The Most Common SAP ABAP Vacancies in India

ABAP programming language is not as popular as C# or Python but in terms of earnings it is much more efficient. The average annual salary of ABAP professionals in India ranges from ₹ 4.8 to 6.0 Lakhs. Most of the largest Indian companies use SAP products and are ready to invest in implementation and development. Plus the number of qualified specialists is far less than in the popular niches like mobile app development, thus it creates a niche and as you know everything niche is expensive.

In the article we examine the most common ABAP vacancies, their pros and cons for a beginner.

SAP Consultant

Flagship SAP products include ERP systems SAP R/3 and SAP S/4 HANA, SAP NetWeaver platform, the set of analytical applications SAP BI, multi-model database SAP HANA, and SAP Cloud Platform. Each product should be customized for the business processes of a definite client and that is why SAP Consultants exist. Initially such a specialist would choose a specialization (say, material flows) and study it thoroughly. At a specific project the primary task of the SAP Consultant is to present system features most favourably so a client would agree to implement it.

This can be achieved by thoroughly examining the client’s business, its place in the industry, how it operates, what the processes depend on, and how a similar SAP product works in competitors’ companies. When the picture is clear, you must comprehend how a typical SAP project is organized. Each project has its methodologies and phases and a SAP Consultant is engaged in each of them.

The list of typical SAP project phases is below:

learning client’s business and client’s expectations,
inspection,
technical design,
product customization and fine-tuning,
user training,
porting data from source systems to an SAP system.

A good SAP Consultant would have a business or IT background because the position includes the skills inherent to both spheres. One wouldn’t turn a programmer who likes to code but dislikes communicating into an SAP Consultant. On the contrary, a business analyst who gets along with clients but hates to program won’t be able to succeed in this niche either.

Successful SAP Consultant should be:

communicable,
presentable,
stress-resistant.

SAP Developer

If product customization won’t lead to expected results the team of developers would develop the necessary features. Before both front-end and back-end features were developed ин the same programmer but in recent years specialization appeared. Front-end may be implemented using Java, JS, HTML and other frameworks.

ABAP is used in SAP products exclusively, its syntax is somewhat similar to COBOL while the source code is easy to read and percept. For almost 40 years of its history ABAP incorporated many paradigms of programming – from procedural and oriented to object-oriented. ABAP programming language is still developing via the creation of new constructions and frameworks.

It’s important to understand SAP development is not related to coding from the scratch but to expanding the existing features, and implementing features expected by a client. SAP developer is somewhere in between programmer and analyst – in addition to the ability to code he/she should speak the same language with business representatives.

Processing data in SAP products is handled by the HANA platform. HANA developers are responsible for native development which this enterprise-oriented. To develop for HANA one should know the SAP environment, its tools and standards. Because of certain restrictions HANA developers should be able to find a compromise yet a creative solution that will meet the client’s requirements AND technical parameters of the system. Wipro Team Manager Narayan Singh points out it is usually hard for generic developers to get used to this way of programming, they often experience a certain shift of consciousness.

Successful SAP Developer should be:

Neat,
pedantic,
flexible,
creative,
fluent in foreign languages (mostly English and German),
team player able to listen to others,
have analytical abilities,
have quick and structured thinking,
take responsibility for decision-making.

A good SAP Developer would have Engineering or Economic Education. Knowledge of several programming languages, database basics and the ability to build SQL queries will be a major asset

There won’t be a narrow specialization, typically a developer works with an SAP Consultant which will require a knowledge of business processes.

Perspectives

In recent years SAP became more open, you can find user guides and other documentation on the net and even download and install a demo version of SAP. There are communities of SAP specialists on the net, SAP SE holds online workshops for beginners regularly. The best way is to pass a company-based course because of its cost and technical abilities.

To learn successfully one should be curious and patient, it’s critical to have a business/economic background.

As for professional growth you can start as a junior and progress as far as you are willing and able. To get more demanded and get significant bonuses to salary one should deepen the depth of knowledge of the SAP system and its implementations. Another option is to specialize as an architect and project manager – grow from development and configuration to design of the system and project management. It will require mastering the wide range of SAP products and establishing good practices in implementation.

In short, SAP specialist is a rare specialization embracing a broad array of skills and soft skills. Education will take considerable time, money and additional effort. Vacancies are quite rare in India. But SAP clients are large prestigious foreign companies and they’re ready to pay a decent salary. If that’s what you’re looking for then go ahead!