BIM coordination: a success factor in digital construction projects

In dig­i­tal con­struc­tion projects, unclear respon­si­bil­i­ties, a lack of coor­di­na­tion or incon­sis­tent data can quick­ly lead to expen­sive risks. Over­all BIM coor­di­na­tion (BGK for short) ensures max­i­mum trans­paren­cy and reli­able deci­sions. In addi­tion to tech­ni­cal tools and stan­dards, it is based on care­ful organ­i­sa­tion, smooth com­mu­ni­ca­tion and cen­tral roles: Over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor and BIM coor­di­na­tor.

This arti­cle shows how the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor acts through­out the entire project — from prepa­ra­tion to deliv­ery of the final mod­els.

Categorisation of overall BIM coordination in the BIM process

The terms BIM man­age­ment and over­all BIM coor­di­na­tion are some­times used inter­change­ably, but refer to dif­fer­ent roles and respon­si­bil­i­ties in the BIM process. BIM man­age­ment takes place at a strate­gic and organ­i­sa­tion­al lev­el. It is intend­ed to ensure that the entire BIM process runs accord­ing to defined stan­dards, objec­tives and strate­gies through­out the project.

Over­all BIM coor­di­na­tion

• ensures that the indi­vid­ual spe­cialised mod­els are cor­rect­ly merged, checked and coor­di­nat­ed at the oper­a­tional-tech­ni­cal lev­el
• ver­i­fies inter­dis­ci­pli­nary BIM con­tent
• is respon­si­ble for the coor­di­na­tion mod­el
• mon­i­tors the imple­men­ta­tion of the spec­i­fied tasks of the spe­cialised coor­di­na­tion

The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor is the link between the BIM man­ag­er (strate­gic) and the BIM coor­di­na­tors and BIM authors/specialist mod­ellers (oper­a­tional). They take care of the spe­cial­ist mod­el coor­di­na­tion with­in a BIM project and are the main point of con­tact for dig­i­tal plan­ning vis-à-vis project management/BIM man­age­ment.

Overview of the roles in the BIM project

Overall BIM coordinator tasks in the individual phases

1. preparation and establishment of the BIM framework

In the first phase, the foun­da­tions are laid for the entire BIM process. This phase is cru­cial to ensure that all par­ties involved — archi­tects, engi­neers, com­pa­nies — work in a coher­ent and har­monised envi­ron­ment. A typ­i­cal chal­lenge at this stage is the dif­fer­ent lev­els of BIM expe­ri­ence of those involved and knowl­edge of BIM guide­lines and stan­dards.

A BIM project can be com­pared to a hike: it has a start and an end point, but more or less large dif­fer­ences in alti­tude. At SOLTIC, we endeav­our to ensure that the gra­di­ent is nev­er too steep. We clar­i­fy and address all aspects so that the plan­ning teams know from the kick-off in which direc­tion we want to go.

Role, respon­si­bil­i­ties and objec­tives

At the start of a BIM project, it is essen­tial to define roles and respon­si­bil­i­ties and to clar­i­fy expec­ta­tions of the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor. A uni­form under­stand­ing of the BIM objec­tives among all project par­tic­i­pants cre­at­ed in advance min­imis­es con­flicts of objec­tives between costs, qual­i­ty and dig­i­tal lev­el of detail (LOD/LOI).

Defined process­es ensure who deliv­ers and checks which mod­els as the project pro­gress­es. The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor can also define var­i­ous stan­dards. The best known are those for nam­ing con­ven­tions, the ele­ment plan and the mod­el deliv­ery pro­gramme.

Sched­ul­ing

Anoth­er key aspect is the syn­chro­ni­sa­tion of project dead­lines and mile­stones with the BIM coor­di­na­tion process. The mod­el deliv­ery pro­gramme defines when and to what extent the spe­cial­ist mod­els are pro­vid­ed. The spe­cial­ist plan­ners’ mod­el deliv­er­ies are syn­chro­nised with the project phas­es and planned coor­di­na­tion cycles. This ensures that the nec­es­sary mod­els are avail­able in good time for the coor­di­na­tion and review process­es. The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor con­tin­u­ous­ly mon­i­tors this sched­ule and informs the project team of any delays or devi­a­tions in mod­el pro­cess­ing.

Train­ing

One task that the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor may take on con­cerns the train­ing of the plan­ning teams. In the­o­ry, BIM projects assume that all those involved are trained or have basic knowl­edge in this area. In prac­tice, the sit­u­a­tion is often dif­fer­ent. Our expe­ri­ence shows that knowl­edge varies great­ly or is some­times even com­plete­ly lack­ing. Our over­all BIM coor­di­na­tors sup­port these teams in order to cre­ate good work­ing con­di­tions and suc­cess­ful­ly com­plete the project.

Tech­ni­cal frame­work con­di­tions, soft­ware com­pat­i­bil­i­ty and data man­age­ment

The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor ensures that the tech­ni­cal frame­work con­di­tions and soft­ware com­pat­i­bil­i­ty are har­monised in accor­dance with the select­ed BIM strat­e­gy (OpenBIM/ClosedBIM). Dif­fer­ent soft­ware solu­tions and mod­el for­mats, a lack of IT infra­struc­ture or inad­e­quate train­ing of those involved would lead to dis­rup­tions in the project. It must also reg­u­late access rights and the ver­sion­ing of mod­els.

2. collection and testing of the specialised models

Now each team cre­ates its mod­els (archi­tec­ture, struc­ture, build­ing ser­vices, oper­a­tion, etc.) accord­ing to the defined con­ven­tions. In this phase, the BIM coor­di­na­tors receive the respec­tive spe­cial­ist mod­els and check mod­el sta­tus­es, ver­sions, file for­mats, their con­tent, etc. The BIM coor­di­na­tors then hand over the spe­cialised mod­els to the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor. They then merge them into a coor­di­na­tion mod­el.

Cen­tral to the qual­i­ty inspec­tion are

• Mod­el checks: Geom­e­try, cod­ing, clas­si­fi­ca­tion, units
• Rule checks in accor­dance with BEP: plau­si­bil­i­ty, storey allo­ca­tion, com­po­nent labelling, etc.
• Cor­rect and com­plete entry of infor­ma­tion

BIM qual­i­ty assur­ance

In the inter­dis­ci­pli­nary coor­di­na­tion check, the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor car­ries out col­li­sion checks between the spe­cial­ist mod­els (e.g. struc­tur­al MEP). BIM soft­ware tools such as Nav­is­works or BIM­col­lab ZOOM iden­ti­fy inter­fer­ences between the dis­ci­plines.

3. coordination meetings and issue management

The dig­i­tal coor­di­na­tion meet­ings (DKS) take place at inter­vals deter­mined by the project plan­ning. The DKS serve to

• Pre­sen­ta­tion and dis­cus­sion of the dis­cov­ered clash­es and issues
• Assign­ment of respon­si­bil­i­ties
• Deter­mi­na­tion of cor­rec­tion dead­lines

The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor assumes the role of a tech­ni­cal medi­a­tor and, togeth­er with the BIM coor­di­na­tors and spe­cial­ist plan­ners, ensures that all deci­sions are cor­rect­ly doc­u­ment­ed and tracked

4. consolidation and validation

In the final phase, the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor ensures that all tech­ni­cal mod­els are con­sis­tent and cor­rect after cor­rec­tion and val­i­da­tion.

The coor­di­na­tion mod­el serves as a ref­er­ence for meet­ings and audits and is used in par­tic­u­lar for

• the spa­tial and func­tion­al inspec­tion of the build­ings
• the final con­flict detec­tion
• Cre­ation of the dig­i­tal plan­ning and as-built mod­el (as-built mod­el)

The over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor checks the over­all coher­ence before the mod­el is passed on to the client.

Overall BIM coordinator: Conductor in the BIM project

A BIM project only works if all spe­cial­ist dis­ci­plines work close­ly togeth­er — archi­tects, struc­tur­al engi­neers, tech­ni­cal build­ing ser­vices plan­ners, client rep­re­sen­ta­tives and con­trac­tors.

The role of the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor can be com­pared to that of a con­duc­tor in an orches­tra: Each spe­cial­ist plan­ner plays their own instru­ment — their own spe­cial­ist mod­el — but it is only through coor­di­nat­ed har­mon­i­sa­tion that a har­mo­nious whole is cre­at­ed.

The tasks of the over­all BIM coor­di­na­tor go beyond tech­ni­cal test­ing and pure mod­el man­age­ment: he is also a mod­er­a­tor, medi­a­tor and qual­i­ty man­ag­er. They pro­mote open, solu­tion-ori­en­tat­ed com­mu­ni­ca­tion between the spe­cial­ist dis­ci­plines. This ensures the qual­i­ty of the infor­ma­tion through­out the entire life cycle of the build­ing — a key suc­cess fac­tor in the BIM process.

Conclusion

Effec­tive BIM coor­di­na­tion depends as much on tools as it does on human com­mu­ni­ca­tion. CDE plat­forms and issue man­age­ment sys­tems ensure trace­abil­i­ty, but it is the struc­ture of the process and the clar­i­ty of com­mu­ni­ca­tion that make for suc­cess­ful coor­di­na­tion.

Our expe­ri­ence shows that the fol­low­ing fac­tors are the key to effec­tive and reli­able BIM coor­di­na­tion:

• the reg­u­lar­i­ty and con­sis­ten­cy of BIM reviews
• the stan­dard­i­s­a­tion of for­mats (IFC, BCF)
• Trans­paren­cy when track­ing tasks

Coordinate precisely, realise efficiently

As Gen­er­al plan­ner and thus over­all man­ag­er SOLTIC sees over­all BIM coor­di­na­tion as an essen­tial pre­req­ui­site for the suc­cess of com­plex indus­tri­al con­struc­tion projects. SOLTIC’s BIM experts are in charge of these projects from the ini­tial mod­el struc­ture to the com­plete dig­i­tal han­dover. As over­all BIM coor­di­na­tors, we ensure that tech­ni­cal pre­ci­sion, data qual­i­ty and inter­dis­ci­pli­nary col­lab­o­ra­tion are seam­less­ly inte­grat­ed — for effi­cient plan­ning process­es and sus­tain­able project results.

Do you want clarity in your digital construction project?