Solution for Learning Stress – SAP TECHED!!!!

Have you tried to learn “everything” new in the SAP technical world yet?   I’ve tried.   It’s an interesting road.   I don’t think I’ll ever learn it all – at least not well.  However, I learned that about SAP a long, long, time ago.    No I stand by the first statement I’ll never learn it all.  SAP Teched covers it all – or most of it!

If you want a shorter blog skip down to the here’s mine section.  Otherwise buckle up – I’m starting at the beginning of my journey.

Learning SAP, SAPScript, ABAP, Business areas the first time:

Once upon a time…  There was this young lady who knew she wanted to program.  After working on RPG and some other languages she found herself!   SAP, yes, she found SAP.  Back then the only  real technical code was ABAP.  BUT there were so many other things to learn Sap Scripts – those were horrible.  The business side of things was at the top of the list as well.  And all the tables – where they nuts?  But she had to decide which area(s).   Ahhhh!!!!  The stress.  The internet wasn’t much help back then.  And she had just had a baby…

She picked up some other “stuff” along the way workflow, EDI, XI/PI, Web Dynpro, XII and the lists goes on.  But, of course not all at once.

So you have the background of when I started my SAP journey and knew I had found a “home”.

She like most of you has a lot of things going on in the background at her job.  Learning is just plain fun most of the time.

Fast forward a couple of million years.  That son of hers was in and just out of college is a blink.  And there was something new in SAP.  OK – a lot of new stuff.  HANA brought it all.  Stress hit again.  Learn it all – learn it now – do well – and shine.   Easy, right?   Not so easy.  There just was too much to learn at once.  So she started her journey.

New Way of Learning

Blogs, books, internet, SAP community, open courses, tutorials…  and more.  It was all out there at her fingertips.   So what to learn, how to learn, it should be a thing I would know, right?  Wrong.  I had to go way, way, back to when I started SAP to think about how I learned things, what worked for me, what didn’t.  That type of thing.  Now the standards I had held myself to were unreasonable.  I had to learn one “thing” a month or more.  Give it my all as time permitted.  And that stress floated away – no not really but….  You would think that would help.

TechEd all Fun – No Stress

That brings me to one of the coolest, funest, easyest things to do.  Getting ready for SAP Teched.  And it doesn’t cost a thing – except for my time.  The company had to agree to let me concentrate, because I stay up and watch as much as I can.   No stress, no worries, just plain fun.  Learning at it’s best.  I soak it up like a sponge.   I get to “meet” virtually people like me who love/hate SAP and all that it brings.  Chatting with them and learning from them as well.

My husband laughs at me.   I tell him SAP Teched is like a child going to Disney World.  He just thinks I’m strange.

So, too long of a story for a blog.   But I’m not splitting this up into two blogs, because I want something from you.  What is your best memory from any SAP Teched?

Here’s Mine:

I’m not sure what Teched I was at, but I was going to the 2 day networking workshops prior to Teched.  I was with my friend and co-worker Claudia.  We were learning about something when we met an amazing person “Blag” (search the internet for that one).  He was an SAP Mentor.  We talked for a while.   When he was done we were amazed at his knowledge.  We had an issue we were working on that we couldn’t solve, we mentioned it, and after the session.  He helped us figure it out!  Amazing.  Someone who didn’t know us just helped us out for no real reason.

That began my excitement in Teched!  People.  There were people out there like me who would give us their time.  I later payed it forward by helping someone when we were in the hall waiting to get into a hands-on session.

I go to every Teched that I can.  I beg my employers to let me go.  Or they just do let me go as soon as I ask.

Teched, no stress, no worries, just 100% fun AND you learn something.  I dare you to go and then tell me you didn’t learn anything.

The Big Question:

Now I throw the ball at you.   Maybe even at your head, because it doesn’t always go where I want it.  I never was good at catch.   What is one of your best memories of a Teched?