Want to Hire the Right SAP Consultant? Here’s How.

Do you know the difference between SAP functional and SAP technical consultants? Find out the best practices on how to hire the right consultant for your next SAP transformation project.

There are many factors to ensure your next SAP project succeeds, but these factors stem from hiring the right SAP consultant who best fits your business needs. It can be daunting to figure out how to find and choose the best SAP consultant! Fortunately for you, we’ve compiled all the tips you need to know to narrow the field of potential candidates.

Understand the role of an SAP consultant to maximize project success.

Even before looking for the right SAP consultant, you need a good understanding of what an SAP consultant can do for you. Their primary duties and responsibilities are to:

• Design and implement SAP solution(s): SAP software must be configured to fit your business needs. It’s not a one-size-fits-all situation and, therefore, requires the SAP consultant to tailor a custom solution that addresses your business pain points and takes into consideration your industry best practices.
• Improve the current SAP solution(s): Your end-users can encounter issues and challenges after the implementation of the SAP software. Your SAP consultant can identify the root cause of those issues to propose solutions that will improve your operations.

With this understanding of an SAP consultant’s role, you are ready to choose the right consultant that will best suit your needs!

Understand the difference between SAP functional and SAP technical consultants.

SAP offers software and technology that can take your company to the next level. Since choosing the right software and implementing it is difficult, businesses tend to hire SAP consultants to streamline and ensure an efficient project. An SAP consultant is generally sorted into two categories:

• SAP Functional Consultants: They are experts in particular areas of business processes. Functional consultants tend to interact with the clients the most to prepare business case documents, and then communicate the client’s requirements to the technical consultants for implementation. They should be able to understand both the business side and the SAP side of your business needs and know how to achieve that.
• SAP Technical Consultants: They are the programmers who will write translate the business case documents into code that will meet your company’s needs and requirements. SAP uses its own development code called ABAP (Advanced Business Application Programming).

These two roles tend to merge and overlap. Nowadays, companies are looking for consultants that understand both the functional and the technical aspects of SAP to hire for their implementation projects.

Create a list of your needs that SAP solutions can fulfill.

Like creating any business case, your company needs to identify the business pain points and the areas of improvement. You don’t need to figure out the specific solutions and specifications you think you may need. Your SAP consultant is there to turn your requirements into reliable and effective working solutions. Here are some general examples of business requirements:

• Reduce entry errors and redundancy
• Eliminate the dependency on paperwork
• Optimize employee processes and operations
• Improve customer satisfaction

Once you have your list of business requirements, you can then search and vet through SAP consultants with the right skillset.

Identify and research qualified SAP consultants for your project.

Job portals and websites may be the first location to find qualified SAP consultants, but there are more avenues than you’re aware of! It’s important to make and utilize your SAP connections. Here are some networks you can find the right SAP consultant:

• Your personal connections
• Your company’s connections
• ASUG community
• SAP Press publication authors
• SAP Mentors
• Industry experts and analysts
• LinkedIn groups
• SAP Community

Use all these ways to identify the possible SAP consultants, but make sure to do your research on their qualifications. It’s important to review their testimonials, client portfolio, and case studies if they provide it. If you’re receiving resumes, double-check their experience and skills with your requirements. Hiring an SAP consultant for your project requires experience in translating business needs to SAP language, and vice versa. Doing your research will help narrow down the candidate pool to then interview for hire.

Assess and verify SAP consultants for your company’s best fit.

During your interview with potential candidates for your company’s SAP project, there are a few things to assess and verify:

• Experience in SAP solution implementation
• Level and understanding of SAP technical skills
• Communication skills of both business and SAP language
• Cultural fit to ensure successful collaboration with existing team members and processes

After vetting through resumes, it’s crucial to test if their knowledge and skills match up with the claims they’ve made on paper. Ensure the SAP consultant you’ll hire will be a valuable team member in your SAP project. 

Finding the right SAP consultant for your company requires some extra work to ensure that your SAP implementation will be smooth and successful. To best maximize your collaboration with an SAP consultant, you must understand what the role offers and the difference between the major categories of SAP consulting. Then, compile a list of your company’s business needs for software in order to hire the right SAP consultant for you. Now you can finally look for consultants! Use trusted and available networks to identify potential SAP consultants. Finally, and most importantly, verify the best SAP consultant who will fulfill your requirements based on experience, skills, and cultural fit.

Good luck!