How do you break into a career in a niche field like SAP development. From what I see, I can learn about SAP all I want, but without professional experience, it wouldn't seem like you can get a job working with it?
Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
1–10 of 50 posts
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#2What level in your career are you at? If you're recently out of school, the easiest way I know of is to get hired into one of the big 4 consulting firms. (eg: PwC, Accenture, etc). Associates are hired with little experience - related experience is fine. If you're more senior, possibly take an "around the edges" approach - or specialize in the underlying integration technology (eg: java, etc...whatever it is). Creating a plugin or similarly deep diving if you can get into their developer / customer program. If you're wanting to go into it because of salaries - I understand that. Realize what you're getting into. The salaries may be higher - but the work may be un-relentingly boring. You might also look into competitors in the space that are more SaaS'y, and less Enterprise footprint-y.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#3What level in your career are you at? If you're recently out of school, the easiest way I know of is to get hired into one of the big 4 consulting firms. (eg: PwC, Accenture, etc). Associates are hired with little experience - related experience is fine. If you're more senior, possibly take an "around the edges" approach - or specialize in the underlying integration technology (eg: java, etc...whatever it is). Creati…
Just to nitpick: Accenture is not part of the Big4 (PWC/Deloitte/E&Y/KPMG).
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#4What level in your career are you at? If you're recently out of school, the easiest way I know of is to get hired into one of the big 4 consulting firms. (eg: PwC, Accenture, etc). Associates are hired with little experience - related experience is fine. If you're more senior, possibly take an "around the edges" approach - or specialize in the underlying integration technology (eg: java, etc...whatever it is). Creati…
Just to nitpick: Accenture is not part of the Big4 (PWC/Deloitte/E&Y/KPMG).
I think that's true. But Accenture does a lot of SAP work as far as I can tell based on experience.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#5What level in your career are you at? If you're recently out of school, the easiest way I know of is to get hired into one of the big 4 consulting firms. (eg: PwC, Accenture, etc). Associates are hired with little experience - related experience is fine. If you're more senior, possibly take an "around the edges" approach - or specialize in the underlying integration technology (eg: java, etc...whatever it is). Creati…
Just to nitpick: Accenture is not part of the Big4 (PWC/Deloitte/E&Y/KPMG).
To nitpick further (but this isn't in common parlance), Accenture was a part of Arthur Andersen, which itself was a part of the Big Five until Enron happened.
But you're entirely right in that Accenture isn't considered a part of the Big Four accounting firms precisely because its skillset is advisory rather than accounting.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#6What level in your career are you at? If you're recently out of school, the easiest way I know of is to get hired into one of the big 4 consulting firms. (eg: PwC, Accenture, etc). Associates are hired with little experience - related experience is fine. If you're more senior, possibly take an "around the edges" approach - or specialize in the underlying integration technology (eg: java, etc...whatever it is). Creati…
Just to nitpick: Accenture is not part of the Big4 (PWC/Deloitte/E&Y/KPMG).
"Big 4" used to refer to accounting firms. Accenture used to be a part of the "Big 5" with Andersen, but they had to re-brand because of the Enron scandal. They no longer do accounting.
But now all these companies are bleeding over into each others business areas - many do strategy, operations, implementation, accounting.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#7I work in that very field, so I hope this input will be useful to you:
There's no one thing called "SAP" anymore. It's many platforms, ranging from the old ERP (with its ABAP programming language) to CRM to HR to E-commerce. With the exception of its proprietary tools (like ABAP), you can certainly leverage your Java/JS skills.
If you have access to SAP training (though it's neither cheap nor easily accessible), get some training on the dev tools and find beginner-level openings in companies or consulting firms. (Reality check: the latter will be harder - you are competing with a truly global developer-base for SAP.)
If you don't have access to training, then drop the proprietary ABAP route and stick to Java. You can apply those skills in SAP's more open stacks for e-commerce, mobile etc.
The public sector (Federal/State governments, public utilities, military etc) are also big SAP users and are often hard-pressed to find US citizens (assuming you are a US citizen). That may be another avenue to explore.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#8You work for a company that uses / consults for SAP, and they either give you training or send you off to get trained. It's the same way with most of the big ERP systems.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#9if you are clever, you will probably suffer from over-corporate environment and seeing customers being milked because of vendor-lockin (aka morality, not so common feature as I would like).
if you want enterprise, high salaries and don't mind/welcome wearing a suit every day, I suggest rather JEE - backend never dies in one way or another, and it is actually a very interesting field to live in.
IMHO one merge/market crash might gradually wipe the SAP market much easier rather Java.
Re: Ask HN: How do you get into a niche field like SAP development?
#10Work for a solutions provider. Get yourself on a SAP project and ask for SAP training alongside. Work your way up. At some point you'll be senior enough to leave an get yourself lucrative contracting gigs.