BIM Understanding and Activities Research 2022

BIM UNDERSTANDING AND ACTIVITIES
EILIF HJELSETH
Department of Civil Engineering and Energy Technology, Faculty of Technology, Art, and Design,
Oslo and Akershus University College of Applied Sciences, Norway
ABSTRACT
The AECOO (architects, engineers, contractors, operators, owners) industry is moving toward
increased digitalization. This unstoppable process requires a clear understanding of the important
elements required to reach the defined objectives. The change of process – how we work and interact
– is often highlighted as one of the most important objectives for the AECOO industry. BIM, which
can stand for building information model, modelling, or management, is one of the enablers and most
highlighted initiatives in digitalisation, but there is no joint understanding of BIM. However, our
understating of BIM, and especially the M, will directly influence our actions related to implementing
BIM with objectives that can be documented. This study is based on a literature review of scientific
papers, the buildingSMART Norway newsletter, an overview of BIM-related ISO standards and BIM
guidance, and experiences with the digital implementation of BIM guidance. Integrated design and
delivery solutions (IDDS) focus on the integration of collaboration between people, integrated
processes, and interoperable technology. It has, therefore, been used as a framework for exploring the
dominating understanding of BIM. The findings from this study indicate that BIM primary is
understood as the use of software programs. Activities for implementation are related to solving the
technical aspect of the development of software as well as the exchange of files. Software skills and
the use of software are used as indicators of the degree of BIM implementation. Activities related to
the development of skills for information management were hard to identify, except in large projects.
The understanding of BIM revealed in this study stands in contradiction to numerous statements
claiming BIM as a process for changing the AECOO industry. An increased awareness of our real
understanding and how this influences our activities can contribute to more targeted activities for
implementing BIM to realize objectives for improving the AECOO industry.
Keywords: BIM, building information model, building information modelling, building information
management, BIM guidance, BIM manuals, BIM standards.
1 IMPORTANCE OF JOINT UNDERSTANDING OF BIM
BIM is nowadays a widely used term in the AECOO (architects, engineers, contractors,
operators, owners) industry. However, “widely used” does not imply “well understood.”
Understanding a term has a direct influence on one’s response to it. This understanding is
often considered tacit knowledge, which makes it easy to underestimate the impact of the
term. There is general agreement in the AECOO industry that the current level of
implementation of BIM is far below what was expected about five or 10 years ago [1]–[5].
Could this have some connection to how we understand BIM and the efforts on which we
focus when implementing BIM in individual companies or in the industry in general?
This paper explores and critically reviews the use and understanding of BIM in the
AECOO industry. In the widely used BIM-handbook by Eastman et al. [6], BIM can be
treated as a single term, and not necessarily as an abbreviation for building information
modelling, building information model, or building information management. An alternative
approach is, of course, to state from the beginning that BIM is all three of these or to use all
of the words instead of the abbreviation. However, each of these elements/perspectives still
needs to be understood in full, not just recognized.
Numerous presentations state clearly that BIM is an abbreviation for building information
modelling, and where modelling indicates that BIM is about processes, it is a new way of
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WIT Transactions on The Built Environment, Vol 169, © 2017 WIT Press
Building Information Modelling (BIM) in Design, Construction and Operations II 3
doi:10.2495/BIM170011

working and collaborating. These types of presentations have received recognizing nods and
applause. “BIM is a process that’s enabled by technology. You can’t buy it in a box, it’s not
a software solution, and it’s something you can’t do in isolation” [7, p. 349]. Also,
“Measuring BIM benefits and cost consistently apportioning to who get what’s benefit and
why is difficult. The reality is that everyone in the supply chain benefits when using BIM in
a collaborative way” [7, p. 352].
The BS PAS1192 series of standards for information management from the United
Kingdom (UK) is going to be developed as ISO [8] and CEN [9] standards. These standards
can have an important impact on the understanding of the BIM-based process in the AEC
industry.
This study focuses on whether BIM is understood as a program versus a process. A
program includes software tools, training and hardware, things that can be bought as generic
product or services. A process includes documented descriptions of procedures for ways of
working and collaborating with BIM in projects. The project (or company) specify this in
separate documents like BIM guidance (BIM manuals), or documents describing how
defined parts in specified standards, BIM guidance from third part (e.g. national or industry
BIM guidance) or other normative documents shall be used in the project.
This can be identified by exploring how much effort is placed on software versus
development of soft skills (implementing standards, procedures), versus new ways of
collaborating. The research question is aimed at uncovering this by exploring the options
of program versus process versus people.
The research question in this study is: What is the dominating understanding of BIM?
2 THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK
Integrated design and delivery solutions (IDDS) focus on the integration of collaborating
people, integrated processes, and interoperable technology [10], as illustrated in Fig. 1. These
three aspects are used to structure the findings and discussions in this paper.
BIM can be regarded as an integrated deliverable. The aspects of IDDS can be embedded
into BIM in the following ways:
1. Integrated Processes – use of BIM guidance and BIM-related standards for
specification or exchange of information
2. Collaborative People – collaboration between stakeholders in the BIM project
3. Interoperable Technology – use of BIM-based software with IFC export/import
IDDS was developed in 2009 as a special theme by the International Council for Research
and Innovation in Building and Construction (CIB) [11]. IDDS can also be regarded as a
simplification of the sociotechnical theory that Bostrom and Heinen [12] adapted to the
AECOO industry.
Figure 1: The three aspects of IDDS [10].
Collaborating
people
IDDS Interoperable
technologies
Integrated
processes
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3 METHODS AND MATERIALS
This study used a qualitative approach based on a literature review of multiple sources to
obtain an overview of the situation in the AECOO industry. By using multiple sources, this
study identifies sources that could be applicable to further studies, either qualitative or
quantitative ones. Where numbers are compared, the precision of the numbers helps to
illustrate a situation and trend, not a short time comparison. The multiple sources used come
from around the world to provide a general impression either program of process is given
priority. This study therefore does not include national queries. National differences can be
expected, and more in-depth studies including queries could be used to explore and compare
situations, but this is not the scope of this study. IDDS is used as the framework for the
classification of findings.
This study includes (1) the classification of papers from AutoCON from 2013 to 2017 to
explore the focus on the research and to determine where the development in the industry has
taken place. To explore which themes are in focus in the industry, an (almost) bi-monthly
newsletter (2) from buildingSMART Norway has been used. An overview of ISO standards
(3) and BIM guidance (4), as well as when they were developed, is included to illustrate that
support for BIM as a process has been available for long time. BIM guidance is made for the
manual validation of content in BIM files. A survey (5) about the automatic validation
processing of BIM requirements is included to illustrate that processes can be supported by
programs such as BIM-based model checkers. Each (#) above refers to a subchapter of
Section 4 below.
4 FINDINGS
4.1 Research perspectives in AutoCON papers
Table 1 is a classification of 274 papers from AutoCON from 2013 to 2017 [13], which was
done to explore the focus of the research. The findings indicate a massive focus on technology
compared to research studies on collaboration and processes.
Table 1: Research perspectives toward AutoCON papers from 2013 to 2017 [13].
Year Interoperable
technology
Collaborating
people
Integrated
processes
Total
# 202 25 47 274
% 74 9 17 100
2017
# 20 0 2 22
% 91 0 9 100
2016
# 54 4 9 67
% 81 6 13 100
2015
# 45 9 13 67
% 67 13 19 100
2014
# 43 6 7 56
% 77 11 13 100
2013
# 40 6 16 62
% 65 10 26 100
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4.2 buildingSMART Norway’s Newsletter
Table 2 provides a general impression of the focus of different articles in the buildingSMART
Norway Newsletters from February 2014 to December 2017 [14]. Reports from projects
without profiles that can be classified by the IDDS framework [10] are not included.
4.3 Overview of BIM-related standards developed by ISO
The overview in Table 3 of BIM-related standards developed by ISO illustrates that some of
them have been available for many years, but there was a significant increase in the
development of new standards and in the revision of old standards starting in 2001. Most of
these standards set requirements for processes – how the work is organized or managed. This
listing illustrates that processes have focus, but it does not say anything about how they are
implemented, how widely they are used in different countries, or if they are used as a
foundation for the further development of solutions.
4.4 Overview of BIM guidance
The intention of BIM guides is to support how BIM should be used and which information
has to be exchanged. These specifications can be given on different levels, as the technical
specification ISO/TS 12911:2011 framework for BIM guidance [18] in Fig. 2 illustrates.
Without the use of an established BIM guide, all requirements have to be negotiated by the
stakeholders in the project.
Table 2: buildingSMART Norway newsletters from Feb. 2014 to Dec. 2017 [14].
Year/month Interoperable
technology
Collaborating
people
Integrated
processes
Comments
2016
– December ****** * Standard mentioned
– June ***** * Paperless construction site
– March ****** ** * Change management
2015
– December **** ** * Article where Statsbygg (#)
proposes model to be valid if
disagreement happens
– October **** * ---
– June ***** ** * BIM execution plan
– April ***** ** * buildingSMART Norway BIM
guidance launched
– February ***** ** ---
2014
– December **** ** ---
– October * Architecture company get all
staff BSN certified (%)
– August ***** ** * New Norwegian BIM standard
NS8360 launched
– June ***** * New committee for BIM
standardization of carbon
footprint
– April **** ** ** Info about Connect &
Construct
New tyes of contracts
– February ****** **
* Illustrates the number of news article about each group of theme.
Statsbygg (#): The public building and property agency in Norway.
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6 Building Information Modelling (BIM) in Design, Construction and Operations II