ERP / CRM Professionals Job Overview
ERP (Enterprise Resource Planning) and CRM (Customer Relations Management) professionals have different job titles but the same job description. ERP is geared towards control of business resources for better customer assistance while CRM deals with the customers directly.
Both are geared towards better customer satisfaction and proper relationship to vendors and partners. Although by principle ERP and CRM are geared towards professionals with advanced business training, this position requires a lot of technical knowledge also.
The need of ERP and CRM experts are based on the fact that small to large scale companies have to ensure that every resources is used towards customer satisfaction.
Business will always have resources but the challenge is on how to direct them towards customer satisfaction properly and how to accurately measure that process.
Business owners and managers usually have a hard time controlling the resources. Raw materials and services could easily be acquired but distributing them to the customers is a challenge. With an ERP expert, business owners will have a full report on the resources.
Business owners will be assured that the resources used in business will be used only for customer satisfaction. This will usually involve an application or a software wherein the ERP professional recommends so that a systematic and real time monitoring is possible.
ERP / CRM Professionals Education Requirements
The education required for this position is usually a business degree. But more companies today are preferring individuals who has MBA for advanced knowledge in business transactions.
With an MBA, there is knowledge of the latest trends in business transaction which includes familiarity with ERP and CRM processes. There are also MBA courses today that offer training in different ERP and CRM platforms which is proven to be useful once the MBA course is completed.
On the other hand, an MBA alone is not enough. ERP and CRM consultants have to be certified before they could apply for any ERP and CRM position.
There are different companies that offer online certification through training. There are also certifications that will require seeking candidates to take an exam before receiving their certification.
Two of the country’s most popular ERP certification groups are CIERP (Certified Implementer of Enterprise Resource Planning) and CNERPS (Certified Novice of Enterprise Resource Planning Systems).
Both require an exam in order to be certified. No previous education or experience is required but training and experience is highly encouraged since the exams are usually based on real world settings.
Computer Degree is also required for ERP consultants. Software developers will not only be a consultant for ERP but could also develop an application that could cater the specific need of a business.
There are also software development companies that provide certification on their application. An example is the training offered by eXegeSys on their ERP product. They provide certification but only for their ERP application.
ERP / CRM Professionals Qualification:
- MBA
- Business or Computer Degree
- ERP Certification
ERP / CRM Professionals Skills
There are two types of professionals in ERP – an ERP professional who has a degree in computer and an ERP professional who has a business degree.
Either way, their expertise comes from the fact that they have great analytical skills especially in understanding a particular business.
A business graduate already has knowledge in business process but should have the ability to port that knowledge into different ERP applications.
On the other hand, computer professionals who already have familiarity with different ERP applications should know how to port their knowledge of the application to specific business processes.
Apart from analytical skills, ERP professionals’ attention to details should be impeccable. Businesses, especially the small ones, will be affected even by the smallest detail.
Every information should be taken into account by ERP professionals and properly use them to help improve the business.
ERP / CRM Professionals Expected Salary
- Beginners: $7560
- Mid Level: $7900
- Experts: $9500 or more