A good experience but not a long-term career as "opportunities" run dry.
Pros
- The benefits provided are quite lucrative. Also having them as a flexible option allows staff to accumulate more take home pay in their salary. - Travel is a key aspect of working in CoE, should you be that way inclined then this is a very nice aspect of the job. - The employees in Ireland are highly qualified for the job and very easy to interact with. - Flexible work hours, SAP allows for flexible work hours during the week when you are on day shift. - Fuel card option for those who drive, saving almost 50% on fuel costs. - The bonus is high compared to competitors with an onsite bonus provided for every day you are with a customer. - Dealing with customers face to face and remotely can be a hugely rewarding experience with regards to learning. Soft skills such as these can be imperative across many jobs. - Plenty of SAP Certifications to learn and obtain for free.
Cons
- Progression through the ranks is often based upon vague and unrealistic KPIs that contradict one another. Allowing for management to ensure you're not pushed up the ladder for rudimentary reasons (not enough onsites, not enough rotations, not enough knowledge transfer sessions to name but a few). These reasons often don't correlate with your actual business acumen or technical know-how. You could potentially get glowing reviews from customer interactions and support yet still be told you didn't have enough team presentations in the year...resulting in no progression. - Base pay is incredibly low compared to competitors. When trying to take out loans and mortgages, banks don't look at the "package" you are earning with your respective company. They look at base take home pay. With this being so low you could find yourself in a difficult situation later in life. - Whilst the travel aspect is a positive, it is also a negative. Work hours whilst onsite are ridiculous, you must adhere to the customer's demands in that regard. This can leave you working 12-15 hour days for 5 days a week whilst onsite (completely removing the flexible work hours benefit that SAP promotes). - The SAP CoE Ireland office is now used as cheap labour to the US, Canada and China. The Irish employees are sent routinely on 15 hour+ flights to these regions at the very last second and with very little notification. This results in a very low worklife balance and low morale due to insecure work conditions. You often have the feeling that you don't know where you'll be next week. Planning events in your life becomes almost impossible. - The expectation with CoE is to travel onsite/rotation for up to 6 months of the year. If you are gone for that amount of time you cannot avail of certain benefits like the fuel card or the free lunches. Both of these benefits become redundant whilst away from the Irish office. You are offered a per diem for the lunch costs incurred whilst onsite but this is often too low an amount to pay for your daily intake. - The influx of jobs within the CoE area has resulted in a massive knowledge gap between experienced and new employees. Graduates are often asked to ramp up these new colleagues resulting in the blind leading the blind. Often new employees are sent onsite without full training - the reasoning being that they can "learn on the job". - Unsociable work hours; whilst there is a flexible work hours initiative within SAP, this does not often apply to the CoE area of the company. As CoE is expected to cover all regions this results in staff working late shifts regularly. The EMEA timezone is in fact covered by Germany meaning that Irish staff are often working unsociable work hours from 1500-2300 every day. There is no end in sight for this as the US and APJ regions enlarge. - SAP Ireland is essentially at the whim of Germany. Every change that happens with Irish staff is controlled and dictated by German management. Often staff get the feeling that Irish management is powerless - this results in even lower morale as nothing can be changed on this side of the water.
