SAP_Certification

[Former Member]

Hi All

The information which I am going to share is neither a question nor an answer but it is an important information about the value of the certifcation especially for those who wanted to do certification without any sponsership and with no SAP work experince.

Dear friends

SAP certification has a value when you have some experience under your name. If you have no experience and still your certified with good percentage & with comm skills also you will not be preffered in most of the cases.

So what all I can tell you is getting a job with only certification is almost impossible. Hence do not dare to do certification without experience and without sponsership.From my practical experience I can say only one thing i.e., WITHOUT EXPERINCE SAP CERTIFICATION IS USELESS, WORTHLESS AND HOPELESS

From

SAP CERTIFICATION VICTIM.

[jurjen_heeck]

I'd say relying on certification alone is a problem.

It does give you a good start in getting experience but I'm afraid you'll only be treated slightly different than freshers who have taken some courses but aren't certified.

Don't think of yourself as a victim but as someone who has shown to be willing to invest in their futire. Employers do appreciate that!

[Former Member]

I Really appreciate your positive thinking but do you how much SAP certification costs in INDIA it costs three lakhs change so my friend my question is that event after spending three lakhs if you not getting atleast an interview call then what is the use of sepnding such an amount .

As you said employeers will show interest, let me telll you friend there has been some bitter experiences in my SAP life in which few of employeers has literally told me that certification has no value now and they asked me why did do it. Employeers show interest only on the experience consultants even though there experince is not genuine. Among my friends I was the only one certified and the other guys have claimed experience and they are well settled now . you know they are asking me also to do the same thing . The same companies which have not given me an oppurtunity to prove my self have recruited them . Like this I have many bitttttttttter exp. So know I want to make people aware of true value of SAP CERTIFICATION. so that there cannot be a victims like me. for the SAP certiication victims neither SAP INDIA provides the oppurtunity nor the Education partner.

[Former Member]

>

Hi

I am sorry to hear the whole episode,but I am not sure if your timing of taking the certification was right in the first place,2009 as a whole was not really good for SAP job market..only guys with experience had some opportunities coming there way. It is just that you did certification during a time when companies closed their doors for new recruitment as they were not sure of the projects.

But, dont loose hope....and keep learning new stuff, I am sure the market situation is going to improve and If not MNCs,there are small to medium size consulting firms which will recruit freshers, you will need lot of patience and determination to grab that first job,some get lucky,and some dont.

All The Best.!!!

Vishwa.

[Former Member]

I totally agree with this, in my country taking the SAP Certification by yourself costs 4 times what an average worker earns per month and it is imposible for somebody earning this salary to collect enough to be able to pay for the Certification. Then comes the problem that companies don´t care if you have or not a SAP Certification but the experience you have.

But SAP Partners employees must be certified, even if clients don´t care about it so the load imposed in this consulting companies is huge and it is not rewarded unless they certifiy experienced people only so freshers don´t have any chance to get hired. I work for a SAP Partner and my boss told me that I must get some e-learning courses because SAP is imposing this even if most e-learning courses costs about 800 dollars each and last only 3 or 4 hours!. 800 Dollars in some countries are not much but in countries like where I live is almost 1 month salary.

So what is the advantage on being SAP Certified? as far as I know this is just a promise of getting a job in less time or that you will earn a little more than a fresher with little experience but of course this is like one of those tv comercials telling you that you will lose 30 pounds of weight in a week, it is just simply not true.

I tell people that if they have the chance to get certification from a Partner to do it but if they want to pay for it that forget the idea and try to get experience.

[Former Member]

Hi,

I work for a SAP customer company and I can tell that we could not care less about whether the external consultants we hire are certified or not.

The certification is the guarantee that you have been able to answer multiple choice questions.

That is not what we ask people working for us to do...

Certification is just a way that Software vendors found out to make money.

Of course this is just my personal opinion from my experience of working with certifed or not certified SAP professionals

Olivier

[matt]

I am not certified in any SAP discipline. It has never been an issue. ( Though IIRC, some of the SAP partnership options require a certain number of certified consultants).

As a hiring manager, it would only have made a difference for recruiting freshers, which I never did. That's not to say certification is a waste of time. If I send my staff on a few courses, and then they get the certification, at least I know they've paid attention!

I'm pretty sure there was a blog about this a while ago...

What concerns me more is if SAP training leading to certification is being sold as a route to getting a SAP job. Since certification first came in, to my knowledge, that has never been the case. If training is being sold in that way, it is an absolute scandal, and I think the term "victim" is appropriate. Of course... you must always take into account self-delusion, and not checking things out.

So, to the original poster. Were you told it was a sure fire way to getting a SAP job? Who told you? What did your contract with the training company say?

[matt]

>

> But SAP Partners employees must be certified,...

If that's the case, then as a business manager, responsible for dealing with suppliers, I'd steer clear of SAP partners, as they're missing out on a huge pool of non-certified talent. Or maybe they use freelancers for the difficult stuff

[Former Member]

Hello Matt,

Not sure elsewhere but in India its quite well advertised that if you get a certification, getting a job is for sure. Many institutes claim this. I have personally known many such victims who pay lots of money as a fresher, get some basic training for about a month or so and make them write the certification exam with the false hope that once you clear the certification, the job will be ready.

What many of them do is, as Praveen pointed, just show up a fake experience with the certification, get a job and carry on with it. Atleast from now those who are in this false notion, should realise that they are being cheated.

Vikranth

[Former Member]

That's exactly what those partners usually do, if something difficult shows up, then a Freelance consultant is contacted and they work on that stuff.

I know more than 10 people that have taken the Certification course and after getting their certificacion paper, they haven't been able to get involved in any decent job or project so they eventually stops seeking and look for different areas or some others that pass the Certification Exam but when they were assigned to a client they did not last one week, they just where good students but bad Consultants.

It is difficult to belive but like some one else already mentioned already, looks like SAP is trying to keep the profit using SAP education for marketing something that is not a real benefit.

[Former Member]

I am sure the intention is to raise the bar of the minimum skills required to actually work on an SAP project or systems, to improve the quality of implementations... and not be a barrier to work for those who do make the investment.

Of course out here in the wild things are different. There are sharks around who will lure you into bad investments or others who might consider you overqualified (and too expensive) if you have it, particularly once you have sent them your CV and rate, but they have another fresher available who will work for half the rate or less, leaving more margin for them...

It is some sort of a comfort zone for those who are not even able to interview you on the subject matter IMO.

For example, I give the security related training courses (ADM940, 950, 960, IdM, GRC) for SAP in Zurich and Walldorf, which are "needed" for the SAP security certifications, but have not actually done the certification myself. As I know the questions, this seems a bit silly to me...

However when I tell this to some customers and the odd recruiter when they offer some consulting which looks interesting and request Certification as a condition... then it sometimes does not impress them.

They want the certificate because they have to fill out some form!

Perhaps I should consider this a blessing in disguise...

[Former Member]

Hi

I do understand that we have different view points about this topic. I have mine.

I got certified in Sept 2009 and am now working with a 90,000 employee strength company.

Frankly, it is the right approach that we should carry and not the Certification tag, when we appear and apply for interviews.

I do understand about the'cost' hyperbole. But take it as an investment, rather.

There are endless opportunities in SAP if you hit the right nail at the right time. Recession was just ane excuse most of my other SAP friends took help of, when they were unemployed.

To make things interesting (or not), I am a fresh MBA grad without any work experience whatsoever!

Cheers!

[former_member184657]

>

> Not sure elsewhere but in India its quite well advertised that if you get a certification, getting a job is for sure. 

Beg to disagree with that. Back in 2006 when I was seriously considering a career in SAP, I made enquiries with SIEMENS and I was made to understand that completing a course does not guarantee a job. They will however provide job assistance, meaning fix up interviews for you. Its your prerogative to ace the interview. It was through these enquiries that I had decided - back in 2006 - to not go for certification.

If this was the situation in 2006, then I can only imagine the condition to have worsened over the past 3 years. Investing such a huge amount of money requires a lot of thinking and weighing the pros and cons. Its the duty of every individual to look into all aspects before he puts his money into anything.

Having said that, I feel its a pity that SAP Training Institutes charge such a substantial amount for its course which does not guarantee a job. I feel its time for a reassesment of its training strategy.

pk

[Former Member]

Yes I agree that I could have gathered more information on SAP certification but my intention in posting a message is just to make people think 100 times before going to take a certification and I don't want to see another victim like me. To be frank my financial status is not that good take a cetification but I still took a dare decision just to get break in SAP without any fake experince. But know I realise that I have definitely commited a big mistake of my life.

[former_member184657]

Do not lose hope. It is not the end of the road. SAP jobs are hard to come by. Just keep trying and some day your efforts will be rewarded. Some people get lucky and land up a job - by hook or by crook. Do not depair looking at them. We all have gone through these difficult times.

Start looking for smaller start-up companies and get ready to accept what peanuts - read salary - they give and gain that all important "experience".

Good Luck and chin up soldier!!!

pk