In my role here at Vico I spend 60% of my time working with our customers and prospects at their offices helping them learn more about what 5D BIM or Virtual Construction can do for them.

While everyone is excited by the power of connecting models to quantities and locations they inevitably look a bit concerned and say, "How long will it take us to learn all this?"  This is the first critical part in the adoption process that we often spend a lot of time discussing. 

The answer to this question is another question, "What do you want to do with it?  How much support do you have today for use of new solutions to typical problems, or in other words, "Has this process been broken for so long that you have just decided to live with it?"  

The reason you have to answer the question with a question is each customer must decide for themselves what is right for them and their organization, but as a friend of mine says, "Every journey begins with a step," so get your company involved.

Once you have decided to do something and you have begun to educate your team you can think in terms of 4 big opportunities:

• Presentations, Constructability and Coordination
• Quantity takeoff and Cost Management
• Schedule analysis, optimization and Simulation
• Field Operations including Layout, Schedule tracking and updating as well as  
  integration of detailed subcontractor models

We have had the privilege of working with some really great contractors and owners around the world.  In the next posting I'll report in on a visit to St. Joe's Healthcare System, a forward thinking Owner organization who has about 10 5D BIM projects underway and is expanding its goals for each project to reach further and further into actual Construction by connecting their 5D Model to Trimble gear for MEP systems placement and site layout as well as some advanced seismic hangar and bracing coordination.

In the past year, Vico has put together some great resources to help you take that first step towards BIM.  Please take advantages of these papers, webinars, and other learning materials to make BIM a reality in your firm:

The BIM Checklist was originally designed as a comparative list of functionality to reference when evaluating BIM tools.  Since it was originally published, the BIM Checklist has turned into a way for Owners to compare two firms bidding for the same job.

The BIM Master Class Series was developed as an interactive webinar series to help GCs explore the 5 dimensions of BIM from 2D drawings to 3D model coordination, contract law, 4D scheduling, and 5D estimating.  The series ends with a special segment, BIM for Executives, that gives upper management the language and dollar values for explaining BIM benefits to Owners and colleagues.

The Fridays with Vico webinar series continuously offers fantastic BIM programming, including customer case studies from Swinerton Builders, PCL, Webcor, Hensel Phelps, and Suffolk Construction.  Be sure to check back regularly to see the current programming, as well as all the archived webinars.

Have a great week and feel free to email me if you have a question or would like to discuss one of these topics in more detail with a member of our team.

Don H - EVP Vico