Dear Alexis,
I am an engineer working in Saudi Arabia. I am from India. I have 8 years of oracle SQL, PL/SQL, Oracle Forms and Reports programming experience. I am certified in Oracle Forms and Reports programming, certified in Oracle Database Administration and certified in Java programming.
I am not satisfied with the salary I am getting as an Oracle programmer and I would like to switch my working platform to ERP. I have studied your book ERP Demystified and it helped me a lot to understand the concepts.
Further, I am in need of your valuable consultation in choosing the correct line of study, which will help me to earn more money. Please suggest me according to my experience, which side of ERP I should take—functional or technical and what modules. I have 2 months of vacation starting next month; hence I would like to take up the course to change my career. Please also let me know the chances of getting the best jobs in specific ERP category.
Warmest regards,
IM
Dear IM,
What is your current job profile? Are you a member of the teaching staff? Do you have any industry experience? If yes, what are the areas of your specialization?
Since you have not specified any industrial experience, I am assuming you have none. In such a situation it is better to go in for the technical side of ERP as you does not have the necessary functional experience for getting trained in a functional module like finance, production, inventory control, HR, etc.
So I suggest to take a course in SAP (because it is the most popular ERP package) Basis Training which should include ABAP, BAPI, ALV programming, SAP Scripts, Smatforms, etc. This will get you jobs of Basis programmer and depending on your knowledge and experience can get the job of Basis Administrator and so on. Since you have a lot of programming and database experience, taking this module will be easier, than trying to become a expert in a function that you don’t know.
Best regards,
Alexis
Dear Alexis,
Thanks for your valuable advice. My organization is a computer center, which develops software for technical colleges in Saudi Arabia. I have developed systems like finance, payroll, budget, projects that deals with office administration and systems that deal with all technical colleges’ data like admissions, courses, exams etc.
As I have strong command on Oracle SQL, PL/SQL programming, I will be get benefited if I join in oracle ERP. What do you say? In the Middle East Oracle ERP has good market. This puts me in dilemma—should I go for SAP or ORACLE. Please clear this doubt for me.
Once again thanks for your valuable advice.
Regards,
IM
Dear IM,
Deciding on whether to join SAP or Oracle depends on where you want work. If you want to work in Middle East and if you know that Oracle has great demand there then go for Oracle, Your oracle background will also help in getting a good job.
But if you prefer working in some other part of the world then SAP would be a better bet. The worldwide market share of SAP in 2002 was 25.1%, Oracle was the second with a market share of 7%. The figures for the year 2001 were 24.7% for SAP and 7.9% for Oracle. So while the market share of SAP has improved by 0.4% while that of Oracle has decreased by 0.9%.
So you can decide on which course to join depending on your preferences. But irrespective of the vendor (SAP or Oracle) you choose make sure that you get the training from the authorized training centers (SAP has something called Sapient College for giving training). You can get more information at http://www.sap.com/services/education/index.aspx. Oracle also has authorized training centers.
Best regards,
Alexis
Respected sir,
I am a post graduate in Master Of Computer Application, and in my final year of curriculam i went through and i studied your book, ERP Second edition, and I was really impressed by the content of the book, and further after completing my post graduation I joined SAP course, and given certification examination, and I passed the certification examination with 75% marks, but we do not have implementation experience, and life cycle experience, so I am unable to get a good job, right now I am working as a solution consultant in INFODART TECHNOLOGIES,On support project, can you guide me to what shall I do to get implementation experience,and to give my future a global shape, as in india most of the people do pirated version course of SAP in less money, but I paid hefty fees of SAP course as well as examination fees, which I invested from my previous job saving, so my future is not predictable, as SAP is only providing education and examination platform but those who get certified, they do not take care of their certified consultants, and i found that in your book, you do have unbias opinion regarding all ERP software vendors similarly i feel that, you must have something to support for people like us, so if you help needful persons like me, it will be a great help to me, and others who are in same situation ooking forward for yours’ positive response for the same.
yours’ faithfully,
Yogesh Sane
yogeshsane123@gmail.com
further i want to state that I am a SAP certified solution consultant in sales and distribution
module, and i have an experience in pharmaceutical marketing of almost twelve years.
Hi IM,
I agree with Alexis. I think you should go with SAP since it’s got a wider share of the market today.
Cheers,
James
Hi there,
Upon reading on what you had posted on your site, I was really impressed.
Please add some more information about SAP and I’ll keep updating.
More power!
Thanks,
James
Helo,
I agree there with alexis. If you want to work abroad you should go for SAP. but then you said that oracle’s got a good market on saudi arabia and if you want to work in the middle east then choose oracle and since you got background on oracle I think that should help a lot
Goodluck!
Cheers,
James