Do you remember where you were when you first heard the “S word,” you know, “Solutions,” as it pertains to document imaging?
I can’t pinpoint my first time, but I have distinct memories of hearing the word at industry events stretching back years. Over time, the word “solutions” has become as ubiquitous as an open bar at an opening night dealer meeting cocktail reception. However, the true origin of the word remains one of the document imaging industry’s greatest mysteries. There is a movement in search of the word’s origins, but whether or not it will be found and verified through carbon dating is anybody’s guess. It won’t be for lack of trying, however.
As I write this a team of archeologists is combing through the ruins of the old NOMDA museum in Kansas City uncovering treasures such as rusted IBM Selectrics, crumbling Texas Instruments calculators, dusty DEX fax machines, and ancient copiers that were once known to overheat and burst into flames like Moses’ burning bush. Deep within the museum’s recesses are ancient manuscripts such as The Hanson Report and the complete works of Carl Lindquist as well as other scrolls touting new product introductions dating back to the early 1990’s. Industry analysts have been able to decipher the words “digital” and “connected” among the hyperbole in some of those yellowed scrolls and manuscripts, but to date have yet to find any trace of the word “solutions.”
Some document imaging industry scholars claim the word “solutions” originated in the Far East in conjunction with the first boxes shipped to this continent that did more than just produce a copy of a document. Another school of scholars say the word “solutions” is as American as baseball, apple pie, and despising the band Nickelback, and was likely uttered at a dealer meeting in some exotic climate by a long-forgotten industry executive in an attempt to make the software that was being sold with the box sound more impressive than it really was at the time.
That may be when the word first entered my lexicon. To my untrained ears it was a foreign language, but a language many of us would adopt and use in print and conversation even if we couldn’t quite figure out how to define it in a way that made sense.
It wasn’t until one of the document imaging industry’s ancient seers, Bob Sostilio, stepped forward and told it like it is as he is prone to do. I vividly remember him lamenting how much he despised the word “solutions” and how he completely nailed it when he said, “It’s software, stupid.” I admit, I’m embellishing his quote for effect because he didn’t use the word “stupid,” but doesn’t his explanation sound so much better with the word “stupid” in it?
Anyway, the definition was so obvious some of us missed the obviousness of its obviousness.
I bring up solutions because it’s now an industry standard, and because most of us understand what’s being said when someone uses the “S word.”
Coincidentally, solutions are the focus of our main feature in this issue as dealers across the country identify the solutions that are making a difference for them and their customers. But that’s not all. We’ll also be publishing additional solutions-related articles written by the solutions experts at Buyers Laboratory, Inc. throughout the month of October in our newsletter and online at www.enxmag.com. We think these articles will educate you about additional solutions that are impacting the channel now or may be doing so in the not too distant future…even if we never do discover the true origins of the word.
Thanks for reading.
