Independent view of market

1. Spinnaker Consulting Group GmbH
Introduction to June 2009 Newsletter
And Now - What Comes
We are in the middle of complex trading conditions. Projects are on hold, firms Next ?
have stopped investing and are just waiting, sometimes just afraid to make a
decision, other times not allowed to make decisions, projects are being talked
about but still no movement is taking place. So even though it may be tempting to
staffup and attempt to eliminate externals
Organisations are also aware that they cannot stand still for too long as this will hurt as much as possible in the future, the
operations in the short and medium term. We envisage this view to continue recent slump warns us against that.
through 2009 with the recovery starting in January 2010 at the earliest but, we
know that most projects will have to move forward. You would be wise to maintain a level of
externals that can be easily disposed of if
Projects that are in the deployment stage are being staffed internally as far as and when the slump re-occurs so that one
possible but, as ever at the expense of other internal projects and is able to manouver round the storm.
business as usual services. Many organisations have cut all
external consultants and have tried to staff projects solely with You should also consider external consultants for current GAP‘s in resourcing, as
available internal resources. rates are currently competitive and if the slump continues you can easily cut costs.
However, organisations must not be caught again when one talks about knowledge
Budget Reductions: transfer. More stringent controls and processes must be engaged to ensure that
The luckly organisations that maintained a mixture of internal and knowledge never walks.
disposable external resources were immediately able to react.
Cutting 20% off base line costs was achieved overnight in Knowledge must be retained in the core of the business and not dependent on
organisations that maintained the mixture. external resources. If thats the case, then you must re-access your staff and ways
of working.
For organisations that were predominately driven by permanent
employees this time is hurting, stressfull and expensive.
But the Market is full of Candidates
Yes—but, all the more reason to be cautious. The market is flooded with
candidates, not necessary good candidates but they have managed to have a
A New Challenge: major effect in consulting rates.
However, it is never that simple as we also need to consider the
knowledge repository within this group of externals. This in many Rates have taken on average a 20% hit. Some Good news at last, as rates were
cases was core to the operation of a myriad of departments and again approaching a ridiculous level for what is now a Standard IT Technical
processes. service.
Knowledge transfer and control of that knowledge was a major
factor but also highlighted a new risk which many organisations Spinnaker Consulting Group GmbH Phone: +49 89 4161 9370
had neglected to mitigate. Disposing of these exterxnal resources Flurstr. 20 Fax: +49 89 416193729
has in many cases caused GAPs in knowledge, not so much on D-81675 München
the IT and SAP technical side which can more easily be secured, Web: www.spinnaker-group.com
Registry: AG München HRB 159659 Email: info@spinnaker-group.com
but more on the business process and operating side which can
VAT: DE814561250
be costly to operations. In many cases this knowledge was lost Managing Director: Fionán MacCormaic

2. What is Happening? What should be Full Service for the SAP Regatta
Happening? Over a period of years the term SAP consulting became
Organisations are tending to wait longer before considering to interchangeable with Busness / Management consulting.
engage external resources. The are blinded by the current There tools to map processes were more accessible and
availability and maybe somehow believe that this will continue. easier and friendly to use. A key result was that organisation
generally missed the fact that they were mapping only to SAP. This was not
However, caution is advised here. We firmly believe that now is the necessary an improvement and we lost an element of skill that business in 2009 is
time to invest the effort into future resource planning in order that paying for.
you capture and secure the best resources at the optimal cost.
Waiting will put you back in the middle of the quot;rat racequot;. We judge SAP Consulants were positioned to fill the business consulting positions over the
that January 2010 will see an explosion of requirements and this will last 10 years as business projects all to often were purposely positioned behind the
have an immediate effect, resulting in a resource scarcity and at the same time ERP implementation. SAP consultants were deemed to be skilled enough to be
driving back up rates, but hopefully not significantly. able to fill the process and the business knowledge GAP.
Then you are in a fight as before just to secure resources rather than the top skilled The majority of SAP consultants lack the basic skills to justify results achieved from
ones. - „TAKE WHAT YOU CAN GET“. A familar story in the over priced SAP vital process and business mapping. Yes SAP consultants know how to make SAP
Consulting Market. You will have to compete with everyone to secure the right jump through loops but all too often deliverables were only based around their
people, act with lightening speed to secure the services and invest double the time knowledge of SAP.
to verify that you have the correct people. Finally selecting the most acceptable
candidate available. Thats not where you want to be. Good news is on the horizon. We now see a trend to engage business /
management consultants more when it comes to ERP projects. We need these
And the Business Consultant—Who are they? people, after all SAP consultants on the whole are experienced technical people,
During the last decade, the business consultant has been a dying breed. One that mainly comming from a university IT related degree. They know how to customise
is almost extinct. Two SAP related factors contributed to this scenario, the the software by turning the right switches. You do need your SAP technician to
emergence of SAP and the SAP consultant. deliver the technical element and training but organisations must position the
appropiate resource to the task in hand, as only then can true benefits be realised.
SAP carried the tag that stated its the standard SAP way and no other. There is
some truth in this statement with best business practice, industry solutions etc. But, And Finally..............
all too often it was overplayed and exageratted. Hence the „Darwin evolution of We hope that this update was packed with useful information and that it can assist
SAP consultants“ was set in motion. you with some ideas over the coming months. Please visit us at www.spinnaker-
group.com, you can also test your project critical success factors with the online
Business consultants were diluted mainly because of the easy money freelancing in tool.
the SAP market. Secondly, ERP software took on a more important role. It
developed into this mythical answer and promised to deliver the ultimate solution.
Spinnaker Consulting Group GmbH Phone: +49 89 4161 9370
In many cases it delivered and in other cases fell well short of its target. These Flurstr. 20 Fax: +49 89 416193729
failures we must point out were rarely software related but, can be assigned in most D-81675 München
cases to inadequate consulting skills as too few business people and too many IT Web: www.spinnaker-group.com
Registry: AG München HRB 159659 Email: info@spinnaker-group.com
people were involved in projects.
VAT: DE814561250
Managing Director: Fionán MacCormaic