Ricoh: Merged Reality inside the service model

How Ricoh’s teams of technicians and experts aligned Help Lightning with their successful, service-focused digital transformation.

Introducing Help Lightning

Help Lightning’s patented technology uses Merged Reality to combine two real-time video streams into a collaborative work environment shared between a remote expert and an on-site technician.

Reaching beyond the limitations of a phone conversation, a Help Lightning live session accelerates and simplifies problem diagnosis and resolution. Experts can be hands on and reach into what their customer or service technician sees in the live view — even from thousands of miles away. Almost any business unit can benefit from this method of service delivery. This software-as-a-service solution is available as an Android, iOS, and web browser app, and it can be integrated into existing customer care and field service processes and systems.

Introduction

Ricoh is a global technology company with an entrepreneurial spirit. Since its founding in 1936, the company launched the first generation of fax machines and has since transitioned into digital copiers and other collaboration tools and hardware.

The company now has a growing focus on cloud and IT. In 2019, Ricoh had 3,400 technicians in the field in the United States alone, tasked with everything from hardware repairs to work in sophisticated IT and network server environments.

Already well known for hardware, Ricoh has transitioned into a service-led business model. The company sought new business lines and revenue-generating opportunities that would support this services transformation.

Ricoh’s strategic partnership with Help Lightning enabled a better service experience for both customers and technicians, which in turn drove better customer outcomes.

Ricoh’s innovations in service delivery are part of a strategy called “The Ricoh Way.” In June 2019, Ricoh partnered with Help Lightning to address four main points of this strategy: innovation in service delivery; “What if?”; innovation — The Ricoh Way; and transformation through strategic partnerships.

Defining Innovation in Service Delivery

Though hardware is a critical part of Ricoh’s legacy, its next evolutionary step was to transition from a hardware-centric enterprise to one focused on high-quality service and customer experience. This would include adoption of more sophisticated technologies, both physical and digital.

An analysis found that customers’ print volumes were decreasing 30% year over year. As customers increasingly used digital tools for information exchange, Ricoh’s need for primarily hardware-oriented technicians declined.

“What if?”

The company set out to reshape its service teams for customers’ new needs. It asked, “What if we trained our teams to provide IT-related services?” Each technician already had some level of IT industry certification and substantial customer service experience. Transforming the service organization would require additional certifications and a new range of service-oriented digital technologies.

Ricoh also re-engineered the support process for technicians, moving beyond the traditional practice of calling a centralized help desk far from the job site. In the past, an operator might not have been a functional expert and could put technicians on hold while gathering resources, delaying repairs and inconveniencing customers.

The new process would connect technicians with the right resources at the right time and in the right context. Help Lightning became a central part of that process.

Ricoh gave its hardware-trained technicians the opportunity to become fully trained and certified in IT. The new approach combined reactive IT support, scheduled office support, and a hybrid of the two using Help Lightning’s Merged Reality.

These business units created value for customers through improved service and illustrated Ricoh’s commitment to leading-edge technologies.

“The key message to our clients is, we understand what their ROI targets are,” says Edward Krzysik, Director, Service Programs at Ricoh. “If we can put in the right resources, technology, processes, and best practices, we can help them achieve ROI at a much faster pace.”

History of Innovation

1936 — Began innovating with photosensitive paper, imaging, and cameras.

1974 — Developed the first high-speed office fax machine.

1990 — Introduced the fastest digital color printer at 15 pages per minute.

2001 — Released GlobalScan, the first server-based solution with embedded MFP software.

2014 — Reimagined remote and on-site collaboration with the Interactive Whiteboard 5500.

2018 — Introduced Ricoh’s Print Platform Cloud Service.

2019 — Launched the strategic partnership with Help Lightning.

Innovation — The Ricoh Way

Ricoh’s process begins with technicians in the field. A technician launches a service call through an app, Twitter, text, or phone. The call enters a queue in Ricoh Express Support, the company’s centralized business group.

Team members select service calls based on their experience and functional expertise. Each call goes to the person best equipped to handle that technology or product for the customer.

While taking a call, the team member gathers the knowledge and remote tools needed and then reaches back out to the technician.

The technician at the customer site has confidence that the person calling back knows the technology or product involved.

“It does provide an opportunity for us to take care of a bigger customer population at some fairly significant margins,” says Krzysik. “We know that we have a significant reliance on strategic partnerships and that’s where this very important relationship with Help Lightning comes into play.”

A Strategic Partnership with Help Lightning

Ricoh began accelerating its partnership with Help Lightning in December 2018, launching Help Lightning’s Merged Reality — a next-generation technology that “has been a game changer for us,” says Krzysik. Starting with 35 employees, adoption “grew like wildfire,” especially in collaboration between IT-specialized technicians and Express Support teams.

Ease of Transition

Help Lightning made Ricoh personnel’s transition to the new technology easy. Regular meetings with Help Lightning, shared best practices, and a consistent focus on change management helped Ricoh explain the “why” behind the technology. Employees established expertise after using the tool only a few times.

“It is really an intuitive, very easy-to-use technology.”

Improved Workforce Management

With Help Lightning, Ricoh established a team of functional experts and a regular training cadence for group administrators. That team then trained other groups within Ricoh.

“It really does run the gamut of how this tool could benefit the organization. It is a great decision for Ricoh, and we only see growth at this point.” — Edward Krzysik

Ricoh set up groups within Help Lightning that include subject matter experts working in a network environment. Technicians can quickly identify the right expert, typically a peer, connect through Help Lightning, and get to work. In practice, the technology puts a functional tier-3 operator in the room with a tier-1 or tier-2 technician on site.

Company-Wide Applications

Ricoh deployed Help Lightning to multiple business units, including administrative teams, sales teams, and teams delivering day-to-day customer service. At the time of the story, almost 1,500 Ricoh employees used Help Lightning.

Service teams extend the value of service visits by increasing first-time fix rates, reducing time on the job, and improving the customer experience.

Help Lightning supports live sales demonstrations on Ricoh-branded equipment, allowing Ricoh to audit and validate a salesperson’s ability to demonstrate products to potential customers.

Administrative teams can work remotely in the same system and gain assistance as if colleagues were working beside them.

Exceptional Business Outcomes

Ricoh reduced the time from a technician’s first customer meeting to completion of the job. Time on site for next-tier issues decreased to a 9- to 11-minute response time, a reduction of 20%. Access to high-level experts also increased first-time fix rates.

As a partner and resource, Help Lightning helped Ricoh roll out the technology to new teams and customers. “This is an organization that took the time and effort to really understand our business in how we deliver the service, how we measure results, how we try to impact the end user,” says Krzysik. “I think that was really a key takeaway for us — that really means a lot.”

Through Help Lightning, Ricoh became not just a service team but a business partner to its customers. Ricoh marketed Help Lightning directly to customers and during sales engagements as part of its commitment to advanced, service-oriented technology.

About the Author

Edward Krzysik, Director, Service Programs at Ricoh, has been with Ricoh since 2004 and has held several leadership roles, including Area Director, Region Director of Operations, and Director of Service Programs. At the time of the story, he was responsible for the growth and expansion of Ricoh’s SmartHands program, which uses Help Lightning to combine field technicians’ skills with subject expertise at Ricoh’s Centers of Excellence.

Ricoh transforms the way people work with technologies that help businesses innovate and grow. Its portfolio of services, solutions, and technologies helps organizations improve information flow, automate processes, and increase workplace productivity.

WBR Insights is the custom research division of Worldwide Business Research. Its work includes research-based whitepapers, benchmarking reports, infographics, and webinars for institutions seeking to inform and educate stakeholders.