#ManagedPrintServices: "I feel a lot of love in this room..." just not A3&A4

March 8, 2017.

"All Roads Lead to MpS and MpS Leads to All" -  I've been saying it for years.  At first, it was a joke.

I drop phrases like, "You know, copiers were the first devices on the internet of things.(MWAi)"

Or...

"In my world, voice mail is a document..."  In a room full of IT types, the response is silence.  Yes, that is a third eye growing out of the top of my head.

Here we are, March of 2017 and not much has changed since 2007.  Everyone 'does MpS', but few understand the expansive realm.  

Are you stuck in the 'Mps is toner and service billed by click...' morgue?  Is that all you got?

Do you, as a provider, consider A3(11x17) to be separate from A4(8.5x11)?  Your prospects don't. As a matter of fact, they resent you over-selling the bigger devices. 

When performing an MpS assessment, are you collecting two or three cost components? There is so much more, don't be a waif, ask.

Back to the beginning: What is Managed print Services?  This is Managed print Services:

Managed print services is the proactive management of document output devices and related business processes.

As Michael Keaton said in Night Shift, "You know a lot of times it'll help you to understand a word if you break it down, so let's do that now, shall we?" Let's do just that.

 

"Proactive..."

We service your device before you call us.  This IS NOT scheduled air-bottle cleanings.  This is monitoring devices for repeated error codes and reaching out before the device shuts down.

This capability has ALWAYS been possible even before the days of PrintAudit, PrintFleet, or the DCA of the day.  I know this, I did it back in 2008.

If you're not proactive, you're not MpS.

"Document..."

What is a document?  Any vehicle which transports, presents, or stores information or data.  A video, letter, three-part invoice, bumper sticker, or .mp4 file are examples.  This doesn't mean I manage every output device, it means I understand the entire ecosystem.  

You can too.


"Output Device..."

Printers, copiers, speakers, kiosks, and large-format video screens are all output devices. 

Maybe you don't offer end-point management, but one of your clients' prints POs and clips a copy next to the monitor for easy input - wouldn't TWO monitors make more sense?

Big screen kiosks are all the rage, information streamed to these panels is hosted in a cloud and presented, on-demand. 

It doesn't matter what vehicle is used to convey information, it can be managed.

"Business Process..."

In the MpS Gospel according to Greg, business process optimization is a central theme in an evolved program.  We don't stop at the printer - no.  Why do you print in the first place? 

If I were to create an MpS Covenant, one requirement would be for all practitioners to ask these types of questions:

"What happens before and after the device?"
"How do you process accounts payable?"
"Share with me the process in place when generating pick tickets."

These are great questions to get the ball rolling and separate fake-MpS from Evolved-MpS.  But there's more:

• "How do you determine to upgrade or replace a device at lease end?"
• "How did you establish device standards?"
• "How do you support your existing devices?  What is the process?"
• "How many print servers and cues do you manage?"
• "How do you decide which devices to replace or remove?"

These questions begin the journey into a deeper understanding of your client's decision-making process and fall into the "related business processes" section of the definition.

Just don't separate A3 and A4.  

What, do you ride a dinosaur to work?