Matters Needing Attention as A SAP Freelancer
I have been engaged in SAP consulting for more than 15 years and worked as SAP freelancer for nearly 7 years. Someone asked me what should be paid attention to when doing SAP Freelancer. In my spare time, I wrote this blog.
1, Always pay attention to the industry trends, especially the blacklists of relevant Party A companies, Party B companies and headhunters.
One possible risk of doing SAP free is to encounter an unreliable partner, that is, the headhunter to which freelancer is usually affiliated. Through some contacts and customer relationships in the industry, the headhunting company found SAP freelancer and recommended him to the customer through advertising after obtaining the project needs. After the customer interviewed, the headhunting company signed a labor contract with SAP freelancer and dispatch freelancer to work on the project. The headhunting company receive consulting fees from Party B or Party A, and then pay the salary to freelancer. Many SAP freelancers can only find SAP project opportunities through the headhunters in the market, and the headhunters also rely on SAP freelancer's man day commission for survival and development. There is a cooperative relationship between the headhunter and SAP freelancer. They make mutual achievements and support each other to obtain deserved benefits. Of course, if encounter unreliable Party A or Party B, the headhunting company will also be difficult to do, and will also be the victim.
But in fact, SAP freelancer is the most vulnerable party to these partners. If the headhunter is unreliable, or the cooperative Party A or Party B is unreliable, SAP freelancer can only be very innocent victims. It is also common in the industry to go to court with partners for service fees. As a party, Freelancer is often exhausted and suffers a lot of entanglement and suffering.
Fortunately, in the SAP consulting circle, there are blacklists of Party A, Party B and headhunters, which are summarized by SAP peers, especially SAP freelancers. When selecting project opportunities and partners, SAP freelancer can carefully check whether future partners are in the blacklist. If yes, then he must be careful to avoid taking the detour that others have taken and falling into the pit that others have fallen.
2, Try not to do SAP projects for private enterprises. This is one of the bottom lines when I am looking for SAP projects, and it is also the lessons I have learned after summing up so many years of freelancer work experience.
I have worked as SAP freelancer for six to seven years and have done eight projects. Most of the project clients are multinational giants headquartered in Europe and the United States. The headhunters I have cooperated with are basically reliable. The consulting companies I have cooperated with Party B are also good and take good care of me. So far, I have maintained a friend relationship with relevant colleagues and peers. There is basically no payment problem when I worked in these projects. My monthly salary can be paid on the agreed date. The cooperation with my partners is smooth and pleasant.
Unfortunately, I still encountered the problem that the last month's salary was in arrears in two SAP projects. The last month's salary of one of the projects was paid after 7 months' delay. Receiving this salary after 7 months actually made me feel like a pie in the sky. The clients of these two SAP projects are both private enterprises and leading enterprises in their industry, the consulting fee is not even a dime to its operating income, so it is unlikely to delay the payment for our consulting fee. And their delay payment is not because that our project delivery is not successful or our delivery quality is defective. It is because the customer's internal IT service procurement process is not smooth, resulting in Party B failed to receive consulting fee. Having experienced these two private SAP projects in arrears of consulting fee, I decided that I would never do SAP projects for private enterprises in the future. It can be said that you are far away from the SAP projects of private enterprises, and can basically be far away from all the pitfalls you may encounter when you act as SAP freelancer, so as to protect your vital interests and labor achievements to the greatest extent.
Of course, there is a prerequisite for not doing SAP project of a private enterprise. As an SAP freelancer, you need to have good foreign language skills. Many global projects have strict foreign language interviews, especially for the core team from the European and American headquarters of Party A, and even encounter Indian interviewers. As long as you pass the foreign language interview, the subsequent project work will be easy to do. Global projects tend to have a long cycle, many consultants participate in the project, and the division of labor is very detailed, so the work will not be too challenging.
3, For each project, you should do your best to establish a good professional image and reputation in the consultancy industry.
As SAP freelancer is a freelancer, it is similar to a self-employed business. SAP freelancer takes over the project by himself. After the project is completed, he must find the next project by himself. During the project, if the customer is not satisfied or Party B is not satisfied, freelancer is likely to be asked to leave halfway. At this time, SAP freelancer also needs to find the next SAP project opportunity as soon as possible. Otherwise SAP freelancer will face unemployment and will have to sit idle and eat. In a word, this kind of occupation has no long-term stability and sense of security. People who excessively pursue job stability or sense of security are not suitable to be SAP freelancers.
In order to be SAP freelancer for a long time, and to have a short project interval or even an absolutely seamless connection between old SAP project and new SAP project, SAP freelancer needs to do a good job in each project, and complete the project delivery on time with high quality for the deliverables; Expand your contacts, maintain good relations with Party A, Party B and headhunters, and get their recognition. Imagine that if Party A highly recognize you and Party B highly appreciates you, and the headhunter thinks you are reliable, you will never worry about your next SAP project. In the past seven years, I have received offers for several projects because the same old customer contacted me and asked me to help them. Therefore, in the past years, I have basically realized the seamless connection between the old and new projects, which can be regarded as a long-term stability and absolute sense of security in my work.
2022-05-19.
