Why it’s Awesome to Work for Ricoh

I’m Garima Mittal, a graduate student at Fordham University, about to enter the second year of my MBA program. I have been fortunate to get to serve as an intern for Ricoh for three months this summer. I enjoyed it so much that I asked for the opportunity to put this blog together to explain why it’s awesome to work for Ricoh.

Ricoh Values Growth

My background is in sales and product management, and since starting my MBA I’ve been focusing on marketing and information systems. When it comes to marketing, the bulk of my experience has been academic. I was eager to get my foot in the door to actual, hands-on experience. Ricoh opened that door.

Mentorship & Challenge

First, the team paired me up with a fantastic mentor. My manager came alongside me and encouraged me to ask questions and be ambitious with what I attempted to accomplish. She opened the way for free dialogue, welcoming ideas that I would normally keep to myself.

So I dove in. I got involved in ongoing campaigns and even started a new one. I designed some social media infographics and worked on website optimization. It’s been a marketing nerd’s dream.

This is the kind of encouraging atmosphere and collaborative culture I hope to contribute to in my future career. The kind of workplace that says, “Let’s go for this ambitious project. It’s risky, and it will stretch us, but we will embrace this together as a team.”

You can’t expect to grow professionally if you don’t attempt things that challenge you. You may not reach every goal of that challenge, but the growth that comes through momentary failure can be greater than that which comes from success.

By encouraging its interns to embrace difficult passion projects—but without entirely abandoning us—Ricoh is raising up a future team of adroit and dedicated professionals eager to lead their industry.

Formal Education

Ricoh put together a comprehensive internship program that kept the interns talking with each other. We were able to encourage each other as we faced obstacles or had questions about how to accomplish a task. We shared successes and frustrations. In short, we grew together.

One of the best parts of this has been the formal education side of the program. We delivered project pitches to each other as we gathered—remotely—for group education. Speakers ran seminars that embraced most corners of the industry so that we got the bigger picture of what Ricoh is doing companywide, beyond our own divisions.

This is characteristic of what Ricoh does for its customers. We come alongside our customers, taking their disparate systems and processes, and we weave them together into a cohesive machine. We’re moving forward with innovative cloud solutions that both secure our customers’ information while sharing it between the whole scattered workforce.

Learn More About Ricoh’s Innovative Solutions

Ricoh is so good at this for our customers because we do it between our own teams. We’re spread across the globe, but we are united around a common goal, and we communicate about it. The combined sense of both vision and camaraderie between teammates is unmatched by any organization I have belonged to in the past. Although I worked remotely, I did not feel disconnected from the core company. 

Ricoh’s Cutting Edge Approach to Business Enthralled Me

I always thought Ricoh was just a printing hardware company. True, I never realized the sheer power of some of their hardware, but beyond that, I had no idea Ricoh was pushing things like MIS, cloud technology, or workforce integration.

The sheer technological prowess of this historic brand encourages me. No company has to stay pigeonholed by the past.

Ricoh is an exciting company to work for because it is redefining its reputation in a genuine way. Its people are educating themselves so that they can develop products and services that take their customers—and the whole print industry—beyond what it has ever been. Potential employees want to be a part of this kind of endeavor.

Ambitious People Work for Ricoh

After obtaining my MBA, I aspire to become a brand manager. After working a summer for Ricoh, this desire is only strengthened.

The approach here to training interns has given me a bird’s-eye view of the whole brand. It has exposed me to visionary leaders—like Linnea Wolken, Director of Global Marketing, Alliances, and Operations—who are formulating the future of the Ricoh brand and everything it can do and be.

I intend to follow this model when I manage a brand in the future. I’ve seen a legacy company in a legacy industry pushing innovation. It is moving beyond mere hardware and redefining what the print industry can be.

I’ve learned that at Ricoh, people don’t just listen, they collaborate. They take crazy ideas, and they refine them and polish them until they’re the next industry standard.

If you’re tired of wearing the same ruts in your industry, consider working for Ricoh. You can do something new and innovative here.

Reach out to learn more about how you can make an impact Ricoh!