Study on barriers of implementation of building information modeling in facilities management

Abstract

Innovation implementation within an organization has always been associated with barriers from all aspects. As a key innovation in the building industry, Building Information Modeling (BIM) has been adopted rapidly in the design and construction process. Facilities management (FM) which contributed far more values than design and construction however did not seems to catch up with this trend. High cost, poor technology and other factors inherent within organizations were mostly mentioned in research papers and industry to be the key obstacles. This paper aimed to explore and identify the key organizational barriers of the implementation process of BIM in FM. Three case studies on large FM organizations in Hong Kong were reported through in-depth interviews. Two FM software providers were also interviewed to have a comprehensive understanding of BIM in FM interfacing technology.

Before the data collection process, two theoretical models were built to guide the data collection and analysis process. The first model was based on the information flow during the BIM in FM implementation process whilst the second model was about the required conditions for such process.

FM managers from three leading organizations in BIM implementation in Hong Kong were interviewed. Some published documents from the targeted organizations were reviewed to facilitate the research findings. Soft system analysis was adopted to analyze the barriers which impeded the implementation of BIM in FM. A cross case study was also conducted to strengthen the findings from the three case studies. Two overseas software providers with successful BIM in FM experiences were also interviewed. The technology of BIM in FM is found to be ready for importing the construction stage information to FM software packages. The additional functions based on BIM in FM, however, are still not readily available in the market.

The fragmentation between the project and facilities management teams was found to be the most significant barriers for BIM implementation. To overcome such barriers, organizations may consider establishing a coordination platform between the project management team and FM team. It could be the most efficient way when the fragmented organizational structure was not possible to be changed in a short time. A company-wide BIM standard would also be useful to help during the coordination process.