Last Tuesday, David Delgado Vendrell was participating as a mentor in BILT Academy #DBWEurope 2019 in Motherwell (Scotland) giving 3 Lab Sessions about openBIM project management, introducing openBIM standards, process mapping and Agile methodologies within the BIM design stage.
We are very proud of being involved in such that challenging event with young AEC industry students, so eager of knowledge.
Thanks to the organizers and sponsors for this opportunity.
BILT Academy announces the fourth mentor who is going to lead the workshopProject Management in OpenBIM.
David Delgado Vendrell
Biography
David is an architect (MSc. Arch) by ETSAV (UPC, Polytechnic University of Catalonia), and CEO of DDV (since 2004), a BIM consultancy especially focused on implementing this technology in the public sector and also private companies working in the different stages of the asset life-cycle.
He is a specialist in the use of the ARCHICAD platform and the fostering of openBIM. He is the Director of the Master’s in BIM Management (en, es, pt) of ZIGURAT, Global Institute of Technology, and also collaborates as a lecturer in other BIM educational programs. He is an active member of the BIM User Group of Catalonia (GuBIMCat). He is a member and the Vice-President in Design Area of buildingSMART Spanish Chapter, to whom he represented in the recently closed IUG (International User Group) of buildingSMART International. He also collaborates in the “We Build the Future” Commission of ITEC in Catalonia, in the representation of the CoAC, the national Architects Association. He has co-authored the BIM classification system “GuBIMclass”, an initiative of GuBIMCat and Infraestructures de Catalunya.
Motivation
We are professionals, with a technical background and rational approach, from a sector immersed in the process of digitization that other industries already addressed years ago.
To embrace this challenge, we undoubtedly should face the involvement of the most critical resource for this process to be successful: people!
In this sense, my primary motivation to be part of BILT Academy as a mentor is to push for the combination of these two aspects: technical and human. For many years now, BIM talks about collaboration. But, most of the times, people don’t have an appropriate response to those collaboration expectations due to a lack of suitable communication skills.
As a person who also loves communication and social interaction, BILT Academy becomes the ideal environment to explore and enhance this aspect: young professionals, highly qualified, interested in innovation and with the desire for real collaboration. It will be a pleasure to be part of it!
KLO1 – The basic of processes within the framework of buildingSMART standards
• Learn which are the main buildingSMART standards, especially about Data and Processes.
• Understand the basics of IDM (Information Delivery Manual), as the international standard for defining the information that should be exchanged between project participants in the AEC project lifecycle.
• Learn the basics of Process Mapping, exchange requirements and BPMN as the standard to represent which is defined in an IDM.
KLO2 – Agile and Scrum as an alternative for an openBIM project management
• Understand how concurrent engineering processes can help to have a suitable response to changes in BIM design stages.
• Learn the basics of Agile Methodology
• Learn in detail what is Scrum and Kanban, as agile approaches: definitions, team members, ceremonies, artifacts, hierarchies, board examples and metrics.
KLO3 – Applying Scrum and Kanban to an openBIM workflow using visual web-based tools
• Learn how to apply Scrum and Kanban methods in digital cloud-based boards, like Trello.
• Explore the main features of Scrum and its relation with usual BIM design workflows using Trello boards, triggers and other complementary tools.
• BIM projects use case.
At the end of this class, students will comprehend and apply how the Agile methodology combined with BIM workflows, instead of a system based on strict rules to develop their designs, becomes a support guide, as alternative project management to their future projects, where the value is the primary goal of the client.
QnA
What does openBIM mean to you? In which way is it different from closedBIM workflows in the AEC industry?
We can define openBIM as basically an approach based on BIM collaborative processes in which data exchanges occur using open and neutral standards (not proprietary). ClosedBIM processes are wrongly seen as the opposite of openBIM ones. Beyond that controversial binomial, there is a distinctive border, which is the one between native environments (editable ones) vs QC environments (at least, read-only). When we are producing deliverables from BIM authoring platforms, our environment is mostly native. If there is some workflow in which we are using some open standards (such as IFC or BCF), then we could say that there is an openBIM collaborative framework. In my opinion, the “model as a reference” approach, in which openBIM is based, should be the critical point of any BIM collaborative process which must assure and guarantee authorship, data access across the life cycle and data quality-driven results.
To combine technology and humanity, you are planning on using appropriate communication/collaboration methods, based on openBIM standards eg buildingSmart standards. in what way are they different/more efficient compared to conventional standards/closed BIM workflows?
In my opinion, one of the fields in which openBIM, and especially the use of IFC, enables the best performance is in Quality Control within the framework of BIM coordination processes. Many of BIM technicians are applying excellent QA methods within their native environments. Nonetheless, BIM authoring tools can hide or disrupt some results due to their own internal data architecture. In that sense, we can produce or export these data into an IFC Schema-based models; in other words, a neutral and non-propietary file, to validate them. That enables us to put the QC focus on specific standardized property subsets, without the risk of dealing with native misleading data. And this is where a consistent Information Delivery Plan (IDM, another openBIM standard) is needed, which documents exchanges of information in a project.
In which steps/phases of a project do you see the most relevant usage of project management tools, such as Scrum and Kanban?
Design stage, whether in early phases or more advanced ones, is the suitable one to apply Agile methodologies. The results of this stage are the ones in which the client (or the owner) has the biggest expectation. Although designers start their projects with an initial quite-well defined project requirements, it is usually a phase exposed to high levels of changes during the whole period. Agile methodologies enable those professionals to interact in a more flexible, efficient and effective way, not just among the team, but especially with the client.
What is the most important message you want to hand over to the students attending your lab?
Whether if we are good creating a well-performed work breakdown structures in response and following apparent immutable client requirements, what I would like to show that it is quite easy to change our habits. And it starts with ourselves, in our daily practices using friendly tools within the framework of more flexible collaborative practices. We need to adapt our procedures using BIM, as methodology based on digital technologies, in combination with client-oriented project management approaches if we think that value is the crucial factor which client prioritize.
“Designing the future” —the main BIM event in the country— is celebrated once a year, alternating between the capital city of Warsaw and Krakow, the second largest city in Poland. The conference is organized by BIM Klaster Collective (BIM cluster in the country’s construction sector) together with Konfoteka, a well-known event organizing company throughout the country.
According to David Delgado, a variety of different BIM topics was discussed at the conference and the level of the presentations was very technical. In spite of global BIM implementation being still at an embryonic stage in Poland, there were some local examples of advanced BIM implementation, in which a variety of BIM modeling tools or the use of open standards could be observed.
In spite of global BIM implementation being still at an embryonic stage in Poland, there were some local examples of advanced BIM implementation, in which a variety of BIM modeling tools or the use of open standards could be observed.
Our professor and director of the master’s David Delgado presented a paper titled “Agile as a suitable approach for project management in BIM design”. The goal of the presentation was to introduce to the sector the idea that in the design phase, the traditional project management approach is not the most appropriate and that there are other approaches in project management, such as AGILE methodologies, which are more appropriate. The BIM allows interacting more closely with the end-customer, generating a series of deliverables in a cyclical way that will reduce uncertainty and improve the final results of the project with the expectation of ownership.
BIM Experience of European BIM Summit 2019
As a partner of buildingSMART Spanish Chapter, DDV openBIM Solutions participated at the event of BIM Experience of European BIM Summit. It is an activity held prior to the European BIM Summit to start in the BIM environment. The BIM European Summit aims to create an open space for companies and actors in the production and execution of BIM.
As a fair, it produces a public space where commercial and technical opportunities presented by the digitization of construction can be discussed and knowledge and experiences on the subject can be shared while offering a perfect opportunity for networking with other professionals.
On this occasion, the contribution of DDV consisted of two presentations on the open BIM standard, specifically on the IFC. The first was “Exporting and Importing IFC File. Best Practices”, which showed how using a BIM authoring tool, such as ARCHICAD, can help to handle IFC models satisfactorily. The second presentation also touched the subject of the IFC, but in this case from the point of view of the Quality Audit and visualization of these models in open standard. There were different recommended workflows in order to achieve a level of quality of these models suitable for an exchange of information that responds to the requirements of the openBIM focus.
