The SAP Business One talent shortage, from the desk that sees it daily
The UK does not have enough SAP Business One people. We can say that with some authority — B1 has been our core market for over a decade, and the gap between the roles we're briefed on and the consultants available to fill them has never been wider than it is now.
The arithmetic is simple enough. The B1 partner channel keeps winning customers, every SQL-to-HANA migration adds project work, and the pipeline of new consultants coming into the ecosystem has never matched either. Training someone to genuine implementation standard takes two to three years of live projects. Most partners can't spare the bench time, so everyone recruits from the same small pool instead — and the pool notices.
What the shortage does to hiring
Three things, all visible on our desk.
Offers move faster. The strongest B1 candidates rarely stay on the market a fortnight, and the employers who win them have compressed their process to match — first conversation to offer inside two weeks, decision-makers in the first interview.
Counter-offers are standard. When a good consultant resigns, their employer usually finds budget that didn't exist at review time. We prepare candidates for that conversation before they resign, because it's coming.
And pay keeps climbing. A mid-level UK functional consultant now sits at £49,500–£66,000, seniors at £66,000–£82,500, with HANA migration experience adding 12–18% on top. The full role-by-role picture, including what support consultants and SDK developers earn, is in our SAP Business One salary guide.
What actually works
For employers: pay the band, not last year's budget — under-offering just means running the search twice. Widen the funnel: strong support analysts convert to implementation consultants inside two years, and hiring one is often faster than waiting for a finished consultant to appear. And if the role can be hybrid across the UK, say so in the advert; it changes the response rate materially.
For candidates: this is the strongest seller's market B1 has had. If you're two-plus years in and haven't benchmarked yourself lately, spend thirty seconds on our salary checker — the result surprises most people.
We maintain the largest dedicated SAP Business One network in the market. If you're hiring into the shortage, or you are the shortage, talk to us.