SAP consultants looking for a job are doing themselves a favor by tempering their demands and expectations from the outset. Salaries are under pressure. One or the other will familiarize themselves with completely new industries, search for months, or leave SAP consulting and switch to related fields of activity. Those who are regionally flexible increase their chances.
SAP beginners have it even more difficult. In order to even get one of the few entry-level positions, you have to have a lot of qualifications in advance. And it can happen that the entry-level positions are not as exciting and demanding as they were a few years ago.
Good long-term prospects in the SAP environment
However, all of this does little to change the good long-term forecasts, which continue to predict a high demand for IT specialists. The German Economic Institute expects the skills gap in IT professions to reach new highs by 2028. And according to the CIO Agenda 2026 study, 44.4 percent of CIOs expect the number of employees in their IT to increase somewhat, and 26.8 percent think it will even increase significantly.
SAP remains the backbone of the IT processes of large companies and operates successfully despite difficult circumstances, as the latest quarterly figures (July 2026) show. All of this offers good long-term prospects for SAP professionals.
There is also no immediate impact on the SAP labor market due to AI. In the business process environment, companies want strictly deterministic, traceable processes, which SAP delivers, but AI often does not. The AI capabilities required in tenders are often the icing on the cake to increase efficiency and are usually not as in-depth as other requirements.
How medium-sized businesses can now accelerate SAP initiatives
This presents a unique opportunity for medium-sized businesses. Companies in the second tier and outside metropolitan areas now have the chance for the first time to recruit top personnel for their SAP initiatives and thus strengthen and accelerate digitalization projects. Medium-sized companies that defy the crisis can prepare themselves for the digitalization tasks of the next few years, for example by migrating to S/4 Hana early.
