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Understanding barriers to BIM implementation: Their impact across organizational levels in relation to BIM maturity

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• Published: 20 March 2020
• Volume 8 , pages 236–257, ( 2021 )

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• Sander Siebelink 1 ,
• Hans Voordijk 1 ,
• Maaike Endedijk 2 &
• Arjen Adriaanse 1  

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This multiple case study of a contracting firm contributes to understanding the barriers that organizations face during the implementation of building information modeling (BIM) by providing insights into the impact of these barriers across different organizational levels (i.e., from top management to project teams) and by relating these barriers to different degrees of BIM maturity. First, we observe the dominance of barriers related to the motivation, competence, and time capacity of people across all levels of an organization. Second, the cluster of barriers at the middle-management level highlights the important role of this level in reducing these barriers. Third, only those cases with a low level of BIM maturity have struggled with lack of top management support, thereby highlighting the importance of such support in achieving BIM maturity growth. High BIM maturity situations are more prone to externally oriented barriers in attempting to further leverage the benefits of BIM. Our study provides insights on where to focus BIM implementation measures and how to enhance organizational BIM maturity.

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Department of Civil Engineering, Faculty of Engineering Technology, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands

Sander Siebelink, Hans Voordijk & Arjen Adriaanse

Department of Educational Sciences, Faculty of Behavioural, Management and Social Sciences, University of Twente, Enschede, The Netherlands

Maaike Endedijk

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Correspondence to Sander Siebelink .

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Siebelink, S., Voordijk, H., Endedijk, M. et al. Understanding barriers to BIM implementation: Their impact across organizational levels in relation to BIM maturity. Front. Eng. Manag. 8 , 236–257 (2021). https://doi.org/10.1007/s42524-019-0088-2

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Received : 29 August 2019

Accepted : 15 November 2019

Published : 20 March 2020

Issue Date : June 2021

DOI : https://doi.org/10.1007/s42524-019-0088-2

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Building Information Modelling: conceptual constructs and performance improvement tools (PhD Thesis)

Building Information Modelling (BIM) is a set of technologies, processes and policies enabling multiple stakeholders to collaboratively design, construct and operate a facility. There are numerous challenges attributed to BIM adoption by industry and academia. These represent a number of knowledge gaps each warranting a focused investigation by domain researchers. This study does not isolate a single gap to address but espouses a holistic view of the knowledge problem at hand. It contributes to the discussion a set of conceptual constructs that clarify the knowledge structures underlying the BIM domain. It also introduces a number of practicable knowledge tools to facilitate BIM learning, assessment and performance improvement. This study is delivered through complementary papers and appendices to answer two primary research questions. The first explores the knowledge structures underlying the BIM domain whilst the second probes how these knowledge structures can be used to facilitate the measurement and improvement of BIM performance across the construction industry. To address the first question, the study identifies conceptual clusters underlying the BIM domain, develops descriptive taxonomies of these clusters, exposes some of their conceptual relationships, and then delivers a representative BIM framework. The BIM framework is composed of three-axes which represent the main knowledge structures underlying the BIM domain and support the development of functional conceptual models. To address the second question, BIM framework structures are extended through additional concepts and tools to facilitate BIM performance assessment and development of individuals, organizations and teams. These additional concepts include competency sets, assessment workflows and measurement tools which can be used to assess and improve the BIM performance of industry stakeholders. In addressing these research questions, a pragmatic approach to research design based on available literature and applicable theories has been adopted. By combining several research strategies, paradigms and methods, this study (1) generates several new conceptual structures (e.g. frameworks, models and taxonomies) which collectively clarify the knowledge structures underlying the BIM domain; and (2) develops a set of workflows and tools that facilitate BIM assessment, learning and performance improvement. This study delivers an extendable knowledge structure upon which to build a host of BIM performance improvement initiatives and tools. As a set of complementary papers and appendices, the study presents a rich, unified yet multi-layered environment of conceptual constructs and practicable tools; supported by a common framework, a domain ontology and simplified visual representations. Individually, each paper introduces a new framework part or solidifies a previous one. Collectively, the papers form a cohesive knowledge engine that generates assessment systems, learning modules and performance improvement tools.

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The term Building Information Modelling (BIM) refers to an expansive knowledge domain within the design, construction and operation (DCO) 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. This article identifies five complementary components specifically developed to enable such assessment: (i) BIM capability stages representing transformational milestones along the implementation continuum; (ii) BIM maturity levels representing the quality, predictability and variability within BIM stages; (iii) BIM competencies representing incremental progressions towards and improvements within BIM stages; (iv) Organizational Scales representing the diversity of markets, disciplines and company sizes; and (v) Granularity Levels enabling highly targeted yet flexible performance analyses ranging from informal self-assessment to high-detail, formal organizational audits. This article explores these complementary components and positions them as a systematic method to understand BIM performance and to enable its assessment and improvement. A flowchart of the contents of this article is provided.

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Purpose The emergence of building information modelling (BIM) has led to the need for pre-qualification and selection of organisations capable of working within a BIM environment. Several criteria have been proposed for the assessment of an organisation’s BIM capability during the pre-qualification and selection phase of projects. However, no studies have sought to empirically establish whether organisations selected on the basis of such criteria have actually been the most successful at delivering BIM on projects. The purpose of this paper is to address the aforementioned gap through a comparison of predicted BIM capability and post-selection performance. Design/methodology/approach BIM capability of firms in a case study was predicted using 28 BIM pre-qualification and selection criteria, prioritised based on their perceived contribution to BIM delivery success from a survey of practitioners on BIM-enabled projects. The comparison of predicted BIM capability and post-selection per...

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Contemporarily some firms in the construction industry are attempting to adopt a BIM method of working. Each of these attempts reflects a varying BIM adoption philosophy and inevitably different BIM technologies, implementation strategies and roadmaps. On the other hand, all these attempts are often motivated to attain competitive advantages for product delivery in the market place. The question of what the best method of adopting BIM has not been answered yet. That is to say, it is required to identify a standard method that will benchmark the different BIM adoption cases by comparing the efficiency gains in these cases: a standard benchmarking method can help the stakeholders to decide on the most appropriate strategies for themselves. This paper explains the live experience of BIM adoption in a KTP (Knowledge Transfer Partnership) project, undertaken between the University of Salford and John McCall Architects practicing in the housing and regeneration fields, with a particular f...

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The Implementation of Building Information Modelling (BIM) Level 2 in the UK Construction Industry : The Case of Small and Medium Enterprises

• Khaled Abu Awwad

Student thesis : Doctoral Thesis › Doctor of Philosophy

• Building Information modelling Level 2
• Small and Medium Enterprises
• Critical Success Factors
• Implementation Lifecycle
• UK Construction Industry
• Validated Framework

File : application/pdf, 3.28 MB

Type : Thesis