- I am Govind Sharma a qualified Chartered Accountant from India. Today I am a Senior SAP Cloud ERP Consultant who has worked in different countries.
- I was a regular boy from a vernacular medium school, very weak in English communication, and used to stammer a lot. I was so average in my studies that nobody was sure about my chances of clearing even the 10th standard.
- Today when I look back I realized that I have overcome all of those challenges and doing very well myself.
- My only message is – If I can do it so can you. Here is my story.
Humble Beginnings
I am born and brought up in Amravati, near Nagpur in the State of Maharashtra-India. As I did my primary education in Hindi, the English language wasn’t really my cup of tea.
During my childhood, I used to spend most of my time playing with friends, the study was way down on my (priority) list. In fact, everyone who knew me thought I would only study till class 10 and to their surprise, I scored well in class.
Around the same time, the IT industry was booming in India and I was mesmerized by the few real-life examples of our neighbors and some others about how they are doing great in the IT sector.
I saw this as an opportunity and decided to pursue a career in Computer science. Luckily my class 10 score was just enough to get me admission to vocational science in class 12. The plan was to secure a seat in Government College for computer engineering and life was set!
Every day was an unending struggle to deal with languages. I am a Marwari, lectures were delivered in Marathi which is a regional language and the course material was in English.
All this was scary for an average boy coming straight from a Hindi medium school.
Nevertheless, I cleared class 12 with a distinction (which was a big achievement in itself) and was very excited to take admitted to Computer Engineering. This was a time when I got introduced to the reservation system in detail in India.
Due to various reasons even with a good score, I could not get admission to a government engineering college. There were other private engineering colleges as well but their fees were really high. Also being an elder son of the family, there was tremendous pressure on me to do something worthwhile with my future. (I have seen my parents struggling hard for us, and I was in no mood to waste a single day.)
I gave up the idea of pursuing Computer Engineering and enrolled for BSC (Bachelor of Science) in a reputed college in my city. After 3 months, I realized that this surely would have led to a stable future but not a very rewarding one. I collected myself and started browsing other career opportunities where I could fit in.
Somewhere I got to know about Chartered Accountancy. I interacted with students pursuing CA and realized the level of serious effort required to clear this course. By God’s Grace, I am blessed with parents who always stand by me. They encouraged me to always wanted me to pursue whatever makes me happy.
After a lot of discussions with my family, I was ready for the biggest challenge of my life – pursuing Chartered Accountancy. This was a turning moment in my life.
My CA journey
In the initial days of class, I had trouble understanding the concepts and sometimes felt like quitting after looking at the expertise of the students from commerce backgrounds who contributed the majority of the batch.
PE-1 & PE-II Exams. Fortunately, I cleared my CA PE- I (now known as CPT). Now it was time for the second level CA – PE II. I again gave my best but this time the result was disappointing. I failed in both groups but I was quite sure about my expected marks. So, I applied for re-totaling and also filled out the exam form again for the next attempt. Just 10 days before the exam the result of my re-totaling was declared and I cleared one group. And the next attempt cleared group 2.
Extra Tip: If you have failed and you are sure that you have written the exam very well then there it’s always good to try your luck in re-verification.
I then started with my three years of articles (more on it below).
CA Final Exams. After completing almost 3 years of articles it was time to prepare for CA Final exams. I had to put much more effort into CA final preparation. I had no positive results on my first and second attempts.
It was on my third attempt when I cleared my final exams with a good score and earned the title of Chartered Accountant.
It was a big success for someone like me who grew up in a small town. I was the first Chartered Accountant in my whole family tree, a big moment for all of us. My parents literally distributed around 10kgs of peda (sweet dish) on that day to temples, our neighbors, family members, friends, well-wishers, social acquaintances, and everybody.
“How was my Articles Experience?”
I did my articles from one of the best firms, Shah Khandelwal and Jain in Pune (India). It was the most difficult time for me as I had to manage everything by myself.
I still remember those exciting and tiring days of my article ship – tuition, traveling standing in overcrowded public transport during visits to client’s locations, office work, homework, lots of new things, and the huge pressure of deadlines. I learned a lot of new skills during my articles like:
- Business acumen
- Business applications & tools
- Networking skills
- People management
- Corporate reporting.
With this, I got an opportunity to work in the most interesting auditing & Taxation areas like:
- SOX audits
- Tax Audits
- Statutory audits
- Stock Audits
- Internal audits of listed companies
- Oracle Implementation support
- Indirect Taxation
Extra Tip: All that I studied was put to a practical test during these days. You should always take your articles phase very seriously and do whatever work is assigned to you putting your heart and mind and giving your best every day.
Taking a Leap into the Corporate World as an SAP Consultant
I participated in CA, and ICAI campus recruitment drives but due to my stammering problem, I faced rejection in the last round, as a result, wasn’t able to get the senior role.
Nevertheless, with the help of my close friend Anand, I got to know about SAP Consulting.
I felt excited about foreign travel opportunities and flexible working approaches in IT companies. After doing my research, I decided to go for an SAP Consultant position in the IT sector MNC.
I managed to improve my status on my weakness list like stammering, English communication, corporate culture, etc. The key approach followed was to get an understanding of new things around me.
Over the past years, I have gained a lot of new accounting and finance knowledge like Accounting practices of very large organizations, and GAAP ( IFRS, Europen, and US GAAPs). I played various roles in the IT industry as a business analyst, Subject matter expert, FIN Consultant, and Finance Transformation Consultant.
“What are the opportunities as an SAP Consultant ?”
You get an opportunity to understand the complete business process of various industries
The opportunity to work with senior-level management to redesign their existing processes and IT systems for business operational effectiveness by utilizing the new IT solutions.
As an SAP Consultant, you will be able to suggest business re-engineering and redesigning their business processes, streamlining the existing process, and effective utilization of their IT infrastructure.
As a part of my work, I have traveled across different countries for 9 years including, the UK, Germany, Italy, Turkey, and Vietnam. Currently, I am living in Den Haag and working in Amsterdam, Netherlands. It is a dream come true for a boy like me living in a small town to travel the world and now working and living in the Netherlands.
In Conclusion…
Give yourself a chance. We can all create our own destiny, just be patient.
I wish I could express how grateful I am to have such a beautiful Family. My father worked hard so that he could provide me with all the necessary resources for study, my mother was always there when I used to study at night. My younger brother, took all the responsibility at home so that I could give my whole attention to becoming a CA.
With the help of this platform, I would like to thank everyone, My Family…My Teachers my Colleagues, and my real friends who helped me to achieve my dream…
Now It’s Your Turn…
What is your success story? I would love to know about your journey as well. Also, have you considered moving to the Netherlands?
I would love to connect with you, do leave your comments below.
You can connect to me on LinkedIn at Govind Sharma
