Digital transformation at a glance
Digital transformation initiatives dominate the IT and communications landscape right now. Robotic process automation, digitalisation and cloud adoption are being harnessed to deliver improvements in productivity, sustainability, security and cost efficiency. But how do you identify the areas that need improvement? You can’t just go with your gut or tackle areas that you “think” need remediation; you have to know.
Business intelligence supports key decision making
Organisations of all types often find it difficult to surface and interpret business intelligence in support of decision making. As more and more devices become connected, decision makers are exposed to big data in its raw form. However, turning this wealth of information into actionable intelligence is not always straightforward.
One of the areas of technology that have seen significant change in recent years is printing. It’s not because printers are substantially different to what they were five years ago (we’ve seen small improvements in energy efficiency, speed and quality, but nothing earth-shattering), it’s because many organisations’ relationships with print have changed.
Are paperless offices becoming a reality?
The concept of a paperless office has been around since the widespread adoption of PCs and VDUs in the late 1970s. However, for most businesses, this is not achievable. Undeniably, we have seen a reduction in print volumes in recent years. Sustainability has become a core business value for many and cutting down on the use of paper is an obvious place to start. This has elevated the concept of “think before you print” beyond a slogan in an email footer to an enterprise-wide mantra.
The reduction in print volumes has seen a corresponding increase in the use of print management services and solutions. Logically, the two go hand in hand. A greater degree of visibility over who is printing, on what machines, from what devices and via what applications, allows fleet managers to identify areas of concern and address them from a position of enlightenment.
Business change takes time and a willingness to adapt
Over time, business needs change. As your relationship with print changes, so should your provision of print resources. A fleet of machines that was fit for purpose pre-lockdown may no longer being serving your business needs effectively. Some devices may be under-utilised, others may experience greater volumes of traffic and cause bottlenecks. Again, visibility of these issues can help eliminate unused devices, barriers to productivity and unnecessary costs.
With an increasingly dispersed workforce, printing now also presents more of a security challenge than it did before. Line of business users, like the finance and HR departments, may be called upon to print sensitive or confidential information. Allowing this information to sit in a printer out-tray unattended is a data protection no-no. Intelligent print release functionality would allow authorised users to release print jobs on arrival, using any device.
This may sound strange coming from a print services provider, but we’d like you to print less. Of course, if you absolutely have to print something, we’d like you to print it with us.
Useful links:
Print management solutions to support digital transformation
Increase business intelligence with intuitive data visualization dashboards
