[rbrtl]

The difference between an SAP consultant, even on retainer, saying someone else can't do it because it's "too hard for them", and an employee being on the receiving end of that remark, is that the employee is an investment on the part of the company, the consultant is an expense. One is the equivalent of the programmer obfuscating his code to keep himself in a job, the other is an employee learning something new and becoming more valuable to the business.

I work in infrastructure an automation on the AWS/MS platforms and work with just about every level of their technical capabilities. I don't have any certification. I don't even have a university degree. I can work with the documentation, which is more often than not up to date and worthwhile. Though the curve is often steep, this doesn't mean it is beyond people with a careers worth of experience around the subject.

I have also learned a small amount about the sort of work involved in these custom queries from my friend. For the most part it's no more difficult than basic database administration; i.e. it's a query language, akin to SQL. It's difficult enough that I can see why someone would want training in it before touching a production DB. But from what I hear these consultants often work straight on Live and then rack up more billable hours fixing the mistakes they made with the customers' live data.

All of this is anecdotal, but the business model (essential monopoly) makes me squirm at the best of times.