Stage 1- Assessment and Need – BIM Academy: Learning and Development

Access to reference information and shared resources should be checked by each task team (appointed party) when a generation of information is about to start. Reference information and shared resources are initially provided by the appointing party and can then be reviewed and extended by the lead appointed party.

Reference information and shared resources are held in the project’s common data environment (CDE) and lack of access could be caused by a number of reasons, including:

• The relevant information was never shared through the CDE;
• The task team/appointed party has not been given access rights to the information, or these rights have lapsed or been revoked;
• Relevant information was shared, but has become obsolete; or
• New requirements for reference information or shared resources have arisen which are not covered by the information currently available.

Lack of access to reference information or to shared resources, for whatever reason, should be reported to the lead appointed party as soon as possible. Ideally, this should be before the task team generates any of its own information. The task team should also assess any impact on its information delivery plan, and report this to the lead appointed party as well.

Once everything has been verified, the task team is ready to proceed with generating their information in accordance with their respective task information delivery plan.

Individuals generating information (as with all members of the project team) have responsibility for robust information management. The task information delivery plan (TIDP) is the primary consideration in generating information as efficiently and effectively as possible in a collaborative manner. The TIDP identifies which information containers an author is responsible for generating. While generating this information, the project’s information production methods and procedures (i.e. the process for information production) and the project’s information standard should be carefully reviewed to ensure compliance from the outset.

In doing so, the task team must ensure that information is:

• generated in compliance with the project’s information standard; and
• generated in accordance with the information production methods and procedures.

Task teams must also ensure that information does not:

• exceed the required level of information need;
• extend beyond the boundaries of the information container breakdown structure;
• duplicate information generated by other task teams; and
• contain superfluous detail.

As well as working in accordance with ISO 19650-2, it’s important that there is effective communication between those individuals generating information and across the delivery team. This may be via the CDE or more informally, for example, email, online meetings or just “picking up the phone”.

When generating information that requires an element of coordination with other information it’s good practice to establish regular exchanges between task teams via the CDE. For example, geometrical models requiring coordination might be exchanged on a fortnightly basis (although this frequency should be flexible depending on the requirements of the delivery team and the project). Any coordination issues should be resolved between task teams and if this is not possible, the issue should be escalated to the lead appointed party.

Checking the quality of the information container is in two parts. The first part is checking the information container from the outside (in essence the wrapper). The second part is checking the contents.

The project’s information production methods and procedures set out the process for undertaking the “outside check”. This activity might be aligned with the appointed party’s ISO 9001 Quality Management System, if that was appropriate/agreed.

The project’s information standard then determines the information container requirements considering its:

• Unique ID;
• Status;
• Revision;
• Classification;

Some checks could be carried out automatically via common data environment workflow. If the information container check is unsuccessful the information container should be rejected with the information author informed of corrective action required.

Once an information container has been successfully checked and has been marked as checked, its contents should be reviewed.

Following the successful quality assurance check of an information container, the task team undertakes a review of the information within the container. The objective of this review is to ensure the information that is going to be shared is in accordance with the lead appointed party’s exchange information requirements and the task information delivery plan (TIDP).

The TIDP may record additional information containers beyond those needed to meet the lead appointed party’s information requirements to support the development and/or coordination activities by/with other task teams.

The lead appointed party, in agreement with the task team(s), should have established a consistent methodology for undertaking this review and will have recorded this within the project’s information production methods and procedures.

Only when a review is complete and successful can the information (within the information container) be approved with the information container then assigned a suitable status code for sharing. In the UK, the recommended status codes for information containers.

Delivery teams should plan and undertake timely information model reviews to ensure the delivery team’s information model is continuously coordinated. The review is repeated, as necessary until the information model is ready for authorization by the lead appointed party.

Each review will consider the appointing party’s exchange information requirements, acceptance criteria and the master information delivery plan (MIDP). It will be carried out in accordance with the processes set out in the project’s information production methods and procedures.

If the information containers in the information model do not align with the MIDP, this will indicate a breakdown in the appointment’s change control process.

It is important that the logistics to deliver and manage all information model reviews for each information delivery milestone are established and reflected in the project’s information production methods and procedures, the BIM execution plan and the MIDP.