Hybrid Convergence, Transformative Business Models and Stagnant MpS
Here it is – 2012: the cusp of the end of the world as we know it. The MpS train is rolling, picking up steam and boldly going. It wasn’t so long ago one couldn’t find a soul who knew the difference between managed print services and the printer who printed wedding invitations. Today, the invitation printers are starting up “MpS practices,” pitching remote monitoring, desk-side toner delivery and service dispatch. Wow.
Back then, I would goad the office furniture folks getting into MpS: “What – are you going to deliver toner with the water?”
My snarky retort to the poor retail office supplies people was, “You’re selling MpS? Where is it? On a peg, next to the Wite–Out? Cleanup, aisle seven.”
Well, the mockery has ended.
Today, supplies stores and office furniture guys are offering MpS; old-school stationers are setting up global MpS programs, and – hang onto your hat for this one – the wide-format boys are getting in too. Oh, what a party it is turning out to be.
The floor is crowded, the music old, and the dance moves mundane. We’re getting burnt out.
Today, the LinkedIn forums are stuffed with questions posed and answered four years ago. Today, everybody who is in MpS has gone through at least three separate MpS training classes, and it doesn’t matter if the content was old, remanufactured, copier-sales classes; we’ve had enough. Brian Stevenson hit it pretty well with his “Death of the Hype?” blog here on The Imaging Channel. Personally – and I think Brian might feel the same way – I’ve forgotten more about MpS than the newbies know. And believe me, that is not a statement based in arrogance; it’s sad, really.
But let me tell you why you may want to take note: MpS is withering. This doesn’t mean you are fading; it means the world around you is shifting. Unlike the transformation from analog to digital, which wasn’t really a transformation, this conversion seems to plateau for three months, and then burst in a different direction.
You’ve been hearing more about the “consumerization of IT” and the explosive use of personally owned smartphones and iPads in the workplace. A study by Deloitte predicts 5 million tablet devices will be purchased in 2012 – a big number for sure, and it’s growing. Compare this with the several decades it took for more than 5 percent of households to have more than one car, phone, radio and/or TV. The world is moving fast, and the line between work and personal time is blurring into oblivion.
Five million tablets equate to the loss of cartridge sales, clicks and service calls. The exact number is not as important as visualizing the overall effect. Can you see it? Leaner organizations filled not with “mobile workforces” but “independent workforces” technologically adept and familiar in the transfer of information without printing. It’s happening right now so quickly, yet MpS appears to be moving in slow motion, almost standing still.
What to do?
Don’t get comfortable. Keep transforming. Fight stagnancy.
See your future by looking at your clients. They are getting leaner; maybe you should too. When they talk about utilizing technology to be more productive and fluid, perhaps you should look at reducing your overhead by getting all your employees set up remotely. Check out the latest tablets and figure out how to integrate to the cloud. Heck, take a look at setting up your dispatcher at his/her home. Then watch your customer satisfaction go up and your overhead drop. This isn’t brain surgery; it’s rocket science.
There is, of course, one more thing. All of this technology allowing you and your employees to work from anywhere in the world reduces overhead yet demands more from executive leadership/ownership – and not more reports or analyses. This movement demands that you break away from the “management by walking around” style. You must learn to trust again, and I’m not talking about trusting your employees or executive team. Don’t be stagnant; learn to trust yourself. Again.
Posted by Greg Walters on 01/23/2012