Civil 3D: Fierce Solutions

At Autodesk University, a parallel event was held called the Leadership Forum. This took place on Monday, November 28, and my contribution was facilitating a round table discussion on the successful marriage of IT and BIM. Below are the class discussion points with a summary of the ideas exchanged.

 1.  Do you see your CAD and IT Management efforts growing apart? What is driving this separation?

As technology evolves, so is the role of the CAD and IT Manager. Whether or not they coexist in the same department or different departments, details and issues of the adjacent technologies are multiplying. The roles of each involve the management of technology collections. The growth is positive since it offers improvements to existing business processes and new areas of business development. The negative side of this is could be that priorities of each are no longer aligned and communication suffers. Company size, size of support staff, and company culture can impact the negative as well as the positive.

2.  What differentiates CAD Management from Information Technology Management? What is driving the evolution of CAD Management to BIM Management?

Basically, CAD Management deals with the support of operations centered about application processes; IT Management deals with the support of technology infrastructure. There is some overlap i.e. data collector, GPS, and laser scanner support; troubleshooting application crashes and malfunctions. CAD Management involves the processes involved in putting black lines to white paper; BIM Management involves the integration of multiple technologies to facilitate the qualification, quantification, and optimization of a design model.

3.  How should the collaboration of BIM & IT in your organization keep you competitive?

 BIM and IT need to partner with leadership to align priorities with optimization of operational processes to guarantee expeditious uptime and expand business development opportunities.

 

 

4.  What should or shouldn't be the expectations of BIM Management according to Leadership? How might IT hinder or encourage the development of BIM in the organization?

Leadership expects BIM Management to ensure that the company's software investment pays off. Leadership also expects to stay informed of the progress. The language used in this conversation must center around ROI. Often times it is difficult to measure ROI. However, speaking in terms of "what it would cost us if we weren't using this technology" often helps to illustrate a clear picture of a company's application of BIM processes. IT can assist with this by collaborating with BIM on hardware requirements and upgrades. If IT can understand overall cost savings in setting up a successful BIM implementation, both can work together to clear obstacles.

 

5.  What does being on the cutting edge of technology mean to you? What are your thoughts & concerns about placing your firm on the cutting edge of technology? Obstacles?

There are three schools of technology thinkers: leading, cutting, and bleeding edge. The bleeding edge which involves the use of very new technology integrated with a lot of unknowns is where present companies did not want to be. Technology implemented after six months of circulation in the industry was considered cutting edge. Staying on the cutting edge is a desirable place to be since cutting edge processes can be researched and prepared for before implementation. Staying on the leading edge gives a little more of a comfort margin between release and implementation of new technology. Implementing technology after being released for a year was an equally desirable place to be.

6.  How and where do BIM & IT overlap?

Overlap can differ from one company to the next depending on size and culture. Typically the overlap occurs in supporting infrastructure technology that is highly applications dependent. Workstations, plotters, 3D printers, data collectors, GPS units, and laser scanners all lend to the overlap. Having one single support submittal process that notifies appropriate staff is less confusing for the end users and expedites response time. This means that even if BIM and IT are in separate departments, they must still work and communicate as one team.

7.  What does it take for communication between Leadership & Technology Leads to be effective?

Technology must be able to communicate on leadership's level to facilitate an understanding between the two. Leadership doesn't want to hear complaints about fatal errors, layer standards, RAM amounts, sluggish network or internet access, server crashes, etc. The mission of a technology lead is to minimize and eliminate the day to day issues that impact operations. However, if there are costly issues that can be eliminated with new technology solutions (hardware or software), communicating these in terms of long-run cost savings will hold leadership's attention. Be prepared to counter the question "what will it cost us" with "what it will cost us if we don't", not only in terms of dollars and cents, but in terms of business development opportunities as well. Leadership expects IT and BIM to bridge their own gaps, communicate, and work together for the prosperity of the company.

8.  What drives BIM, IT, & Leadership into successful ventures?

When the arms of technology are successfully communicating, collaborating, and assisting each other, this positively influences production which is a story leadership wants to hear. Leadership also wants to be educated, not on the details but on the overall picture. Asking the question "what makes this improvement or process meaningful to leadership" and being able to communicate this will promote valuable two way conversation and collaboration with leadership.

9.  Where is the evolution of Technology taking us? What should our objectives be in utilizing this evolution?

It's difficult to predict exactly where the evolution of technology is taking us. We can define where it is we want it to take us. Together, IT, BIM, and leadership can do this so that goals can be defined and set. And if the technology being sought doesn't exist, defining the need helps to formulate objectives. Setting objectives involves asking the question with regard to infrastructure and operations, "How do we want to be positioned six months from now or this time next year?" With the evolution of technology must come the evolution of intellect within an organization; therefore, it is very important that goals be set accordingly.