While digital workflows play a bigger role in today’s streamlined office environments, printing continues to be an important aspect of organizational efficiency. However, printing is quite often still overlooked while it quietly eats away at budgets and resources, like termites feasting on the wooden structures that hold your home together, unnoticed until your porch collapses underneath you! Any homeowner would deem protecting your home from termites is essential. Likewise, businesses should view managing their print environment essential as well.
Streamlining your office printing means looking for ways to optimize your print environment, reduce costs, enhance security and improve sustainability. The best way to take control and achieve these goals is with a proactive print management approach. That’s why we’ve put together your print management checklist for 2024 below to help you align your office printing practices with your bottom line and the environment. Let’s print smarter (not harder) in 2024!
Parmetech’s 8-Point Print Management Checklist for 2024
Even if you think you’ve already got a handle on your office printing, there is always room for improvement. No matter the size of your organization, or whether you’re an educational institution, healthcare organization, commercial business, or anywhere in between, we’ve put together an 8-point print management checklist to help get your organization print-ready as we move through 2024.
1. Assess Your Current Print Infrastructure
The first step in optimizing your print environment is understanding your starting point. This means conducting a thorough assessment of your current print environment. You can do this yourself or enlist the help of an experienced print partner (like Parmetech). Compile a list of the number and types of printers, MFDs, copiers, scanners, and fax devices in use in your organization and evaluate their age, functionality, and location.
2. Partner with a Managed Print Services Provider
In order to optimize your printing, you need to be managing your printing. If you’re already partnered with a managed print services provider, fantastic! Skip to the next step. If you’re not, it’s never too late to start – give the Parmetech team a call 😉 Outsourcing your print management to an MPS provider will give your organization access to cost-saving print solutions, centralized management and proactive monitoring of your print fleet.
3. Invest in a Print Management Software Solution
If you already have a print management software solution in place, such as PaperCut, you are ahead of the game! Please pass Go and move on to Step 4 of our print management checklist. If you do not, talk with your MPS provider about your current print needs and goals so that they can recommend a print management solution that is going to best fit your organization’s needs. Print management software is a worthwhile investment that provides visibility into usage data, costs, user behavior, and the types of documents being printed within your organizaiton. This empowers informed decisions, like identifying wasteful practices.
4. Compare Your Year-on-Year Print Data
Are any of your print devices sitting idle or barely being utilized? Did print volume spike unexpectedly? Are certain departments or users printing excessively? Use this detailed information provided by your print management software solution to help you make decisions about your print fleet such as removing or consolidating print devices, and setting realistic organizational goals for 2024.
5. Review Your Print Policies and Security
What type of print policies does your organization currently have in place? What policies need to be created to help your organization maximize print efficiency? Consider restricting color printing by user or department, setting duplex (double-sided) and black-and-white printing as default, and limiting print quotas for individuals or departments. You can also strengthen print security by implementing user authentication and access controls. This ensures that only authorized personnel can access specific printers and sensitive documents. If you need help with this step, make sure to utilize your print partner to get print policies set up with the correct user permissions and access.
6. Audit Your Remote Printing Setup
Do you still have remote or hybrid workers working from their home office(s)? Do these users have remote access to your printers? Do you know how much and how often they’re printing? You want to make sure anyone that has access to your organization’s print devices is printing responsibly and securely. If you do have a remote/hybrid workforce, now is the time to ensure that your print management solution and policies can accommodate flexible working conditions.
7. Embrace Efficiency and Sustainability
One of the main goals of print management is to reduce unnecessary and wasteful printing. Automate routine printing tasks, saving your organization money and your employees’ time. Additionally, help your team embrace sustainability by minimizing wasteful printing through print policies such as restricted color printing, defaulting to duplex printing, and using basic print scripting to send print jobs to the most cost-effective printer.
8. Educate Employees
Conduct training sessions and awareness programs to educate employees about the importance of print management. Provide tips on efficient printing practices, minimizing waste, and utilizing print features effectively to ensure you’re maximizing the investment you’ve made in print management.
Put Our Print Management Checklist into Action
Prioritizing our print management checklist as a main focus for your organization in 2024 will not only help to optimize efficiency but provide tangible cost savings and benefits. Print management goes beyond just saving money; it’s about creating a more efficient, sustainable, and cost-conscious work environment. By implementing the steps we’ve outlined above in our print management checklist, you can transform your printing habits in 2024 and beyond, leaving a lighter footprint on both your budget and the planet!
