It’s been 17 days since the start of the new year. We’re sure that you’re still filled with energy and eager to fulfill all your new year’s goals and plans. We can’t blame you. We’re as excited about 2017 as you are!
In our previous blog posts, we featured free printables that would help you organize your life and motivate you throughout 2017. Now, we’ll focus on helping you increase productivity at home or work by improving the efficiency through these printing tips.
Printing Productivity
If you have a long list of goals that you want to achieve for yourself, then, you need to start focusing on how much effort you are exerting on each task or endeavor. That’s what productivity is all about. If you are spending too long on a task or goal and you’re not delivering the ideal output for a certain amount of time, then, you need to stop and rethink your actions.
Your productivity is usually affected by the little details that you don’t pay too much attention to like the amount of ink on your printer or if you have enough paper. Although these may seem like simple problems, these scenarios will still eat up your time and your ability to deliver results.
Reducing small time-consuming situations such as these, which could be easily avoided through proper planning, will help in improving your overall efficiency and productivity.
Monitor Your Printing Consumption
If you are restocking for your home, you need to consider how much print supplies you are consuming and measure the lifecycle of each of these products. Track your printer usage by maintaining a logbook or list of documents that you have printed. Make sure to take note of:
- The number of pages
- Type of paper used
- Color or black and white
Of course, if you want to be obsessive compulsive about it, you could also track the ink levels after you are done printing. If there is more than one person using the printer, such as in an office setting, you could install a printer monitor or log software that would allow you to do this more efficiently. But if you’re just monitoring it for home use, a simple sheet of paper would do.
Location, Location, Location.
It is not just about aesthetics. It’s important to consider where your printer is positioned in your home since there are certain environmental factors that can greatly affect its performance. You also need to consider putting it in an area where you can easily access it when you’re working, or where the kids can easily print out their schoolwork. The right printer set-up can do wonders in improving your efficiency with whatever it is that you’re doing, thereby making things get done faster and with just the right effort.
Stock Up on Paper
If you constantly use your printer for work, schoolwork or print activities, then, you should have an awareness of the status of your print supplies. After all, it’s not difficult to see if your printer ink is running low or if you don’t have enough paper stocked up at home.
Paper is a number one must-have at home. Make sure that you have basic printing paper, such as legal and letter size bond paper. It’s always more cost-efficient to buy a ream of paper. It’s practical to buy several reams of paper, which is good for several months. After all, paper doesn’t have an expiration date so it doesn’t hurt to stock up.
If you’re thinking, “But I don’t need so much paper now.” Think of it this way. Would you really want to wait until it completely runs out before you stock up? Running to the store unplanned will eat up your time and money. You’ll be spending on gas just to run to the store for this one thing, which you could have prepared for if you had only purchased enough. Having to rush to the store in the middle of work is also counter-productive and it will throw you off your workflow.
Invest in the Right Ink
It’s not just about buying an ink or toner cartridge for your printer. You need to make sure that you are buying the right one for your printer! Here are 5 Tips to in Buying Printing Ink Cartridges to guide you on what you need to consider before making an ink or toner purchase. Getting it right the first time will save you a lot of time and effort in the future, so educate yourself on what your printer really needs to ensure that it’s running on optimal performance.
Efficiency is a Lifestyle
Your productivity significantly affects your work and life in ways that you just can’t fathom. If you are thinking that efficient printing practices will give you very minimal results in improving your overall productivity – you’re wrong!
Being efficient is a habit that you need in every aspect of life. If you can be efficient at a small activity such as printing, this will ripple out to other small activities that you don’t really pay much attention to. And being efficient in many small activities will help you in being more efficient on a larger scale.
Did you enjoy this printing tip? Please subscribe to our blog to have access to more fun print activities, free printables, and printing efficiency tips from the Ink Toner Store team!
If you have any suggestions or topics you want us to cover, leave a comment below or connect with us on Facebook, Twitter, Google+ or Pinterest! We’d love to hear from you.