The Road to 'Wise Print'–Part 3

Print the right quantity at the right quality for the right price

In my last posting, I proposed that by better managing your print environment, you can pay less for print, while having a dramatic environmental impact, and offered "print less" as the ultimate way to realize both benefits. I also claimed that my "itty bitty rules for why people print" are helping to keep print volumes from going down in spite of today's high levels of computerization. But, in fact, print volumes are actually going up!

This is due to a number of factors, not the least of which is that the proliferation–and in most cases the commoditization–of imaging devices such as printers, copiers and scanners has contributed significantly to the dramatic increase in print volumes in recent years.

Another reason is that because the speed and quality of office printers is much better these days, especially on the colour front, a wave of new applications is enabling the creation and printing of high-quality, highly customized marketing materials. As a result, a growing amount of work that has traditionally gone to commercial printers is now being printed internally, thus driving up print volumes internal to the organization.

It may come as a surprise, but Enterprise Content Management (ECM) systems are also driving up print volumes. It's easy to be misled into thinking that an ECM solution, or a collaboration solution such as Microsoft SharePoint, with documents being created, stored and shared electronically, would result in less hardcopy printing. Not so! Studies show that, on average, an electronic document is printed four times–it's a lot easier to distribute a document in electronic format, for example, so many more people get to see it and thus can choose to print it … ah, there's that Haptic Response kicking in again that I mentioned last time! By way of example, the studies indicate that when e-mail is introduced into an environment, printing increases by 40%.

Against this backdrop of increasing print volumes, and thus printing costs and environmental impact, Compugen's "print less" approach is resonating well with many customers. However, in the book I'm working on–"EcoWise Print: Helping the Earth AND your Bottom Line"–I extend this thinking to incorporate the whole gamut of additional best practices associated with optimizing and better managing a print environment. I call it "wise printing"—printing the right quantity at the right quality for the right cost.

In my next post, I'll finish up the first part of this series by exploring some of the ways to actually reduce print volumes, and lay the groundwork for exploring other aspects of a Managed Print Services environment.

The Road to ‘Wise Print' – Part 2

The least expensive and most environmentally friendly page is the one that never gets printed at all

In my last post, I mentioned the book I am writing–"EcoWise Printing™: Gaining the Full Value of Printing in a Responsible Manner"–to create awareness about the financial and environmental costs of printing, and offered some reasons why I think most organizations are still struggling to understand how much they actually print and how much it's costing them.

One reason for this that I didn't cover is that print always seems to be only on the periphery of IT's radar. It represents only 15% of IT's budget and 15% of help desk calls, so it often gets stuck at priority number four or five and never really gets addressed. But nowadays, throwing in the environmental card may be just enough to take print management mainstream for many organizations. In short, print represents a perfect overlap of business requirements and environmental requirements–by better managing your print environment, you can pay less for print, while having a dramatic environmental impact.

One print-management credo that Compugen appears to be the only firm espousing is "print less".

Put simply, we believe that the least expensive and most environmentally friendly page is the one that never gets printed at all! To this end, a key goal of our Enterprise Imaging group is to help customers print less. With today's high levels of computerization, however, why aren't print volumes already going down? Let me share what I call my "itty bitty rules for why people print":

1. Legality—businesses still generally require signed paper contracts–it will take more time before the courts are no longer loath to accept electronic signatures on documents. As a result, law offices, for example, are big printers;

2. Reality—it is a well-known human condition that people need to be able to see and touch something before they fully accept that it is real and safe–"this is really important, so I'd better print it and keep a copy". It's referred to as the Haptic Response;

3. Practicality—when it comes to versatility, you simply can't beat a piece of paper–you can fold it, you can stuff it into your pocket, you can read it anywhere, it takes no time to boot up, you can drop it without it breaking and the batteries never run low!

While these rules may not be causing print volumes to go up, they are certainly helping to keep them at their status quo. My next post will offer thoughts on why print volumes are actually going up and explore alternatives that reduce or avoid the need for hardcopy printing altogether.