Epicor Software, provider of enterprise business software solutions for the midmarket and divisions of Global 1000 companies, has announced a new centre of excellence for education for its customers, partners and employees, Epicor University. The global initiative is created to specifically address the challenge of delivering consistent high-quality training worldwide, to expand the range of Epicor's existing education deliverables, and to offer certification programmes for Epicor's fast growing partner channel. Epicor University consists of a dedicated central team that will be responsible for developing and delivering all aspects of education content, materials, and blended training across the globe.
"This new initiative expands Epicor's significant commitment to providing best-in-class training and education resources for our customers, partners and employees worldwide," said Louise Keppel, vice president, worldwide education for Epicor, and head of Epicor University. "For our customers, end-user training has a direct impact on the success of enterprise software implementations, and Epicor University will be an additional resource to help ensure that they have access to the best education and training available worldwide, delivered how they need it, when they need itvirtually, embedded, or in the classroom."
The primary objective of Epicor University is to provide customers with resources and tools to help them realise the greatest benefit from their enterprise software investment and enable individual users to succeed in the way they learn best. Epicor already offers an extensive array of education resources that enable users to get the most out of an organization's software investmentfrom embedded courses within their enterprise resource planning (ERP) system, to extensive user guides, classroom courses and certifications, to an online help system that includes field help and technical reference guides. Today,there are more than one hundred embedded courses associated with the award-winning Epicor 9 next-generation ERP suite, over 100 virtual or classroom courses available, 2,500 pages of content and graphics in Epicor Technical Guides, and 74,000 fields defined in Epicor 9 Field Help. Centralising the current resources and adding people to the education team will enable Epicor to offer expanded education material and training options, delivering an improved service to customers, partners, and employees, regardless of wherethey are based.
Driving Real Business Value through Education
According to a recent Gartner report, "Training is a key component of long-termERP/business application value." The report notes that, "Training can provide organisations with real ROItraining prevents costly mistakes; undertrained workers are at least five times more expensive to support than trained workers; and, training ensures that users take full advantage of the applications they use, increasing ROI."
An industry pioneer, Companion Systems launched the ATM surround and enclosure industry by creating the first branded ATM surround 30 years ago. To support its diverse product line and global customer base, Companion Systems recently deployed the Epicor 9 next-generation ERP platform.
"The philosophy at Companion Systems is 'continuous improvement' in all processes and resourcesand our most important resource is our people," said Jason Hepworth, Controller for Companion Systems. "We feel that educating the team, and training the trainer, are very important to a successful ERP implementation, and so we purchased and used all the exceptional education and documentation resources Epicor had to offer. What we learned from the experience is that education and training of the end users both before and after the implementation is critical to successusers take a personal interest in how the system can improve their day-to-day processes."
Gartner, Inc. "Apply Best Practices to Train ERP Support Personnel," by Pat Phelan and Leslie Fiering (Jan. 31, 2011)
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