The impending introduction however has also brought carbon outputs to the front of mind for many businesses, with many now looking at ways to reduce their own footprint. These businesses aren’t just restricted to those affected by the tax, many SME’s and businesses with relatively small outputs are all looking at ways they too can do their bit for the environment.

One area which businesses can look towards to reduce its carbon footprint is printing. While many often think big scale when looking to ‘go green’ simple measures such as reducing printing consumption can have an impact on carbon outputs, and is very cost effective.

Studies show that each piece of A4 paper accounts for 8.4 grams of carbon per sheet, therefore if a company is printing 1000 pieces of paper per day, they are effectively emitting 8.4 kilograms of carbon – and this is just from the paper alone, not including the energy requirement to run old, archaic devices. Improving simple back office functions such as document management and overall printing practices, organisations can reduce carbon emissions by an average of 32 per cent.

Thinking about how you too can reduce your carbon footprint through printing? Below are a few quick tips on reducing carbon output:

• Prevention is better than a cure – Reducing overall use of paper, toner, equipment and energy is the most powerful environmental and financial strategy you can choose – far more effective than recycling. Much in the way preventing an injury is a far better option than any treatment. Keep that in mind next time you print off an unnecessary document.
• Double-up – Duplexing (printing on both sides of the page) and multi-up (printing more than one page per sheet) are standard features on most modern print devices. Few businesses however take advantage of these features. Businesses can literally half their printing output, and thus their carbon output from printing, by making these functions default settings.
• Solutions are the solution – Upstream has a number of solutions available to clients which can help reduce carbon outputs. While all Upstream solutions are successful in helping reduce printing output, the utrack solution allows you to track paper usage and carbon outputs resulting from printing. This information is shown in simple to understand terms, such as the equivalent number of trees used to power the printing and the equivalent amount of energy usage from a 50 watt light bulb in minutes. This can also be traced back to individual employees and departments.

To find out more information about how to reduce your printing carbon output, visit the Upstream Advantage Index.

In our experience, the answer is simple – yes.  Even if you think you don’t print much, chances are your employees are printing more than you realise.  The opportunities to improve efficiencies are therefore often huge.
A good example of this is the work we’ve been doing with Australian integrated services specialist SECUREcorp.
The business has printers based in over 200 remote offices across Australia and was keen to get Upstream on board to identify how it could improve the efficiency of this set up.

Following a detailed audit of current printing operations and implementation of Upstream managed print services, SECUREcorp has seen a printing device productivity improvement rate of 165 per cent.  In real-terms that’s led to a 17 per cent reduction in printing costs.  And it doesn’t stop there.  Over the next five years the business expects to save $50,000 on printing as a direct result of implementing managed print services.
For a business that needs to be efficient to remain competitive and profitable such cost savings can have a huge positive impact.
The next time you’re considering how best to improve business efficiencies don’t forget to consider printing – the savings might be bigger than you think.

To find our more on how your business can save on printing too, please visit Upstream’s advantage index.

Our CEO, Neil Tilley has a lot of experience in networking, and he has shared with us a few tips he has picked up himself, and from other, over time. He believes that any networking conversation can be initiated through three common topics. These are Family, Occupation and Recreation.

Some example questions surrounding these topics include

Family

Ask thoughtful questions about:

• Spouse
  • Married/engaged/partner, Partner information
  • Does your wife/husband/partner work? If so, where?
  • Interests?
• Kids:
  • Boys
  • Girls
  • Ages
  • School
  • Interests (sports, etc)
• Home Town:
  • Where did you grow up?
  • Where did you first go to school?
• General/Other:
  • I noticed the photo on your desk/wall ……
  • I have children myself…
  • My weekend was taken up with family ….
  • The school holidays are here again…..

Occupation /Education

• How long have you been in your current job?
• Where did you come from before this?
• Have you always worked in this industry?
• I’ve heard this is a great industry to work in……
• What was your old job?
• Did you go to university? If so, where? When?
• You obviously did some sort of tertiary training to end up in this position…….
• Its interesting that university education opens up so many more places to study particularly overseas…

Recreation

• What do they really love to do? (e.g. Sport, boats, fitness, pets, music, wine, arts, travel, beach)
  • Did your team win on the weekend? Did you get along to the game? How do you think they will go this year?
  • How was your weekend? What did you spend time doing?
  • Golf – do you play comp or social? Where do you play? How was your game? What sort of clubs/balls do you use? How often do you play?
  • Running around after the kids. That can take up all your time – I have kids myself – netball and rowing were the ones we did. How old are your kids? Schools? Competition they play in?
  • Do you have any holiday plans? Have you been to there before? Which hotel are you staying at?

 You will find most people are keen to talk about themselves and their interests; you might just need to shop around a bit to find the right ones. Below are also a few tips to keep in mind when having these conversations:

Tip 1. Finding out FOR information should be done as part of your conversation. Do not turn it into an inquisition!

Tip 2. Go for quality of information over quantity.

Tip 3. Delve deeper in to each subject if it gets a good response (don’t jump on to the next area or type of question if they answer with any sort of energy).

Tip 4. Ask questions appropriate for the person.

Tip 5. Try to identify with them, relate your own stories or interests when they are relative to the conversation.

Tip 7. Match the hatch. Use questions relevant to the current environment.

While there is no right or wrong way to network, most would agree the personal conversations are key to building trust and positive relationships. It is amazing the business opportunities which can arise from great relationships built from these initial conversations.

Do you have any other thoughts or tips on networking?

The paperless office concept is one that’s been talked about for many years but just how far are we off this becoming a reality? If recent news is anything to go by, it won’t take long. At Sydney-based Neutral Bay Public School, all year six pupils have been issued with an iPad as part of a $100,000 year-long trial. According to The Sydney Morning Herald, almost all classroom work will now be done on the hand-held device. Although the school admits the devices will not completely replace pen and paper, their introduction will significantly change the way in which students learn and produce work. Given these children will soon become our future workforce, their experiences are likely to shape the way in which they work later in life. Whether that’s taking notes in meetings electronically or reviewing everything using a tablet device or PC remains to be seen. What’s more certain however is just how much we can learn about future printing habits by going back to school.

To learn more about how your business can reduce paper consumption and head towards a paperless office visit www.upstream.com.au

If you stacked the millions of café loyalty cards distributed to Australians flat on top of each of other they’d extend about 2.5 times the height of Sydney Tower.  That’s a lot of cards – especially when you consider most of them will only be used once or end up lost.  It’s the same with office printing.  If you piled up all the documents your employees print each month it’s likely you’d be shocked by just how much is produced.

While the solution for the future of café loyalty may lie with smartphone apps rather
than physical cards, what about printing?  What steps can your business take to ensure employees print less?

The answer to that question is far from black and white.  Afterall, every business is
different.

Simple steps you can take to print less

1.       Audit what you print – If you’re going to have any
success in printing less a good place to start is by first assessing who is
printing what.  Does one department print a lot more than others?
What are they printing?  Is the printing in black and white or colour?
Are there individuals printing excessive amounts of documents?  Once you
know the answers to these questions, devising a print less strategy is much
easier.

2.       Set some policies – A lot of organisations talk the
talk when it comes to printing less but few formalise processes or educate
employees about what’s acceptable and not.  What policies look like will
depend on your business but typical policices include printing everything
double-sided and only using colour printers if absolutely critical.
Enforcing policies by regularly updating employees (especially new ones) is
crucial.

3.       Invest in tech – Sometimes educating employees
about why it’s important for environmental and economic reasons to print less
only gets you so far.  To have any real impact in reducing the amount
that’s printed organisations need to invest in solutions such as swipe and
release innovations that require employees to swipe an identification card
before a job is released from a printer.  Our experience shows
implementing such kit can help businesses shave around 20 per cent off their
annual printing bill.

What do you think?  Have you ever tried any of the steps outlined above to get your business to print less?

Did you set some New Year’s resolutions for your business this year?  If you did, it’s likely improving efficiencies and reducing costs feature more than once.  Sensible stuff given the economic pressures Australian businesses currently face. But how do you actually stick to your resolutions?

For resolutions we set in our personal lives success often hinges on determination and good habits. Business is no different.  If you don’t get into goodhabits from the outset, come July you’re unlikely to have achieved your goals.

And when it comes to reducing the amount you print and the associated costs, signing up to a managed print services contract can really help.

Managed print services good habits

Here’s an example of five habits our customers enjoy with
Upstream managed print services:

1. Comprehensive audits of printing levels so businesses can act on opportunities to improve efficiencies.  On average we are able to
   save customers 30 per cent on printing costs.
2. Real-time insight into how much is being printed across a business.  This gives organisations complete visibility
   into who is printing what so they can get a handle on printing levels.
3. Automatic toner ordering so there’s no need for a business to worry about stocking
   up on vital supplies or order toner manually.
4. Swipe and release printing solutions that require employees to swipe ID cards before a job is released.  The impact this has on reducing printing levels is often particularly significant.
5. Ongoing customer account reviews that ensure we’re best addressing the needs and challenges a business faces

If you’re keen to cut costs and improving the efficiency of  your business by getting into good habits you could do a lot worse than getting into managed print services.

There are many types of printing personalities, and today I’d like to talk about just a few of them.

We all know that reducing your printing is good for the environment and great for the bottom line;  it’s something we’ve talked about on here many times before (for example, in the Think Before You Print article).  We’ve also talked a lot about the range of solutions available to help better manage print levels, paper consumption etc.

What we haven’t talked about in any huge detail (but what’s certainly important) is human behaviour.  If your employees aren’t on board in terms of printing less then solutions and printing audits will only take you so far.  To really make a difference, employees need to buy-in to a printing reduction strategy.

Today I thought I’d have a bit of fun by having a go at identifying some personality types when it comes to office printing.  Do you recognise yourself or any of your colleagues? I bet you do

The Print-all – Perhaps the most wasteful of all office staff members who prints, the ‘Print all’ prints anything and everything.  Whether it’s emails, large detailed reports or agendas for meetings, if it’s not printed for review the ‘Print all’ can’t relax.  In fact, the ‘Print all’ will often print so much that they forget what they sent to print, leaving office printers overflowing with uncollected documents at the end of each day.

The Lazy printer – This staff member – the lazy printer – doesn’t necessarily print more than anyone else in the office, but when they do, expect multiple copies to hit the printer.  That’s because rather than previewing documents before hitting “print”, the ‘Lazy printer’ prefers instead to print them than to check formatting.  This trial and error approach can often result in reams of paper being wasted until the desired result is achieved.  What’s more, the lazy printer will often print single-sided and sometimes straight to colour simply because they haven’t changed their default print settings.

The Print Wrecker – Again, the ‘Print wrecker’ isn’t necessarily a heavy printer but for some reason they always seem to be the one using the printer when it malfunctions.  While it’s difficult to determine what, if anything, the ‘Print wrecker’ does to cause such disruption when printer problems arise, they’re often hovering nervously nearby.

The Eco printer – The most frugal printer of them all, the ‘Eco-printer’ only prints what’s absolutely necessary.  When they do print expect the document to be double-sided, black and white and full with text.  For the ‘Eco-printer’, white space is wasted space.  More often than not, the ‘Eco-printer’ will be vocal in encouraging others to print less too.  Unfortunately for most organisations, ‘Eco-printers’ are few and far between and as such their efforts are frequently met with resistance.

So – do any of these make you think of yourself, colleagues or members of staff?

Want to read more about printing less? See more in this print less category

Did you recognise yourself in any of these printing personalities?

Actually, I don’t know about you, but I think I’ve seen myself as each one of those printing personalities at one time or another; scary thought.

Summer is round the corner and personal trainers across the nation are rubbing their hands at the prospect of new clients wanting to shift the kilos before beach season is upon us.

This could also be true for your business. Take logistics organisations as an example:

Streamlining a supply chain can be quite easily compared to losing weight: it’s often the first 80 per cent that’s easy – it’s the remaining 20 per cent that presents the real challenge. This is the part that requires true discipline, dedication and hard work.

Streamlining supply chain logistics is not a new concept; it has been on the radar as long as those extra kilos. However, there are some fundamentals which are often overlooked. For all the effort and investment that goes into scheduling tools and other equipment, quite often there are paper based systems acting as bottlenecks. But, there are solutions:

• Electronic forms eliminate pre-printed forms and documents by storing templates and imagery at the printer. This helps to automate time-intensive processes connected to printing labels, delivery dockets, pay slips and any other forms relevant to your organisation.
• Optical Character Recognition and Barcode Technology can be used to instantly archive and retrieve all documents. Storing documents enables immediate access to archived documents and information
• The most important factor of all however is customisation. This enables the seamless interaction of the entire solution with a company’s ERP system.

Conclusions for your supply chain

At the end of the day, no company wants to be weighed down by unwanted waste, so start by cutting down on waste paper, review your supply chain, and print less.

You’d probably think that choosing a printer is a simple task and not one worth spending a huge amount of time on. But when you think about how much a printer is used within your business and how reliant your employees are on printing documents, invoices, and so on, you might want to think twice before making a snap-decision.

Most people take the printer for granted, until it runs out of paper or toner, or stops working as a result of some obscure error. It’s at these times that you realise just how important the printer is.

Every year hundreds of new models flood the marketplace, with varying price tags and functionality, which makes choosing a new printer quite difficult. Deciding which one to pick based on pricing and spec is of course important but what’s often overlooked is the ongoing running cost. If a printer is not fit for purpose you can quickly find yourself wasting time and energy getting it fixed.

Now, we’d naturally suggest you follow the managed print services route if you’re unsure which printers to pick. This not only saves you time deciding which one to buy but also relieves you of the headaches associated with maintaining a fleet long-term.

Here’s some of the considerations we go through when working with customers to pick the most appropriate machine to meet their needs …

Printer volume
In businesses some teams need to print more than others so it’s important the office set up can meet their needs. For teams that print a lot on a regular basis it’s important to select a printer that can handle the loads put upon it – especially at peak times.

Privacy and security
While a communal, networked printer will be more cost effective than separate individual printers, there may be times where the privacy of documents necessitates a small amount of ‘private’ printers. For example, if you’re operating an open plan office it might make sense for the HR and Finance directors to have their own machines.

Document type
What your organisation prints is of course an important factor to keep in mind. If a lot of printing is done in black and white then black and white machines are naturally the preferred the option.

Processes for choosing a new printer
Businesses today often consider the information flow within their organisation at a software level without really thinking about how that information is printed.  Given invoices, delivery dockets and the like are crucial to business processes it’s worth considering how best to print these.  For example, it might be worth investing in a multi-function device that allows employees to quickly print forms directly at the machine.  This not only makes accessing forms easier but cuts down on unnecessary printing.

Choosing a new printer – Conclusion

I hope the information above helps in your decision-making. Have you had to go through this recently? I’d love to hear your thoughts on choosing a new printer, please post a Comment below – thanks in advance.

There’s been a lot of objection in the media recently surrounding BHP Billiton’s newly released office policy that includes restrictions on everything from post-it notes and mobile phone ringtones to the consumption of foods with a strong odour. The policy also states the amount of paper that should be left to sit on desks and even outlines that the use of iPods within the office is forbidden.

While a lot of companies have a ‘clean desk policy’ in operation, it is the detail with which BHP outlined its policy that intrigued outsiders. Many would argue that actions such as not eating smelly foods and keeping mobile phone ringtones on a low volume would be considered common courtesy; however BHP deemed it necessary to put these into writing.  According to BHP, the rules were outlined to improve efficiency and allow for “desk hopping” for those who travel.

Sounds good but problems can arise from having such stringent policies on office behaviour. Employee morale, for instance, can suffer from working in such a sterile environment, with research showing a clean desk can “leave employees with a smaller brain”. Given estimations you spend over 22% of your life at work and over 91,250 hours in a total working life, surely there’s an argument that making your desk ‘homely’ can improve productivity?

At Upstream we allow our employees to express themselves openly and aim to build a better company culture. The basis of such workplace activities needs to be trust, and we entrust our employees to know their boundaries and use their best judgement in common courtesy.

That isn’t to say we don’t see the value of keeping desks clutter free – especially when it comes to printing.  Keeping desks free of paper isn’t just about tidiness – it’s about business efficiency.  That’s why we’re currently working with organisations across Australia to move them away from paper filing toward electronic filing systems.  Moving toward electronic filing makes it easier to access documents, track the flow of information and reduce the wasted costs and resources associated with printing materials.  The fact it also cuts down on the amount of paper stored on employees’ clean desks is a bonus.

Clean desk conclusion?

So, what do you think?  Are clean desks the key to greater efficiencies or are organisations better to first focus efforts on the cause of messy desks?