The Datamax Thinking Blog

Obviously in order to secure your business and sensitive data you have to know your points of weakness.

How many printers, scanners, copiers, computers, laptops, webcams, tablets, and smartphones are in your office right now? Every one of them is a ripe target for hackers. 

So, if you truly counted, and I know you did because what better way to spend your already limited time, then that’s how many points of penetration the cyber-thieves of the world have to gain access to your network (and your data). Oh, and if you have any videoconferencing systems, smart TVs, or DVRs, go ahead and tack that on to your list of hacker-vulnerable equipment.

When it comes to technology, we often have too much unbridled faith in the power of technology to fix the problem (whatever the problem is, we often think there’s a technology solution – a secret sauce to fix our businesses).

I’m going to give away the ending of this post now: there is no secret sauce for any IT project (unless you count doing the hard work required, but that’s hardly a secret). 

IT projects rarely fail because of the information technology. They often fail because many companies think they’ve found a “secret sauce” of technology that will somehow magically fix or improve broken or ineffective business processes and that employees will immediately adapt to and use new tools. In fact, research from the Project Management Institute shows that 58% of people view changing mindsets and attitudes as the greatest barrier to new project success. 

If you’re experiencing any of the following issues regularly, you’re wasting time when you don’t need to.

I can’t think of many worse ways to start a Monday than by having to immediately troubleshoot an unscheduled firmware upgrade that has played havoc with your users’ connections to the copiers in your office. 

Managing the various office devices is a little bit like cleaning your house – it has to be done, and it’s a great feeling when you’ve finished, but no one actually likes doing it. 

There IS something all copiers have in common: they can kick start office-wide productivity boosts and allow you to get more done in less time.

“The copier’s down . . . Again!” 

Not only can you hear the frustration, you can see it – since your co-worker is staring unhappily in your direction. 

You’ve repaired and duct taped your copier to coax it along as long as possible. It’s unavoidable now – you have to get a new one into the office or risk an uprising from frustrated co-workers. 

Even electronic documents can be lost if you don’t take the time to ensure an effective workflow and index the documents for future retrieval.

Moving documents through your office and getting them to the right people at the right time so that decisions can be made (and invoices paid!) is important. 

It’s also easy for documents to go astray. Paper documents placed on someone’s desk could quickly end up at the bottom of a stack, never to be seen again. A sensitive document printed to the color copier down the hall could be accidentally picked up by a co-worker – and could even be a privacy or other compliance breach depending on the level of personally identifiable information contained in the document. 

Even electronic documents can be lost if you don’t take the time to ensure an effective workflow and index the documents for future retrieval. 

With print rules, you can establish different rules for different roles within your office so that they can meet their legitimate printing needs.

As we interact with information more and more online (PC, tablets, and phones); we still need to print documents to paper. The question becomes not if you need to print, but how do you print documents to:

• Improve print efficiency – and productivity of employees
• Save money
• Meet any green initiatives

Printing rules, combined with an office-wide print strategy and policy, will help you achieve all three of those goals. Printing rules are based on conditions and consequences and designed to create effective user printing behavior. These rules are set using print management software. With print rules, you can establish different rules for different roles within your office so that they can meet their legitimate printing needs.

Not everyone needs to understand the intricacies of how to do everything on the equipment, but understanding the capabilities of the office copier(s) could save money.

Everyone in your office knows how to use the copier, right? 

If you mean do they know enough to copy a document or print to the copier or printer, then you’re right. 

But . . .

Is your partner strategic or tactical? You want a partner who keeps on top of changing technology trends and can adapt new technology and strategies to help you succeed in the future.

Pursuing a managed print services strategy with an office equipment provider is a big investment in time and money. It’s critical that you take the time to ask the right questions of your potential partner – and that they give you honest answers!

We already wrote about seven critical questions a few weeks ago (Crucial Questions to Ask Your Next Equipment Provider, Part 1); here’s part 2.

Tips for getting the most out of meetings – quickly – so you can get back to work.

I can’t think of anyone who really likes meetings, except for those annoying folks who like to sound off in front on an audience. Plus, do we really NEED those donuts?

One reason many meetings are horrible: half of the participants aren’t fully “there.” Someone is texting to figure out car pooling their kids to soccer practice. Someone else is checking email. People are horrible multitaskers (and even your multifunction printer only prints one job at a time). Take a hint from your copier – perform many tasks, but only perform one task at a time. To get the most of meetings, this is an important idea to take and use – focus on the meeting.

Your managed print service provider (we prefer to think of this as managed services “partner”) can help show you ways to reduce your printing costs.

Here’s what managed print services is in a nutshell:

You pay for a set number of prints and copies per month (and a pre-determined fee for anything over that set number) from equipment managed by your partner.

For most contracts, you supply paper and staples. The mix of copiers, multifunction printers, printers, and/or fax machines and software to track and manage the printing and copying is supplied by your partner. Printing costs are rarely tracked, but these costs eat into your bottom line. By exposing the costs of printing, you improve your budget AND productivity by printing only what you really need.