral part of the financial audit. This is the big-4 part. Moreover all big-4s have large SAP implementation practice.

I was considering getting trained on SAP here in India for a career switch . Would like a some suggestions in that regard.

My Background:

I've 10 years of experience in Java with strong Sybase skills. Have worked on Business Objects too. I was in Investment Banking division of my firm previously.

Based on the above profile, let me know if SAP ABAP or SAP BI should be the one I should opt for.

Lakshya,

Hope you don't faint hearing this :). I enquired with NIIT Chennai. SAP ABAP with certification was 3.5 lacs (3.36 lacs to be precise) for Instructor led training (full time for 25 working days, 9AM to 6PM) and the online training 2.1 lakhs . SAP BI (only available online) was 3.2 lacs :).

If one were to train themselves in a specific module, I would suggest SAP MII Manufacturing Integration and Intelligence) http://www.sap.com/solutions/manufacturing/manufacturing-intelligence-software/index.epx
In my integration bootcamp last week, I was told that there's only one company in the US that does work on the MII side of thing. With more emphasis being given to the tracking of the processes and yield control, I would say that this module will gain its prominence very soon.

If you are interested in a more generic business process knowledge, try out the APICS certification. I'm not sure if there is a dearth of APICS certified business consultants in India. You may have to check on that.

farfromhome;364188Lakshya,

Hope you don't faint hearing this :). I enquired with NIIT Chennai. SAP ABAP with certification was 3.5 lacs (3.36 lacs to be precise) for Instructor led training (full time for 25 working days, 9AM to 6PM) and the online training 2.1 lakhs . SAP BI (only available online) was 3.2 lacs :).

Tell me about that?. Everyone wants to be a rich overnight. They will find so many bakara. I am surfing various SAP forum now days. I see Indian fresh kids with 2,3,4 diploma +Certificate +degree wants to get into this field, and I am sure that could be reason these institute charge crazy price. This is my first hands on experience with IT/Indians in job market. I am learning a lot here.:( Somehow i feel that ethic comes very last in their dictionary. First get the job and then we will figure out how to survive on project.

Well I just attend one demo class in USA, and instructor who is CA from India and doing SAP for last 8 years in USA. I must say he was horrible. He was not able to communicate at all. Though I have domain experience, still I had hard time to understand what he was talking. And when I asked basic accounting question, he had no clue how you do that in SAP! His answer was SAP FI/CO is an Ocean, so you will not know everything, but don?t worry I have all notes and PDF files so we can find out that. Now this guy is on project from 8+ years in USA as a functional consultant!! :angry:

I am wondering what actual functional consultant do on Job? I am sure fico consultant must be dealing with Controller-Director of Finance or end user in Finance. How do they able to survive??

All is well, Lakshya all is well?:))

PeterGriffin;364203If one were to train themselves in a specific module, I would suggest SAP MII Manufacturing Integration and Intelligence) http://www.sap.com/solutions/manufacturing/manufacturing-intelligence-software/index.epx
In my integration bootcamp last week, I was told that there's only one company in the US that does work on the MII side of thing. With more emphasis being given to the tracking of the processes and yield control, I would say that this module will gain its prominence very soon.

If you are interested in a more generic business process knowledge, try out the APICS certification. I'm not sure if there is a dearth of APICS certified business consultants in India. You may have to check on that.

PG, How about SAP Security? Any scope in the US or in India? Thinking of switching my career.

I feel good that I found this thread.I would like to hear suggestions from my favorite forum.I will bare out facts and hopefully get some inputs from users

Ok.I am an Engg grad in Computer Science and jaywalked into doing an MBA without thinking much.Dilly dallied with MBA job and got back to govt job in IT.Worked for 5 years and then headed to US.
Been working and worked solely on Unix/C/C++ in Telecom domain with large applications.
I dont see much future for this kind of work and I dont have much flair for programming.Was kind of doing project management for the past 2 years but as a contractor.
Now I quit and am revisiting my priorities on what I want to be.
If I have to be in IT(I dont think I am good at it,alternatively I dont think I am good at something else too) why stick to that vi screen and get a low hourly rate.. Why not move to something which pays better
But may be,I am late in the game
SAP is something I have broadly decided would be a good choice..but i dont have a single person I know who ever was associated with SAP.
Planning to take sabbatical ..visit India and get trained in India and come back by the end of the year and explore openings in US.thats the general plan.
Is it stupid to get into SAP and try getting a job after training without much functional experience?Since its clean slate what are the bext modules to look at
Alternatively are there any new technologies that seem to look good for future?

Please advice..appreciate all your inputs.I am planning to travel to India in a week or so and look at training centers in Hyd or Benguluru

Unix / C++ is a good skill to have, atleast in the trading domain. I always see high paying jobs for those skill set in the trading / financial domain. Though, many of the companies require financial background, if you find the right recruiter Its not impossible to get in.