Taking on board a MPS provider can be a substantial investment in the short term but will offer a significant ROI in the future – as long as your provider is the genuine article.
In theory, bringing on board an MPS provider should be a guaranteed ROI win on your initial investment – but dig a little deeper and you may discover that all might not be what it seems. Whether you’re considering an MPS provider or already have one in place, it is essential that you constantly evaluate their performance in several key areas, looking for potential telltale signs that could be putting your ROI at risk.
1. Square Peg, Round Hole
Is your provider doing enough to assess your enterprise and drive down printing costs?
Headline figures in pitch meetings always sound impressive but in reality implementing and rolling out an effective MPS strategy requires action by your provider. They should assess your company and its existing infrastructure fully by auditing every aspect of your operations from physical space and layout through to existing work processes.
Only once this process has been completed can a provider hope to create a solution that is tailored to your own needs, instead of forcing an off-the-shelf solution onto your operations. They should also undertake assessments of your infrastructure on a rolling basis once the MPS programme is up and running, ensuring that it is always optimised for your enterprise and its ever-changing needs.
2. Crippled by Costs
Is your provider ensuring costs savings are being made across the company wherever possible?
Pay close attention to the processes that the MPS provider has put in place to tackle print costs in areas such as:
- Device to employee ratio - does your organisation have too many expensive printers?
- Human resources – training and educating the workforce about the benefits of reduced print dependency
- Print devices – introducing default settings or rules on printers and MFDs such as dual-sided printing.
The provider must be able to demonstrate that they are factoring in all the dependencies.
3. Zero Visibility
Is your provider offering you the right tools to analyse an implemented MPS strategy?
Being able to monitor the effectiveness of an MPS solution is essential, and a provider should provide you with the ability to track performance across the entire programme, offering total transparency into its workings. This critical reporting and analytical provisioning – using reports or more efficient virtual dashboards – will allow you to access consistent information relating to the reliability of devices, solutions and entire workflows, ensuring ROI is maximised across all operations.
4. Laid Low by Luddites
Is your provider stuck in the print room, unable to offer a clear roadmap to digitisation?
Managed Print Services are about more than just print strategies. Trailblazers in the sector are increasingly promoting a dual system that creates optimised print strategies while offering routes to digital transformation. And enterprises that have embraced digital as part of their print management strategy are already reaping the rewards.
According to research by Quocirca, 87 percent of larger enterprises have stated that the benefits in their paper and digital workflow integration brought about by MPS are effective or very effective. If your MPS provider isn’t offering this dual approach, you need to ask why. It could be a sign that the provider simply lacks the expertise or resources to use new technology that can automate and revolutionise your company’s document infrastructure. The risk to your business? Their luddite mindset could leave your operations stuck in the early 20th Century.
5. Sunk by Security
Is your provider doing enough to secure business-critical data?
The threat of data leaks is very real for companies; with the potential for large fines and irreparable brand damage, the security of documents – whether printed or digital – must be prioritised. MPS providers should show evidence that they understand the issue and have capabilities in place, such as data encryption, whitelisting protection and regulation compliance to ensure that document security is placed at the heart of any roll-out to protect reputation and ROI.
6. The Fast and the Feckless
Is your provider able to offer expert support engineers and positive maintenance outcomes?
The devil is truly in the details with this issue. Very often a decision to go with a particular MPS provider is made on the simplistic basis of how quickly an engineer can respond to a call – but what's more important and relevant to your ROI is how quickly the provider can actually resolve the issue once on site to ensure high overall uptimes. Providers must be able to produce statistical evidence from across their entire maintenance service programme to prove their credibility.
7. Burnt by Billing
Is your provider being transparent and open with its billing?
With billing, charges can be made unnecessarily complicated and hidden costs found lurking in the small print, threatening to jeopardise long term ROI. As with the MPS strategy itself, all costing elements must be visible, clear and transparent to ensure that your business’s bottom line is covered for any eventuality.
Look Forwards, Not Backwards
Credible MPS providers are moving beyond office printing and offering a suite of services that can transform IT as a whole whether it be through business processes, document management and workflow automation, or the entire infrastructure itself, aiding and enhancing their clients’ operations.
Any provider still clinging to a limited suite of basic print services poses a threat to enterprise, acting as an anchor that will keep companies trapped in the past because of archaic technology and outmoded work practices. Instead, it’s time to ensure you and your business are not being held back and adopt a provider who will optimise ROI and push your operations forward to meet the challenges of the future.
Takeaways:
- Ensure your MPS provider’s help desk services have a proven track record by requesting credible statistical evidence.
- Select a provider who is capable of transforming your print strategy via digitisation and doesn’t treat such critical technology as an afterthought.
- Expect your provider to audit your entire company infrastructure so they are able to create a solution tailored to your needs, not their stocklist.
- Choose a provider that puts visibility first – from expert analytics and monitoring efficiency to billing practises, demand exceptional visibility in exchange for your investment.