WHY MEASURE BIM? AND WHAT SHOULD YOU MEASURE?
WHAT IS BIM?
The term Building Information Modelling (BIM) refers to an expansive knowledge domain within the Design, Construction, and Operation industry. The voluminous possibilities attributed to BIM represent an array of challenges that can be met through a systematic research and delivery framework spawning a set of performance assessment and improvement metrics.
BIM assessments have been developed to help professionals create feedback on their BIM implementation and identify areas of strengths and weaknesses. Such feedback loops will assist construction industry professionals to better understand how they are doing, develop a road map for BIM strategies, and identify goals for future directions.
WHY MEASURE BIM?
The BIM-MM (Maturity Measure) has been seen to move beyond ‘evaluation’. Through analysis of the collected data, it has been possible to demonstrate how BIM is applied in different teams, groups, projects, and geographies. This is of significant value to transfer knowledge and skills across projects, groups, and regions. BIM is continuously helping us generate dialogue across our regions about what ‘good’ looks like, how to better deliver projects, and how to deliver better projects.
WHAT SHOULD YOU MEASURE?
Choosing what to measure when evaluating BIM is one of the most challenging tasks in the BIM maturity research field. It is widely known that ‘what gets measured gets attention’ and that ‘what gets measured gets managed’. Therefore, selecting the appropriate BIM elements to assess effectively means putting these elements on the map of BIM implementation. The top five common measures are data richness (the level of detail in model elements), visions and goals for implementing BIM, technology (the applied tools and applications), data exchange (the ways data is shared across different projects’ stakeholders), and model use. Some of the discipline criteria question whether 3D, 4D (time scheduling) or 5D (cost) are applied in the project and whether analysis tools are linked to the main model. In general, these measures reflect two types of forces: internal forces, which include the criteria largely under the control of design and construction companies; and external forces, which are shaped and influenced by client demands and needs. Together, these forces affect the BIM process in the project.
CONCLUSION
The BIM is attracting significant interest internally and is moving beyond evaluation. The tool has been used by project managers to communicate BIM with project members and stakeholders. But it is also gaining attraction from external audiences, including other construction firms, which are applying the tool in their businesses, as well as researchers who expressed their interest in the Global BIM Maturity Initiative. The research agenda of BIM maturity is expected to grow in different directions. New models will emerge to reflect BIM’s evolving nature, more studies will be needed to focus on applying these models to real case-study projects, and new types of analysis will be generated when measuring BIM.
FINAL WORDS: This analysis might answer some of the typical questions surrounding BIM: how to transfer knowledge and skills from high maturity projects and regions to other ones with lower maturity levels; why BIM is applied differently in different geographies; and how performance measurement data could influence the future direction of BIM innovations. However, BIM has the answer to it all as it can bridge the information loss associated with handling a project from the design team, to the construction team and to building owner/operator, by allowing each group to add to and reference back to all information they acquire during their period of contribution to the BIM model. This can yield benefits to the facility owner or operator.