The American Forest & Paper Association recently released a report entitle “Documenting the Value of Paper.” As more and more once-printed items move into the digital space, the future of printed materials remains in question. This report addresses that question by offering five distinct ways that paper enriches lives which will likely not diminish in the future. It got me thinking – maybe there is still a market for paper, and therefore and market for print… what do YOU think?

Five Dimensions presented by AF&PA (and some interesting highlights from the report):

1. Paper informs as a learning tool. Studies show that elementary aged students actually perform better at reading comprehension when reading from paper-based books compared to e-books. Students find it easier and more helpful to employ “active” reading habits (skimming, reading subtitles first, highlighting, underlining, annotating, etc.) in paper-based books.
2. 2.       Paper reaches customers. Direct mail is still cited as the communication channel with the highest ROI for customer contact and retention in B2C marketing, followed by email. A Nielson survey found that respondent’s top three preferences for receiving advertising were paper-based – direct mail, newspapers, and in-store printed displays. Consumers who receive a printed catalog in the mail are more likely to shop online than those who do not receive the catalog. More and more people are “opting out” of email marketing lists.  
3. Paper is a permanent record for milestones in life. Paper is still used for official documents (birth certificates, graduation diplomas, titles to cars, etc.) Paper also preserves many of life’s meaningful personal moments – think family photos, baby books, childhood artwork, handwritten letters, greeting cards, etc.
4. Paper is a secure form of documentation and communication. Information stored on paper is easily accessible over a long period of time and does not need to be continuously migrated to newer technologies. Online privacy of personal information and documents is a growing concern. Electronic forms of communicating are less secure than printed forms and are open to hacking, data breaches, identity theft and fraud. In many polls, people generally prefer to have a paper version of important documents.
5. Paper is a sustainable choice. The paper industry supports sustainable forestry practices and is increasing its recovery of paper and use of recycled fiber. Recent lifecycle assessment studies show that environmental impact of paper and electronic text and communication are relatively similar.

Of course this report naturally favors supporting the role of paper and printed materials in society (it is posted on AF&PA’s website after all). Nonetheless, the information presented is based on legitimate resources and verified studies which provide an interesting literature review and summary of information that already exists. So don’t just take it from me… see for yourself!

About this time last year I posted a release about the new retail sales branch opened by Horizon Blue Cross Blue Shield of New Jersey. Horizon was one of the first health insurance companies to take a “retail” approach to selling individual insurance policies under the then newly approved Affordable Care Act.

In May of 212, Forbes reported on the partnership between Aetna and Costco to offer the Costco Personal Health Insurance medical and dental program.  Consumers who buy the Aetna coverage through Costco will get extra discounts when they buy prescriptions through Costco pharmacies. Costo had already developed banking partnerships to allow them to sell mortgages.

This year we are starting to see the life insurance industry, particularly products geared to lower and middle income consumers, pursue retail sales opportunities. MetLife, for example, has set up kiosks in hundreds of Walmart stores. Unlike the Horizon branch which has specially trained staff to answer questions, visitors to a MetLife kiosk pick up their “box of insurance” in the form of a prepaid card and take it to the checkout. They then have to call MetLife’s toll-free number to answer health questions posed by a life agent. If the customer qualifies for coverage, the policy is activated, otherwise the card can be returned for a full refund.

Two key things we can learn from this trend:

1. As more insurance companies start courting retail partners as distribution channels, or opening up direct branches, they will need a new “retail approach” to their communications as well. This opens up new opportunities for graphic arts services like signage, sell sheets, and packaging for direct branches. It should also increase potential for transaction printers to offer statement marketing to highlight approved retail partners. Design services are a potential “foot in the door” as so much new material will need to be developed for the retail audience.

2. Partnerships, particularly distribution partnerships, can be wonderful things. Printers and other business communications professionals may also find value in new distribution channels and regional partnerships. Insurers are able to reach a broader audience that will pay a premium for convenience through retail relationships. Perhaps there are similar opportunities out there for your business.

If retail and insurance are getting married, let’s crash the wedding or at least get some good dating advice.

Elizabeth Gooding is the President of Gooding Communications Group and editor of the Insight Forums blog. She writes and speaks and provides training on trends and opportunities for business communications professionals within regulated vertical industries.

Last week, Canon hosted a cross-section of prominent companies from the graphic arts, book, direct mail and transaction printing segments in Munich Germany. I was pleased to be invited, along with other expert presenters from Gartner, InfoTrends, InterQuest, IT Strategies, Madison Advisors and NAPL. The  Leadership  Forum was held at Canon’s impressive 14,000 square foot Customer Experience Center where several cutsheet toner presses and a huge array of high-volume, continuous feed inkjet presses were configured as custom application demonstrations. I had ample opportunity to network with attendees and learn what was driving them to update their technology. While not specifically an inkjet event, the majority of attendees at the Leadership Forum were evaluating the transition to inkjet or expanding on an existing inkjet implementation. The top three reasons cited:

• Speed/Time to market requirements;
• Full-color, white paper efficiencies;
• Plans to enter new markets.

My charter was to prepare a wrap-up session on “Preparing Your Business for Inkjet ” along with two customers; Bob Radzis of SG360 (a direct mailer) and Mike McCombs of RevSpring (a transaction printer.) These two gentlemen shared their successes with transitioning to inkjet along with candid feedback on the challenges they faced as early adopters. Dialogue with attendees focused on perceived challenges with inkjet adoption but, there were very few actual barriers cited. Some key take-aways were:

• Inkjet has clearly reached a tipping point among high-volume printers of variable applications;
• Quality is no longer perceived as a barrier to adoption;
• Customers were encouraged by the increasing variety and availability of inkjet papers and seemed confident that the trend would continue;
• Customer seemed to recognize that the right workflow solution was as critical as selecting the right press but were less aware of the critical tradeoffs between paper selection and ink usage;
• The major remaining obstacle to inkjet adoption is production volume. Mid-volume companies often can’t generate the business case for inkjet.

While this was a working trip for me, it was also an opportunity to attend great sessions covering the social, economic and technical factors that are changing the print industry in general, as well as, drill-down sessions on key drivers of change in book printing, direct mail and transaction printing specifically. Whether you are a print provider or a consultant there is constantly more to learn in our industry and the Canon Leadership Forum did a great job of blending business, technical and market related content with product demonstrations and networking opportunities. If you ever have the opportunity to visit Canon’s CEC, or attend a future Leadership Forum I highly recommend the trip.

Elizabeth Gooding is the President of Gooding Communications Group and editor of the Insight Forums blog. She writes and speaks and provides training on trends and opportunities for business communications professionals within regulated vertical industries.

It’s natural to avoid asking for help.

You worry that it makes you appear weak. That it makes you appear ignorant or uninformed. Like you can’t do your job, or are just plain unable to get the job done. Asking for help doesn’t have to be a bad thing. In fact, it can lead to innovative ideas, new collaborations and more. But do you know when it’s time to ask for help?

It’s time to ask for help when:

• You need to think outside the box. You may be a highly creative person, but after a while it’s easy to get in a rut. 
• By not asking for help, you put your company in a bad position. You should never let fear or pride get in the way of doing what is right for your company. If you need help from someone within your department or a different department, just go for it. You know your colleagues. And perhaps one choice is better than another. But don’t forgo help and jeopardize the business (and perhaps your job).
• You need clarification. Sometimes, you may just need something cleared up. A quick question or two may do the trick. If you refuse to ask others for a little clarification, you will be making decisions based on erroneous assumptions. And that makes for bad business.
• You don’t understand what is being asked of you. This can come from inside the company or outside. And this goes hand-in-hand with clarification. If you don’t understand what is being asked, then you obviously won’t understand what your next step to take is.
• You don’t know how to do what is being asked of you. This seems fairly obvious. But it’s easy for someone to get embarrassed or think he / she will come across as looking inept when admitting help is needed. But it’s best to ask and then learn how to do it, rather than attempt to do things when you don’t know how.
• You are totally overextended and crunched by time. Sometimes it feels as if everything falls in your lap at one time. You are only one person. It’s okay to reach out and ask for some help to get things done, especially when deadlines are looming.

So you know you need to ask for help. But how? Here are a few tips on getting professional assistance.

• Ask from a point of strength, not fear. Don’t play dumb and don’t go in asking with your proverbial tail between your legs. Two heads are better than one, right? And the other employees in your company are part of the same team – yours. So ask for help from one team member to another.
• Asking for help, means asking for help – not having another person shoulder the load. If you are late on a deadline and need help closing a deal, then ask for that help. But you should never offload the bulk of your responsibilities onto another.
• Show your appreciation. When you ask for help, make it clear that you are very appreciative if your colleague can provide assistance. After, express your gratitude. Write a personal note. Get your teammate a cup of coffee or offer to treat for lunch. A little appreciation goes a long way and will result in willing helpers later on.

On April 3rd, your business can get a little help from Dr. Joe Webb and Wayne Lynn in a free, 60 minute webinar. > > > 

There nearly 1 million insurance agents and brokers employed in the U.S. and you would think that they would be fiercely competitive with each other. You’d be wrong.  In fact, more and more, agencies are merging, consolidating and forming agency networks to compete with the real enemy – Direct Writers. Many large carriers with captive agency forces or who sell insurance directly online or over the phone, “Direct Writers,” spend as much as $200 to $700 million per year on advertising, particularly in the home and auto insurance market. According to estimates from Independent Insurance Agents & Brokers of America and A.M. Best Co. direct writers dominated the overall personal lines market in 2010 writing over 53 percent of total premium. Independent agents are fighting back and asserting their value to insurance customers.

“Personal touch is what will keep independent agents alive in the future,” says Christopher Misterka, Marketing Coordinator with the Kaplansky Insurance Agency which has offices in 11 locations and has experienced 13% growth in each of the past 2 years. Misterka says that client correspondence used to be primarily letters but, “now it’s primarily email, social media and a monthly online newsletter that offers customer education on timely issues like potential tax scams during tax season.” While Kaplansky has moved most of their personal lines marketing online due to the size of the household audience they want to reach, they continue to prospect for commercial clients using direct mail. To keep content fresh and campaigns timely, Misterka engaged an insurance specialty organization called Agency Revolution with professional writers, an existing library of content and a digital marketing platform that enables quick generation of marketing campaigns.

Angelyn Treutel, President of SouthGroup Insurance agrees that providing educational content is critical in positioning an agency well with customers and that consistency of communication with the customer builds trust. Her organization leverages the Trusted Choice solution available through the IA&B however; their direct marketing is all managed in-house. “We use a multi-channel, multi-touch approach recognizing that it may take 2 or 3 or 4 touches before a customer takes action,” says Treutel. “We need multi-channel because different customers are in all different places,” relative to their acceptance of online versus print communications. SouthGroup has had particular success with personalized direct mail that includes pictures of agents as part of the mailing. Personalization, careful segmentation of campaigns and ensuring that the customer never gets the exact same message twice are important in crafting an effective campaign according to Treutel.

Differentiation between segments of the P&C business such as commercial versus personal lines is one simple method, but many agencies are looking deeper at markets, customers and the communication preferences of individuals. For example, the High-Net-Worth Personal Lines market is more often served by independent agents than direct writers as the agencies give affluent customers the specialized services they have come to expect. In this market, agencies can create campaigns to educate customers on the superior products, pricing, loss prevention services and risk management services that are available through carriers that specialize in the HNW market versus more generic solutions from direct writers. Since many HNW clients are also business owners or senior executives, there are great opportunities to cross sell HNW personal lines insurance to commercial clients and vice versa. Independent agents currently sell the lion’s share of premium in the commercial market and can strengthen that position by building trusted personal relationships with business owners and managers.

Creating innovative communications has historically not been a core competency of insurance agencies but most recognize that this needs to change. As the demand for more effective and consistent customer touches continues to grow, agencies are looking for partners to help them execute regular, cost effective communications programs with their customers. If you are a service provider with a truly robust multi-channel offer and the strategic services to become an agent of change in the P&C industry – opportunities abound. If your offering is not quite as developed, don’t despair, there are still opportunities to pursue business from the “Agency Agencies” that are primarily focused on providing marketing content and digital distribution, but typically outsource printing and mailing services. As agencies cooperate and grow larger, the opportunities to serve them grow larger as well.

Elizabeth Gooding is the President of Gooding Communications Group and editor of the Insight Forums blog. She writes and speaks and provides training on trends and opportunities for business communications professionals within regulated vertical industries.

Change happens whether we take action or not, as evidenced by our country’s political gridlock. Even when people choose to stay on their own sides for whatever the reason, and do not even attempt to collaborate, change is still going to happen.  The consequence of not working together to find a compromise is usually that the outcome really does not benefit anyone. 

 In an article titled Collaborating for Change – Monkey Say, Monkey Do,  Graham Brown-Martin, the founder of Learning Without Frontiers shares the opinion that society operates within a series of mechanisms or under superstructures that maintain the status quo. His focus is on Education Systems but I believe the same applies or even originates in the broader industrial base.  In fact Brown-Martin says, “Our assessment system is broken. We routinely deploy fact-based curricula and examinations that positively discriminate against collaboration. How do we assess collaboration? The fact is that we don’t, because collaboration isn’t valued in our industrial education systems.”  The suggestion is that to effect change and collaboration, the assessment system where people work together to solve a challenge using the digital tools of this century that will form part of their future lives.”   

In another article, Don Trapscott, Curator, Social Media Week, says “Let’s face it. The world is broken and the industrial economy and many of its industries and organizations have finally run out of gas, from newspapers and old models of financial services to our energy grid, transportation systems and institutions for global cooperation and problem solving.” This seems very disturbing yet undeniable; we face changing how banks, healthcare institutions and media itself interacts and communicates with its customers and employees.  Trapscott goes on to say, “Fortunately, for the first time in history, people everywhere can participate fully in creating a sustainable future. We are now building the collective intelligence to rethink many industries and sectors of society around the principles of collaboration.”

In our work improving business performance, we have found over and over that it takes a process to manage the change process, be it implementing new technologies and capabilities, or changing the markets served.  A tool set is needed to break down silos and get beyond self-interest.  Utilizing a process accounting for and embracing functional needs is required – structured collaboration!  Establish common goals, work together on the task definition and responsibilities, hold each other accountable, and measure the team’s results.  Stop the blame game!

Document creation and delivery is an environment where we were slow to change and yet change is happening. The outcome is not always good because of resistance to the inevitable.  When are we going to learn we cannot stop change, but we can collaborate to adapt and optimize the outcomes of change?  What are you doing in your business to promote collaborating to solve problems, and competing less with each other internally and externally? 

Property and Casualty (P&C) Insurance carriers are in the business of assessing risk; risk of theft, damage, injury, professional malpractice and catastrophe as well as investment risk. They make their money by laying odds on the likelihood that things will go sideways for their customers and that they will earn enough money by investing the pool of premium dollars to pay out on the bet if things do. Lately it seems that climate change is blowing up all the models for setting the odds of a natural disaster and insurers are dealing with defining and delineating coverage for new threats like cyber-terrorism that have completely changed the game.

The core systems most insurers have in place are woefully inadequate to handle the scope and pace of this new insurance game. In order to keep up, companies have built add-on modules and work-arounds to their core systems, often relying on Microsoft Excel or Microsoft Access “Band-Aids” to keep business moving. Many carriers that have upgraded their core systems did it on a “go-forward” basis leaving existing business on the old policy administration or claims system and writing new business on the new platform. At some companies this has happened more than once and there are now several “core” systems in production for different lines of business. All of the Band-Aids, work-arounds and go-forward solutions have left data scattered in multiple repositories just when carriers need data in one place more than ever.

In order to adequately assess risk, insurance carriers need large amounts of policy, claims, fraud and customer demographic data all in one place so that they can use risk modeling and data analytics to determine which types of risk are profitable to insure.  According to Accenture’s  2012 North American Claims Investment Survey, 54% of P&C insurers have core systems that are more than five years old, 66% say their claims systems are not optimized to collect and analyze data and 78% regard their capabilities inadequate to manage new forms and levels of risk, such as those presented by cybercrime, terrorism and increasingly frequent and severe natural catastrophes. So, after years of avoiding the disruption, expense and well – risk of a major core systems upgrade many companies have realized that they just can’t avoid taking the leap. A small study of 37 insurance carriers by Novarica indicated that 25 percent of large P&C insurers and more than 40 percent of midsize carriers were in the middle of converting their policy administration systems or planning to start a conversion at the end of 2011.

Keep in mind that the typical core systems upgrade will take from an incredibly fast eighteen months to a more typical three years plus to complete, depending on the number of undocumented work-arounds that need to be incorporated into the system and the level of data conversion to be completed. This means that a large percentage of the industry is either planning a core system upgrade or in the midst of completing one. And what comes out of these systems you ask? Documents, lots and lots of documents: quotes, policies, premium invoices, notices, claims reports, payments and more.

Opportunities abound for reducing the costs of producing documents in parallel with core systems conversion. Bringing systems together increases the opportunity for postal optimization, targeting analytics and improvements to the design of the documents themselves. The core systems upgrades have a larger implication as well; they enable insurers to develop more segmented and personalized products to appeal to different age, risk, ethnic and geographic groups of consumers. Direct marketing and agency marketing support is becoming more tailored and personalized as well with multi-touch, multi-channel and multi-language campaigns hitting the paper, airwaves and cyberspace simultaneously.

P&C Insurers are expected to spend an average of 17.5 million on Claims System upgrades alone. This seems like a pretty substantial number until you consider that the top 16 P&C insurers spend an average of $315 million on advertising each. GEICO alone spent over $993 million on advertising in 2011. This is not counting direct marketing spend – P&C Affinity Mail alone exceeded 500 million mailings in 2011 according to Mintel Comperemedia.

Savvy service providers are positioning themselves to help insures take advantage of newly upgraded systems and a wealth of new data to improve their customer experience throughout the insurance lifecycle. With their plates full to overflowing with core systems conversion initiatives, insurers need help to ensure that the tangible representation of their value to consumers – namely insurance documents – are not put at risk by the very projects intended to reduce risk. Now is the time to show insurers how to redirect some of those advertising dollars toward investments in customer experience and cross-sell using low-risk, high-reward solutions like direct mail, statement marketing and personalized collateral in tandem with QR codes and other calls to action that drive social media engagement and leverage consumers interest in mobile insurance applications. If your company isn’t positioned to help them, maybe you should be looking at some core systems upgrades too.

Elizabeth Gooding is the President of Gooding Communications Group and the Editor of InsightForums.com. She covers business communications trends in highly regulated industries such as insurance, financial services, healthcare and telecommunications.

Running a hospital or healthcare practice is already labor and capital intensive, highly regulated and impenetrably complex. The Affordable Care Act and the growing trend toward consumerism has added constant change to the list of industry challenges. While the ACA itself is the law of the land and implementation is moving forward, the foundational elements to be implemented are as firm as warm Jell-O. Change is the new normal:

• States may or may not expand their Medicaid programs;
• Health Insurance Exchanges (HIX) may be set up by states or by the Federal government in certain states, and the Federal HIX implementation structure is not fully defined;
• Accountable Care Organizations (ACOs) are being formed and tested in near real-time;
• Definitions of Essential Health Benefits (EHBs) can vary by state and guidance is required;
• The “standard” 8 pages format for the newly mandated Summary of Benefits & Coverage (SBC) can now be any length determined necessary by insurance companies (Note: the purpose of this new, somewhat redundant, document was to provide a standardized plan comparison for consumers.)

Provider’s biggest concern may be potential changes and interpretations surrounding “Necessary Care.” According to the Journal of the American Medical Association, “care that did not show a proven health benefit, and where a less costly alternative was not used,” accounted for between $158 billion and $226 billion in 2011. Proposed regulation around necessary care shifts financial risk to doctors and hospitals and this, along with other regulations and stricter Medicare compliance requirements, will require investment in Electronic Health Records (EHR) and other major infrastructure upgrades that smaller providers are not equipped to fund.

The combination of independent providers’ flight from risk, a need to dramatically reduce costs and increased capital requirements is driving the next big source of change: Mergers and Acquisitions.

Market consolidation

The pace of consolidation is mind boggling: the annualized number of hospital acquisitions or mergers nearly doubled between 2009 and 2012. Plus, physicians are merging with health plans and hospitals, hospitals are merging with hospitals and long-term care providers, health insurers are investing in hospitals and physician practices. Not to mention non-provider consolidation in biotech and pharmaceutical manufacturers, disease management companies and all along the healthcare supply chain. In an interview with The Huffington Post, Robert Laszewski,  president of Health Policy and Strategy Associates referred to the M&A climate in healthcare as an arms race in which the players are merging into bigger entities in hopes of restraining their own costs and grabbing larger shares of the markets.

According to PWC’s Healthcare Executive Agenda consolidation is not a panacea and even small healthcare mergers carry a lot of risk. We’ve seen the same thing in the merger-prone print industry – nearly two-thirds of deals do not meet pre-merger expectations. This lack of stellar success is not likely to stem the tide of mergers; however, it does present many opportunities for print service providers and industry consultants to make these newly consolidated entities more successful. Here are a few thoughts:

• While individual providers and provider groups have low volumes of communications, larger merged-entities have volumes that are more attractive for outsourcing.
• Newly formed entities have redundant documents and systems that need to be unified or eliminated in order to gain the sought-after costs savings from the merger. Consultants and Outsourcers can help to meet those needs more quickly.
• The ability to consolidate volumes, processes and technology allows outsources to deliver immediate savings from house holding, postal optimization, white paper processing and electronic services such as electronic payment and presentment.

What needs to happen after a merger? Plenty of situations where service providers can add value:

• Determine brand strategy. Research demonstrates that capital markets respond more favorably to brand strategies that involve combining elements of the two companies than strategies that replace one entirely or leave both untouched. This requires an analysis of the strength of both companies.
• In parallel with re-branding considerations, a business communications audit needs to be performed to identify the people, processes and technology used for generating business documents. This audit should generate documentation on current processes and recommendations for leveraging the best practices within each firm, the combined volumes of the merged firms and eliminating redundancies.
• New branding (and likely new regulatory language) will need to be incorporated in the systems that are proposed to be maintained going forward. Efficient implementation will typically require an additional analysis and redesign step to create document standards and streamline implementation.

The newly merged company will likely also be evaluating their supply chain; eliminating vendors or “right-sizing” with vendors that fit their new status as a larger organization. The ability to support these firms with the analysis and streamlining processes makes it more likely that you will be considered for additional outsourcing opportunities rather than dropped from the vendor list.

While it would be prudent for these companies to go through a detailed pre-merger fit and synergy analysis from both a financial and a customer perspective – most often the customer and customer communications strategy is in that “warm Jell-O” mentioned earlier. The opportunity to help companies evaluate these issues pre-merger or immediately post-merger can be of huge benefit in achieving the hoped-for cost savings and also maintaining market share by communicating effectively with customers and making sure the bills get paid amidst the merger madness. Let’s call that preventative care.

The bottom line is that if constant change is the new normal for health care providers, there will be constant opportunities for companies who can help them deal with those changes.

Editor’s Note: Additional information on changes in the Health care industry is available from our sponsor, Canon Solutions America. See the PressGo! Industry Guide to Healthcare.

Elizabeth Gooding is the president of Gooding Communications Group and the editor of InsightForums.com helping clients in highly regulated industries—and the service providers they depend on— to optimize the designs, processes and production technology used for multi-channel communications.

Being at Graph Expo this year, I was interested to see how big of a topic environmental sustainability was. So many industry-leading printing equipment manufacturers were eager to demonstrate their environmentally responsible solutions. The industry has come under pressure in recent years as the growing trend to go “paperless” takes off. But what I was surprised to learn, and I’m hoping many others will be too, is that a number of myths exist regarding the sustainability of paper and the printing industry. Thanks to information I picked up in one booth from Two Sides (www.twosides.us), I engaged in my own version of myth-busters and would like to share the same with you.

Myth: Making paper destroys forests.
Fact: Paper production supports sustainable forest management and depends on sustainable forest growth to provide a reliable supple of wood fiber.

Myth: Making paper is bad for the environment.
Fact: Paper is one of the few truly sustainable products because it is made from a natural resource that is renewable and recyclable. Furthermore, paper is one of the most recycled products in the world.

Myth: Making paper consumes a considerable amount of energy.
Fact: While this true, nearly 2/3 of the energy used is self-generated using renewable carbon-neutral biomass. Most U.S. pulp and paper mills are self-sufficient and some even supply excess energy to the electric utility grid.

Myth: Harvesting trees to make paper is bad.
Fact: Sustainable forest management can actually benefit people and the planet by supporting jobs and reducing development.

Myth: Electronic communication is more environmentally friendly than print and paper.
Fact: This is not necessarily true as online media also has environmental impacts which are easily underestimated. Electronic products have a lifecycle including depending on energy and managing end-of-life products which also has an environmental footprint. This seems like an especially important tidbit of information for print shop owners to share with customers.

These are just a few of the myths Two Sides debunked for me. On a whole, it seems like encouraging information for our industry and worthy of sharing on a larger scale. If you’re interested in learning more, I definitely recommend checking out the Two Sides website and learning more. They do a great job of formally researching and presenting data to support all of these claims.

Every year, technology allows companies to make more responsible decisions about the environment, and with each passing year, awareness amongst business owners and consumers seems to be rising. The American Forest and Paper Association reported that paper recovery from 2011 was up to 66.8%, which is over twice the conservation compared to 1990. Energy usage is down, Greenhouse gases are down, and all indications show that these trends will continue. What is at the core of these significant industry shifts?

Organizations are taking steps to reduce environmental impact and can make smart decisions about the supplies they do use. The Forest Stewardship Council (FSC) is an international not-for-profit organization designed to reduce environmental impact. Organizations displaying the FSC logo guarantee that the product comes from responsible sources—environmentally appropriate, socially beneficial and economically viable.

Additionally, modern print equipment, especially printers with “waste-free” systems and roll-to-roll printing (that starts printing the first page as soon as the roll begins) produce amazing image quality and reduce waste. Digital printing, by nature, is significantly more waste-efficient, as the chemicals and proofing associated with offset printing are reduced.

The video above illustrates the fluid process of quality management with sophisticated digital print machinery, where the documents can also come to a complete stop and restart, without any white pages in between, mid-run without having to restart the process or check and discard proofed documents.

“Reduce, Reuse, Recycle” was a mantra that was stressed to me at an early age, and responsible printers are doing just that. Printers nationwide can rejoice in the fact that a combination of environmental responsibility and advances in technology are making a difference in the preservation of our natural resources.

As an FSC-certified company, we are not only cognizant of environmental impact, but we are also investing in technology, like the Océ ColorStream® 3500, that emphasizes the importance of waste reduction and how it impacts the sustainability of our environment.

Silos are complicated. No single silo fits all.

On his blog, author Greg Lowe talks identifies four types of silos — regulatory, business unit/hierarchical, interest-focused, and project-focused. That’s not necessarily a bad thing. Lowe makes the excellent point that silos often are in place for good reason. And yet, “…decisions get made that are good for the silo, but may be bad for others or the company.”

First lesson, then: What leadership really wants is not silo abolition, but rather silos that are transparent and permeable.

But wait, there’s more.
Lowe’s four silos are all institutional silos. Silos hide themselves in other clothing, too. For example, social media silos require special treatment or eradication or, at least, inspection. For more on this silo,  download Nancy Pekala’s article on “Smashing the Social Media Silo:A Ten-Step Action Plan.” Or see what a social media digital manager like Wildfire has to offer.

And that’s not all.
Guarav Dhillon, CEO of SnapLogic, tackles the BIG DAWG in his blog, How to Eradicate Data Silos, saying, “I propose that the most important technique we can embrace in our quest to eradicate data silos is the containerization of data.” (Am I losing you yet?). Not to worry, just remember that, if you want to run an agile business, you must expect that you’ll be changing your SaaS systems (software-as-a-service or cloud service) much more frequently than you ever changed on-premise systems … [in other words] you should expect to replace business apps as often as you replace your household gadgets.” (I did lose you, didn’t I?)

If you’re still with me, know that Data Doghouse deals with the Scourge of Data Silos, too. ”Each wave typically advances BI (business intelligence) in some way, but does not really create the breakaway promised; truly pervasive BI remains the Holy Grail. What is almost guaranteed with each new wave, however, is yet another data silo added to the many that already typically litter an enterprise landscape … The bottom-line is that business people need data and analytics from across the enterprise and not just from a new shiny BI silo. But for this to happen, the BI team has to stop the madness by not creating yet another silo and legacy application. Can you say “no” to the data silo?” (Honestly, I’m not sure I can say no. This silo thing is 50 shades of dominant).

Beyond saying that they exist, we’re not even going to talk about search engine optimization silos. And yet, if you must, be our guest in visiting this blog, which appears to tell us how to build silos. Yes, I’m just as dismayed as you are … even distraught.

So. Has it come to this? No More Silos EVER?
In its “State of Marketing Survey” whitepaper, IBM stresses that organizations need an integrated marketing suite that can take customer information gleaned from a variety of different sources and apply it to targeted offers delivered across channels and planforms.” As experience shows, that’s easier said than done. We are not allowed, however, to simply give-up.

Yes, indeed, we need data and many other silos. So, now what?
Writing for Forbes, John Kotter suggests that organizations create a “guiding coalition” whose job it is to break down barriers — that is, “a team of people committed to changing the way the organization operates, composed of people from all levels, divisions and locations. Don’t pick this team; require people to apply for it to gauge their level of commitment.”

To make it happen, this Harvard Business Review article suggests leadership create a compelling case for innovation, bolstered by a fully aligned strategic innovation agenda.

Let’s bring in the machines, too.
Michael Hickins, editor at the CIO Journal, describes the variety of software being used (e.g., Jive,  box,  and Yammer) to offer social networking and collaboration within a corporate environment.

1to1Media describes the experience of Imagetek in devising a new, robust CRM system. According to Steve Ogden, the company’s general manager, “The new system has decreased doubling of work between different departments and apart from saving time, has also increased accuracy.”

And, if you’re not behemoth, that’s good news. Chief Marketer attacked silo proliferation in early October, concluding that smaller companies manage the outbreaks better. “The larger the enterprise, the more likely it is that customer information is managed and stored via a third-party data warehouse. That means marketers must broker the data they need from IT … For example, companies that have cloud-based built data models can achieve a 45% increase in channel efficiency and a 20% reduction in costs. Those are difficult results to achieve without the benefit of flexibility..”

For marketers interested in comparison shopping for software aimed at silo smashing and marketing integration, find some options below [none of which I've used or endorse]. Additions and recommendations are welcome here. We’re all a little desperate.

IBM EMM Suite
Soffront
SnapLogic
Ensighten
OptifiNow

Finishing Web Inkjet Printing, Part 2

Last week we discussed the components that you need to put together a finishing line for a web-fed inkjet system.  So now you have a good idea of what you need.  But now you have to look at your own workflow, customer requirements, and need for flexibility, and decide whether this is to be an inline system, or broken up into sections.    So the question becomes more strategic, and it is one only you can answer.   The answer is that it depends on your product mix, your service level requirements, and your operator skills.

If you ask the printer manufacturers, they often would prefer that you separate the printing from the cutting and finishing.  The reason is simple:  Most inkjet systems will run with little downtime if they are kept running smoothly from roll-to-roll.  All systems will suffer productivity losses if they are stopped and started while in production.  Some will experience more downtime and waste than others (an analysis for a different day), but they all will be less productive if the systems are stopped and started in synch with the needs of finishing equipment.  And this may be your best choice.  But it also may not be.

By separating the finishing from the printing systems you get both productivity enhancements and detractions.  The price you pay for separating the two processes is that you need more labor to handle the printed roll transfer between printing and finishing, you can experience more product waste due to roll damage and setup, and you can lose time in getting the first piece out the door.  You can also increase your risk of wasting a specific recipient’s piece, if your product is personalized, causing more pieces to be reordered.  You also have extra costs of an additional extra unwinder and rewinder.

What you gain by separating print from cut is also important to look at:  You get an important buffer between the printer and the finishing system, which allows your most expensive component to be as productive as possible.  If you have many different product sizes or types, you get the flexibility of using one of several different finishing lines depending on the product type, without a time-consuming mechanical changeover.  Although specs are changing all the time, usually finishing lines can run faster than the print engines, allowing them to “catch up” to production if there was a mechanical maintenance item on them that needed to be replaced, like knives or other wear parts.

The reciprocal discussion can be made for keeping everything in line.  You gain in less labor, faster first-product out-the door, lower chance of losing a piece or damaging part of a roll in the process.  But you give up finishing flexibility, and if any part of the entire system goes down, the entire line gets shut down.

That decision gets more complex due to the growing sophistication of in-line finishing systems.   One firm has been a pioneer in developing multi-capability in-line finishing, and can saddle-stitch, cold glue, or adhesive bind in-line with most continuous printers.   A recent installation in Italy, in-line with a continuous web ink jet printer shows that it can be a great choice, under the right conditions.  The finishing portion can divert printed sheets to either the saddle-stitcher, or the adhesive perfect binder based upon a sheet barcode.   This might be the ultimate in in-line finishing.

All of these pros and cons to inline vs. near-line discussion can be quantified, and your specific “best configuration” really depends on the financial and service level requirement set.  Here again is an area that an independent expert can become an invaluable resource in helping you determine how you should approach your new venture.

Finishing Web Inkjet Printing,  Part 1

This is the first installment of a 2-part series on web inkjet finishing.  This installment will cover the tactical considerations that need to be considered when building your finishing line, and the next installment will be the more strategic question of whether your system components should be in-line or near-line.

The thought of moving to high speed color inkjet printing is very seductive, with the availability of fully variable images, continuously improving quality, runs as short as quantity of one, and the nearly non-existent expense of make-ready, but there is a lot to analyze and decide after making a decision to do it.

After you decide on a printing technology and vendor, the next biggest consideration is finishing.  High speed color inkjet printers are web fed, and there needs to be all of the cut/stack/fold/bind operations that any web printing process requires.  But these processes are handled differently because of the differences in how digital print creates a finished piece as compared to traditional offset printing.  As you are aware, the digital printing process prints one complete book or mailpiece at a time, minimizing or eliminating the need for collating.  Depending on your end products, there are some strategic decisions to make, and some tactical ones, too.

The tactical decisions are the end-product-specific things that you need to finish your printed piece:  Do you need to perforate, punch, stack, slit, slit-then-merge 2 or 3 webs, or fold?  Your finishing vendor can determine the modules and accessories you need based on your product descriptions, and these selections are generally fairly straightforward.

Perfing/punching decisions are broken into two parts:  Static punching and perforating usually gets placed before the first print engine.  This is a device that allows you to create the tractor or pin-feed holes along the outside edges of the paper, and cross perfs at each page if you have legacy bursting/folding equipment that you need to use.  Don’t forget the web cleaner so that chads and paper dust is minimized going into the print engine.

Dynamic punching and perfing can be triggered by either barcodes or other queue marks that are inserted in the margins by the print file and give you the flexibility of placing horizontal and vertical perforations, either partial or full width, on only selected pages.

Then you need to understand how you are going to bind.  If you come from traditional printing, binding is a bit different in the digital world, since you can print an entire book or other document sequentially. As a result, little or no collation is necessary, except for getting covers on publications and books, or getting your printed stack into an envelope.  So your standard pocket-style binders or inserters are generally not going to be suited for this new product stream.  You will need to investigate binding devices that will handle the new product stream.  Again, your binding equipment vendor can help you make this selection based on your end product.  The considerations for digital print binding are much broader than they were just a few years ago, with choices that include stitching, perfect binding and even a cold-glue binding option.

Now that you have the right components and modules to finish your product, you need to decide whether they should all run as a single production line, allowing you to load roll paper in one end and out comes a finished book, mailpiece, or other product, or break the line up into two or more pieces.  That issue we will discuss in the next installment.

Just us next week for Part 2 of this post! 

In my previous blog, I focused on technology and inkjet.  After thinking more about this I realized that in our rush to new capabilities and new technology, we often seem to forget the people who have to work with the new technologies.  From my personal experience, if you have a great technology but do not have the right people behind it you never reach the full potential.  In looking for some insight into this I found as usual it gets back to the basics.

1. Involve the people who need to execute in the planning and specification process.  Those who do the work are in the best position to know the detailed steps in each process, the common roadblocks and bottlenecks, and the key contacts in the organization to get things done. Our workers are our greatest resource, however many organizations do not tap in to the enormous wealth of experience that walks through their doors each morning, and walks out again each night.
2. Identify process owners who will take responsibility for a process end to end. This passes the ownership to the people, and uses their experience and knowledge to bridge the gap from the present to the future.  It will also help to break down the silos in an organization.
3. Empower the line managers to drive business performance on an ongoing basis.  Action plans, communication resources, and employee development tools are all critical in affecting positive change.
4. Work on developing requirements for each of the suppliers and customers within the organization the same way you do for external customers. Seeing how their own local processes and procedures fit into those of the wider organization and its goals allow employees to see the “big picture”. For many, this is incredibly empowering and motivating. Don’t assume you know what another function needs, especially when implementing new technologies.
5. Commit to and deliver on investing in the people as well as the technology they utilize.  Provide training and resources for them to become as comfortable and effective with new technologies as they are with the current way of doing things.  Remember that change can be a frightening thing and forcing it upon the people will lead to inefficiencies and possibly “revolution”.
6. Make change the norm and part of the company culture.  Through a  continuous improvement culture, employees will remain emotionally engaged with the organization and motivated to continue working toward common organizational goals

In looking for parallels to our industry, I was struck by some research in Health Care and Performance Improvement¹.  Our industry is a labor intensive one, and relies on people with a variety of skills and knowledge to deliver superior offerings.  We all hear about the move from Print providers to Service providers, so looking at a high tech service industry I think offers some clues and reinforcement to the role of people in performance improvement.  Not everything was transferable to our industry however some ideas from this article which should be considered are:

1. “Sound and effective leadership is critical to a healthy clinical operation. Without it, optimal financial performance is rarely achieved”
2. “Making business decisions without reliable data is, especially in today’s environment, a costly and unforgivable mistake.”
3. “Using available technology and a few simple management practices, virtually any clinical operation can improve decision making and deliver optimal outcome performance.”
4. “In many healthcare organizations, managers are inundated with unreliable or outdated data, making it next to impossible to monitor operations and, more important, respond quickly to effect change to meet budget and productivity goals.”
5. “A major area of weakness in many clinical operations is ineffective management of direct care hours. Too often, human resources are not aligned with other resources, or restructuring personnel for maximum advantage is seen as a low priority in times of organizational change.”
6. “A network of support fosters better service and optimal performance.”

I see some opportunities for us to continue to learn from areas outside our normal scope, and help our people continue to be one of the major elements of change and improvement.  The old saying about People, Process and Technology being the three legs of a stable and successful operation may have never been more applicable than today with more and more change required for us to thrive, not just survive.

1.  Ten Components of Successful Clinical Health Care performance – A Phase 2 Consulting White Paper. 

It’s hard to believe that I’m finally at the age when I can say, “I remember when. . .” Just like those “old codgers” who used to remember technologies and processes so foreign to me back in the early 90s as a young twenty-four-year-old, wet-behind-the-ears editor of Printing News for whom digital printing technology was no big deal because, well, didn’t we always have computers?

On the cover of one of my first issues of Printing News was my first disaster. It was back when (then) Indigo E-Prints were only sold in packs — I mean pairs — and the first pair was being installed at a facility in Manhattan. There in the headline, in 36-point type or whatever we were using at the time, I called them MAN Rolands.

Anyway, let’s not talk about that. I began covering digital production technologies that day and spent a lot of time interviewing printers and listening to accolades and complaints and walking trade shows in shoes that were comfortable but didn’t match my clothes.

It’s funny how certain things stand out to you, and after covering digital production for however many years, there was one product — a simple product — that stood out to me and still does today.

It was at a time when the quality of toner-based production was still rapidly evolving and graphic designers were still suspicious and critical, and rightfully so. It was a scoring machine designed specifically for toner-based presses. By scoring the folds first, it vastly minimized the classic issue at the time, cracking across the fold. I don’t know why it sticks out to me as being so important, but for some reason, of all the technologies I covered in those Printing News years, it does.

So here’s my Friday question, and I’d really like some input on this from Digital Nirvana readers. Is there a technology like that for 1:1 printing? Something that, to you, stands out as being a “critical turning point” in the area of workflow, productivity, inspection, data management, cross-channel integration, or anything else?

Tell me a story, give me a memory. If you had to pick one critical, turning point technology that you feel fundamentally changed (or is changing) this market, I want to know what stands out to you.

After all, I told you about the “MAN Rolands.” You owe it to me.