Managed Print Services work with you to develop a digital strategy that incorporates print, scan and paper workflows into your wider processes and practices. They help you identify the strengths and weaknesses of your organisation and use their expertise to provide the right solution for you and your people – whether at home or back in the office.

And then, perhaps most importantly, they continue to work with you to implement and integrate new processes, practices and technology. Offering ongoing support to ensure you get the most out of the opportunity that lies ahead. In this article, we’ll take a look at the key areas where Managed Print Services can support your business.

What do we mean by support?

For most people, support – especially in a professional context – means customer service. And, from faraway call centres to confused chat bots and tedious instructions, we know all too well what this feels like when it’s done wrong.

For Managed Print Services, support goes far beyond that, becoming a full end-to-end consideration throughout your partnership. It’s about supporting your organisation as it identifies the right digital strategy moving forwards, helping you implement that strategy. then ensuring your people can perform their jobs to the best of their abilities.

Why is support vital now and in the future?

For your business, global challenges have encouraged greater collaboration between different organisations, waking us all up to the fact that we aren’t alone, and that working together can help us get a healthy slice of a much bigger pie. These learnings won’t disappear, and it’s important your business keeps up with how things have evolved.

For your people, hybrid working practices are also here to stay. Does your organisation have the right solutions and processes in place to support your people? Can they work effectively whether they’re at home or in the office? Managed Print Services can help make sure that it does.

How will a Managed Print Service support you?

Let’s take a look at some of the key specifics of what Managed Print Services can support you with: 

Technology

Do you have the devices and programs your people need in order to work productively wherever they are? Are your current solutions updated with the latest security software? Is your print room stocked on paper and toner? Your Managed Print Service partner can take these tasks out of your IT team’s hands and sort them for you.

Productivity 

Once you’ve got the right things in place, it’s vital that your people know how to make the most of them. Managed Print Service partners will work alongside your people, offering training, support and advice to help ingratiate them with new and better ways of working.

Experience

One of the most valuable aspects of engaging with a Managed Print Service partner is the wealth of experience they bring to the table. Current trends, the latest solutions and technical expertise will all be at your organisation’s disposal throughout any relationship.

How will a Managed Print Service support your people?

Equally importantly, Managed Print Services can offer key solutions to support your people:

Technical support

Engaging with a Managed Print Service partner can ensure your people have access to the software, documents and devices they need to work productively in the office, at home, or on the move.

Security

If your people are accessing your documents from multiple locations and devices, they need to know they’re doing so safely and securely. The support of a Managed Print Service partner can offer that peace of mind.

Connectivity

We’ve all had to adapt to new ways of working together in the past 18 months. Virtual meeting rooms, chat solutions, and digital document storage and retrieval have become commonplace in our lives. As we move forwards to more hybrid working models, with some at home and some in the office, we again must adapt to provide the right support to our employees. A Managed Print Service partner can help you find the right balance.

Ricoh, your people-first Managed Print Service provider

Ricoh has years of experience in understanding the vital role office print plays in an organisation.

As a leading Managed Print Service provider and workplace systems integrator, we specialise in analysing the needs of your business, identifying the right solutions for both you and your people, and then integrating them seamlessly into your workflows –  ensuring your people know how to make the most of them.

And we don’t stop there. We have a UK-based contact centre and hold a Customer Service Excellence Certification, offering ongoing support to make sure you get the most from our collaboration, and that your people work happily and productively to produce their best work for your business.

Finding your perfect Managed Print Solution

Learn more about Ricoh’s support values with our ‘Finding Your Perfect Print Solution’ guide.

Click to read Finding your Perfect Office Print Solution

The post Managed Print Services – offering vital support to enhance your business and empower your people appeared first on Insights - Empowering Digital Workplaces.

At the heart of every office lies its print hardware. Once they were dedicated devices that specialised in printing or scanning. Today they’re multi-function machines that enhance business-critical processes, enable greater flexibility, increase productivity and make your people’s lives much easier.

It all comes down to productivity. Who wouldn’t want to automate tedious tasks so their staff can work on more profitable projects? Or reduce human error by providing technical solutions to problematic paper trails?

But the real potential of your office print lies in Managed Print Services. Engaging with a partner who understands how each part ticks. Linking them together into one, cohesive unit and combining them seamlessly with your own digitisation strategy. 

In this article, we’ll be looking at productivity, and how to find the right Managed Print Services partner for you.

Why office print is vital to your productivity

Your print room and multi-function devices are part of the lifeblood of your organisation – no matter which industry you are in. And as we’ve discussed, modern solutions provide much more than just printing or scanning. Let’s take a look at how office print improves productivity for your people.

Storing and retrieving documents quickly

For many organisations, the days of cabinets filled to the brim with paper, filed away for a rainy day, are hopefully long gone. 

These challenges can still remain, but today we can for the most part, thank multi-function print devices for making the secure storage, archiving, scanning and retrieval of documents a quick and painless process.

Enabling hybrid working

It’s now old news that some form of remote working is here to stay. The events of 2020 onwards have shown that we are capable of performing our roles in different locations. And for many, the benefits that remote working has to offer our work/life balance are too good to give up.

Without modern office print, we wouldn’t have been able to adapt to new challenges, support our people with their print needs, or prepare for the future’s hybrid mix of remote and in-office workers.

Providing greater accessibility and productivity

One of the key considerations in the design of new multi-function print devices is how easy they are to use for people in different departments or performing different roles. 

By featuring user-friendly interfaces and touch screens, simplified operating systems and seamless integration with other devices such as mobiles and laptops (including on the move), your Office Print Solution can elevate day-to-day productivity across the board.

Why office print should be a key consideration for your digitisation strategy

Providing your people with the right office print solution is more important now than ever – and not only because of the events we’ve all experienced since 2020. 

We’ve learned to work under difficult circumstances, testing the resilience of our businesses while adapting our processes for remote and hybrid working. And we’ve also seen further advances in the capabilities of office print devices, and the huge improvements in productivity they can provide.

As more organisations adopt these new practices and processes effectively, those who don’t will be left behind.

Why Managed Print Services are the most effective solution

By collaborating with a Managed Print Services partner, you take advantage of a purpose-built solution that combines expertise with greater visibility. A partner will:

• Identify the challenges and opportunities openly with your organisation 
• Understand the global trends and latest advancements that could work for you 
• Incorporate solutions in line with your own digitisation strategy

Different print partners have different methods for enabling productivity through your print devices. We encourage you to survey the market for one that matches your business’s values. But while you’re here…

Ricoh, your people first Managed Print Service provider

Ricoh has years of experience in understanding the vital role office print plays in an organisation. 

As a Managed Print Service provider, we specialise in analysing the needs of your business, identifying the right solutions for both you and your people, and then integrating them seamlessly into your workflows – ensuring your people know how to make the most of them.

And we don’t stop there. We offer ongoing support to make sure you get the most from our collaboration, and that your people can work happily and productively to produce their best work for your business.

Finding your perfect Managed Print Solution

Learn more about Ricoh’s office print productivity values with our ‘Finding Your Perfect Print Solution’ guide.

Click to read Finding your Perfect Office Print Solution

The post Managed Print Services – how it improves productivity and supports digital transformation appeared first on Insights - Empowering Digital Workplaces.

2020 will long be remembered as one of the most challenging and unpredictable experiences. The spread of COVID-19 and the ensuing global health crisis impacted the personal and professional lives . The UK lockdown and need to remain in the home when possible led to the UK GDP to fall as far as 20.4% in April – the lowest ever recorded monthly drop.

How lockdown unleashed accidental innovations in home working?

The first months saw a rise in discussion of a ‘new normal’ to come. As businesses and employees began to adapt to working from home, we saw an acceleration of remote working. Policies and the adoption of technology to support these new models up and down the nation. Businesses looked to innovate to stay afloat. Whilst we learned to adapt, it has become increasingly clear that the next challenge is the evolution of our workplace.

Facing new challenges

Never before have businesses had to deal with employees being fearful of returning to work . The consideration of illness within the office has never been a conscious worry. Perhaps people had hand sanitiser during flu season. But no office would have required staff to physically distance, sit behind Perspex screens or wear masks for the safety of the team.

What will lockdown mean for the way we work in the future?

Similarly, employees are no longer reliant on the convention of the office to be productive. With many people thriving in new locations, there is a growing call to change the way we use the office.  Addressing the modern-day worker who will want to use the office as a ‘destination’ location, that is fit for purpose.

This new ‘conscious workplace’ is achieved through engagement with change, enablement through new technology, innovation and a constant state of evolution. As a result of the current climate, businesses are having to make difficult and carefully conscious decisions to guarantee the safety and well-being of their staff – both physically and mentally.

We’re not just transitioning to a ‘new normal’, but rather a new future. So how exactly do we, as business leaders, make these choices? How do we create a physical environment which still functions productively and can generate collaboration and innovation?

Enabling through technology

Enabling through technology means employees and employers can create an environment that evolves in a stable way. Supporting your business’s future recovery and growth.

Productivity in the UK was in continuous free-fall before COVID-19. The uncertainty caused by global and European political and economic upheaval meant we had seen the UK’s lowest productivity level since the 1800s. This is not surprising when you consider 80% of office workers in the UK felt they didn’t have the technology to do their jobs properly. Studies showed that 56% of UK workers believed productivity was stalling their company’s growth because of outdated tech.

The transition to remote working due to lockdown kick-started a revolution in the way we work. Businesses and sectors famed for their legacy processes.  Systems had to play catchup and lead on digital transformation projects overnight. Suddenly the projects that IT teams across the UK had been trying to instigate despite opposition, were given the green light and thrown into hyper speed.

Engaging your employees

While we champion technology at Ricoh, we know that it alone won’t solve all your problems. Instead, it’s balancing technology with people that will help tip productivity levels back up. Being forced to work from home may have been a catalyst for a vast digital revolution, but people drove the solution.

Employee experience has long been rated as an important issue among workers. In some cases, employers denied flexible/remote working requests out of concern or fear that employees were unable to do their job efficiently.

Today, many employees feel an improvement in their work and life balance. But for some, the isolation associated with working from home had led to crippling loneliness. While there is no ‘one size fit’s all’, there is an organisational need to communicate effectively with employees, engage and listen to their needs. While enabling a better and more productive way of working.

The evolution

Like everything else in existence, the office will keep evolving. Over time, your employees’ wants, values and needs will change and so too will what your business has to provide.

The workplace environment must continue to evolve. With the right blend of working, we can create environments that are productive and sustainable in the long-term. Technology and the changing needs of people in the conscious workplace will be critical to ensuring long term productivity.

Register to attend our events

If you’d like to hear more insight into why behavioural science should now be the central to your workplace strategy, you can register for the webinar here

Register for the webinar on the 19th November: ‘Why behavioural science should now be the central to your workplace strategy

Get in touch today and we’ll discuss how we can provide the perfect solution for you.

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