Tushar Sakhalkar  – Former Sr.VP – Global Enterprise Solutions, Corporate Strategy, Processes at KloudData

After graduating as a Chemical Engineer, I worked in Operations department of large Fertilizer companies, in India and abroad, for 21 years.

During this period, though I dabbled in IT by way of using MS Office products, never really worked in IT department of sorts.

After wading through Operations, Projects, ISO setups etc., finally decided to convert my hobby (of IT) in to a career. My discussions with various people indicated that ERP is a career where domain experience (Production, Maintenance, Finance etc.) is respected and valued. By that time, in 2004, ERP was becoming a 2 horse race (if not single horse). Hence, SAP entry became an obvious choice.

At the age of 43, I did SAP Certification in Materials Management and joined  Mahindra group company – Bristlecone as MM Consultant.

Thanks to good advice (and its acceptance by me), some diligent upgrading of knowledge, few extra certifications,  I soon travelled the path of Project Manager, Senior Project Manager, Delivery head.

This is the juncture; I decided to leverage my non-SAP experience and skill and took up a challenge to CREATE a company from scratch. I was extremely fortunate to have built 2 SAP companies – one from 0 to 30 and another 25 to 350 – right from scratch. On the way, I held posts of Director, Chief Operating Officer, Senior Vice President and so on.

Most importantly, on the way, I could create, guide and nurture few young minds in their SAP careers.

Looking back, SAP Certification was a turning point that turned the career around.