How to win the hearts and minds of users
Helping Your Clients Manage The Cultural Change Of
Implementing An MPS Program

How many times have you seen a really great MPS solution whose results fall disappointingly short of expectations when you come to review progress with the clients after implementation? One of the commonest reasons for this is that both dealers and clients may underestimate the cultural change involved in introducing a successful Managed Print Service.

This applies especially to clients who are in Stage 1 or 2 of the MPS Customer Adoption Model defined by Photizo. These clients still do not have a lot of experience of working in a managed service environment.

Here we set out some simple practical guidelines to show you how to help your clients manage the cultural as well as the technological change involved in moving to a Managed Print Service

To understand this, we need to remember that introducing MPS involves a lot of changes in technology which are second nature to dealers and IT managers, but can be quite baffling to users who are not IT specialists. To help them understand and get the most out of the technology, we need to take account of the human factor, as well as the technical aspects of the hardware and software involved.

Understanding User Needs

Implementation of an MPS solution often involves changes to the devices people use for printing their documents. It may include removing personal printers from all, or a large proportion of users, and it may also result in greater use of departmental MFDs for printing. It is worth thinking about how users may react to these changes. Here are some quotes from real users, which are quite typical.

HR Manager in Financial Services
“I have to have a personal printer ... I’m always printing confidential documents.”

Secretary in Professional Services Organisation
“I don’t want to print on the MFD. It’s too far to walk to, and my prints are always getting lost in a pile of other people’s work.”

These types of comments can be addressed by a good MPS solution, but the point is that if you don’t consult users to find out how they work and what issues they face, you won’t know how to meet their needs. In that case, users are likely to be against the MPS solution from the word go, and they will very likely resist and undermine its objectives.

The starting point for most MPS engagements is the assessment. This should not just look at devices and technology, but should involve user interviews and consultations as well.

Lesson 1: Understand the users, as well as the technology ... at all levels

A Strategy Which Covers The Whole Organization

The working practices and needs of users vary widely between different types of organizations, and also between the different functions and departments within an organization. They print different types of documents, they use them in different ways, and they have differing levels of pressure on their time.

This can be illustrated by the following quotes from clients and their users from real-life MPS engagements

“When we agreed to take away people’s personal printers to reduce costs, we didn’t mean it for us.” - Executive Management Suite of an international consumer goods company

“I can’t have underwriters walking down the corridor to collect policy docs ... their time is worth €300/hour.” - Head of Underwriting in a major insurance company

“A user device ratio of 10:1 is fine in the factory, but not in the marketing department.” - Facilities Manager in a large manufacturing company

A good MPS solution is not “one size fits all”. It needs to reflect the working environment of the organization as a whole, and to take account of differing work practices and needs throughout the organization. The chances of successful implementation are improved if users are consulted and ideas are tested – resulting in a strategy which should be agreed and signed off by the Client.

Lesson 2: Get sign-off on a strategy which covers all parts of the organization... before designing the solution

Points of Reference

When asking users to change the way they work, you need to help them understand why they need to change, and how it is relevant to their work area. For example, two good ways to reduce costs are to increase the proportion of documents printed in duplex, and to cut down on unnecessary use of color printing – e.g. for email headers. However, it would look ridiculous if you asked a user printing mainly one page letters to use more duplex, or if you asked a marketing department responsible for printing promotional materials to cut out the use of color.

A good way to show users why the changes being requested are necessary and relevant to their work area is to provide benchmarks, showing them how their print usage compares with equivalent users elsewhere in their organization, and with best practice in their industry. This will then allow you to show them how they compare, and identify where and how they can improve.

Lesson 3: Benchmark current state vs. relevant best practice and highlight opportunities for improvement

Gradual Change

Most people find change difficult to cope with, and their natural instinct is to resist it – particularly when it is seen as being imposed from outside. People need time and patient explanation to get used to changes in working practices.

This need not be just a case of “I don’t want to change because we’ve always done it this way.” Rapid change can sometimes involve unnecessary disruption and cost.

Consider the case of the organization which implemented an MPS solution with a limited range of devices from one vendor, and decided to replace the entire existing fleet in one go. As a result, they ended up throwing away a large number of perfectly good, productive printers, which were less than two years old, incurring a very significant write-off cost.

In another case, an organization decided to remove all personal printers, because the cost per page of printing on them was too high. One manager protested that he only used his personal printer for occasional confidential documents, and that as the toner cartridge had just been replaced, it would last him another year at least. In that case, the cost per page was sunk, so the right solution would be to allow him to go on using the personal printer until it either ran out of toner, or malfunctioned – with the proviso that there would be no future supplies ordering or support for the device.

The best MPS implementations often involve a phased transition, to allow users to get accustomed to changes in working practices, and to avoid stupid and unnecessary waste, which can damage the credibility of the solution. There is almost always a trade-off between cost and user convenience, which needs to be understood and explained.

Lesson 4: Show a range of solutions with trade-offs, and a realistic transition path towards best practice

Practical Solutions

Many experienced practitioners of MPS will tell of solutions they have seen which looked great on paper, but which simply did not work in practice.

One of the most common reasons for impractical solutions is that they are based mainly on an electronic audit of device usage, using a network tool, and maybe some high level summary of device location by building and floor. The new solution then allocates devices and volumes by IP address, taking into account the total number of devices and average volume on each floor.

Such high-level solutions often miss important practical considerations. Consider the following examples, from real life.

• 1 MFP provided for 10 users on the same floor – didn’t take account of a dividing wall, so that 5 users would have to walk 50m to reach the MFD

• 1 MFP provided for 12 users on the same floor – but they were in 3 different departments, and only 1 department could readily access the MFD

A good MPS solution is based on an assessment which maps devices by physical location and department, and links this to usage data captured by an electronic audit. In this way the real usage needs and accessibility of devices is taken into account.

Lesson 5: Make solutions practical – take account of physical and organizational location of devices

This article will be continued on the next issue.

As a general manager and business development director, Steven Swift has a long track record of both building and turning around international businesses. He was instrumental in establishing Ricoh Global Services Europe as a €100M + business, and ran a €140M European business unit for Acco Brands. He has a broad background with experience throughout Europe, the Middle East, Africa, the Americas, and Asia Pacific. His diverse experience includes blue-chip consumer marketing at P&G + Mars, followed by corporate strategy responsibility with an FTSE 100 company. Swift is a graduate of Oxford University with an MA degree in chemistry. His language skills include fluent French. He has completed the Inchcape Senior Management Programme at INSEAD, and courses in corporate finance and M&A.