The deployment of a BIM Facility Management and Maintenance project: Transitioning from construction to operation.

BIM was initially designed for the design and construction of buildings and infrastructure. Today, it allows for knowledge transfer to the operators. The emergence of smart buildings and their multiple uses complicates the daily lives of these operators. It becomes essential to implement increasingly connected and intelligible methods, processes, and tools.

Why Use the Digital Model in the Operations Phase?

Digital models contain all the data of modeled buildings and infrastructure. This information allows operators to have an increased knowledge of these structures, improving their efficiency and facilitating their work on a daily basis.

Furthermore, the model will serve as the basis for information sharing to ensure good collaboration among stakeholders, whether it’s directly transferring data into object properties and attributes or visually representing information. This will be done through interfaces understandable to everyone, regardless of their building industry background or ability to read plans.

Here are some examples of how digital models and BIM Operation data can be used for different stakeholders:

Facility Manager: Knowing with a few clicks the properties of a building, such as the total carpet area of the third floor;
Maintainer: Preparing maintenance interventions before going to the field by identifying the equipment they will need once on site;
Occupants: Having a clear interface showing available meeting rooms in an office building and a path to get there;
Owner: Having an up-to-date support containing all the information about their assets to enhance their value.

What are the differences between using BIM in design/construction and in operation?

The design and construction stages of a building vary little from one building to another. Construction professionals, experts in their field, gradually adapt to the use of BIM.

For the operation phase, there are, of course, professionals who integrate BIM, such as maintainers. Unlike the upstream phases, operation involves a population that is not “professional” in this phase: the occupants.

The occupants of a building define its use and operational needs. These can be close to each other but also very distant. The use of digital models must be able to respond to this constraint.

What are the steps to consider before the operations phase?

The definition of needs and uses should be carried out as early as possible.

BIM GEM, like the previous phases, requires the creation of parameters in the models.

The parameters to be filled in will be closely linked to the uses of the models. They should be specified in a charter or in a dedicated chapter on the operation of a global BIM charter.

And if I haven’t done this beforehand?

Thorough knowledge and near-exhaustive referencing of users, their needs, and the uses of the building or infrastructure is a key step in deploying BIM GEM. Enriching a model dedicated to design or construction with new properties is possible. Stereograph offers its clients to bring their models into compliance for optimal use in operation.

How do I choose my tools for using BIM GEM?

The tools to deploy depend on the processes and must adapt to users (needs, organization, quality system, etc.). More and more tools are emerging and all offer interesting technologies. However, technology is only useful if it is adapted to and used by the stakeholders. BIM, as a whole, is a set of project management processes and methods. Tools are merely extensions of these processes and should not constrain them, quite the opposite. Thus, for BIM GEM, it is necessary to choose tools adapted to the project’s needs, connect them, and configure them to meet the uses expected by the operation stakeholders.

The uses of a building shape the profession of operation stakeholders today. BIM, through the digital model, allows for the fulfillment of increasingly diverse and complex needs and uses. Only by studying the stakeholders, their needs, their habits, and the daily uses of a building will it be possible to intelligently deploy BIM in the operation phase. This is why Stereograph accompanies its clients and partners upstream of the deployment of BIM GEM projects with Teia, in order to deliver projects that are part of the digital transition of operation stakeholders.

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