Why finding a SAP SuccessFactors consultant with German payroll sometimes takes three months – and what that actually means for you

And here's the problem. The client needs something very specific: SuccessFactors + Employee Central Payroll + Germany + real knowledge of German payroll regulations + German at a level where you can actually talk to the business. Not "some payroll experience", not "I did something similar once", not "English will be fine". Exactly that. And suddenly it goes quiet. Not because there are no people. There are. The problem is that most companies are still looking for a "good consultant" instead of understanding the exact combination of skills they actually need. And that's where the three months disappear.

The SAP SuccessFactors market is not one thing

"We need a SuccessFactors consultant" sounds good on a slide, but in reality it can mean anything. German payroll is a completely different game than Polish payroll, Dutch pension funds are a different world than the UK, Spanish convenio colectivo is its own specialization. This isn't about how many consultants are out there. It's about precision. Once you combine country + module + language + industry, you're suddenly looking at a very small group of people, and most of them are already busy.

And here's something I see all the time: at the beginning everyone wants that level of quality – precise fit, real context, ownership of outcomes. They value people who understand how projects actually work, not just the system. But when it comes to making the decision, the simpler, faster, "good enough for now" option often wins. That's where things start to drift. Expectations are set at senior level, decisions are made at "let's just get someone in and start", and then the same project needs fixing later. If you've ever had a project that suddenly got complicated after go-live, there's a good chance this is exactly what happened earlier.

We're not a recruitment company

And that's not a slogan. Recruitment starts with a CV and a job description and ends with something that's "good enough". The problem is, in projects like this, "good enough" usually turns into delays and firefighting. We don't start with CVs. We start with understanding where this person will actually deliver and where they'll fail, because even a strong consultant in the wrong setup won't deliver. Before someone joins a project, they understand the context: how the client works, what already failed before, who they'll be dealing with, what's expected beyond just delivery. Nothing fancy. Just work most of the market doesn't bother doing. And then people are surprised when projects suddenly get complicated.

Why I'm writing this

Because projects like this come up regularly, and every time the hardest part isn't finding "a good consultant", it's finding the one person who actually fits. And that person usually isn't sitting on the market waiting for a message. They're busy. That's why you don't build a network when you have an open role, you build it before. I want to already have a few specific people in mind when the need shows up, so I can choose the right one, not the first available one. Because "first available" is the most expensive decision you can make in a project, and usually the one you end up fixing later.