How Wills Bros transformed to BIM adoption using Autodesk Solutions?

MARCIN SOKOLOWSKI: Hello, everyone. Welcome to our Autodesk University presentation. The topic of the presentation is how Wills Bros transformed to BIM adoption using Autodesk Solutions. Together with me will be presenting two of my great colleagues, Mohamed Ziyad Rasheed and Michael Goehler. And my name is Marcin Sokolowski.

MUHAMMAD ZIYAD RASHEED: Hello. My name is Ziyad Rasheed. And I'm a Civil engineer at Wills Bros.

MICHAEL GOEHLER: And my name is Michael Goehler and I'm from Autodesk. And I'm supporting Wills Bros as a customer success manager.

MARCIN SOKOLOWSKI: Thank you colleagues. My name is Marcin Sokolowski. I'm a BIM manager responsible for leading the digital strategy in Wills and supporting this whole journey. And who is Wills actually?

This is a great Civil engineering company that is from Ireland originally. And based on this great experience, it also has a branch office in Scotland, which is operating in the whole UK market. So Scotland, but also in England.

We are based in Ireland also in regional offices that are mentioned on the slide. So the company is operating very much in the Civil engineering sector, but also in other sectors in the UK, in Ireland. But also outside the UK in other European and non-European markets also.

Can you click the next slide, please? And because we are talking about BIM journey of Wills, we need to remember and know the key requirements that we had to start the whole journey, which is setting these five elements together. Starting with the processes, people, technology, which is the key element of BIM.

But also remembering about the standards that we are applying. And because we are in the UK market, these standards were quite demanding when it comes to BIM adoption and also policy. Yes, because Wills-- because of its decisions done by management had a significant step in having this digital journey going forward.

And we, based on our experience on our knowledge, applied numerous solutions-- technical solutions but also process and technology solutions to enable us to have this journey very progressive for the company and very upfront to market needs. Next slide, please.

And just to visualize that, I captured our initial action plan. It's of course, a workshop plan. It wasn't a 100% plan that we've done. But whenever we start the journey in 2018, 2019, whenever I joined in July, I started to shape the strategy together with the teams and colleagues supported by the management.

And we had the numerous activities to be taken. And of course, all of that was on the foundation of building the competence and culture of BIM across the whole organization. And one of the important parts was the technology that we apply and the solutions-- digital and mobile solutions that we are putting on board in terms of providing the full scope of digital service that we were forced-- or we were required to do in our two contracts with BIM requirement in Scotland. Next slide, please.

The ultimate result based on these implementations was achieving the BIM certification kite mark in this regard provided by BSI, which we perceive a result of our effort and our great engagement during the whole process. And I have to admit that having this ambitious goal initially to have the certification done was also supporting our decisions and our activity to become a digital-oriented company supported by technology and by providing the work in quality, in standards according to ISO 19650.

And I think this was a great step in our digital journey taking forward. Next slide, please. And here I will let the voice to my great colleague Ziyad Rasheed who was responsible for coordinating the project.

MUHAMMAD ZIYAD RASHEED: Thank you very much, Marcin, for presenting a nice start to our AU class. I'll be taking over to explain how Wills Bros has moved forward using BIM Autodesk Solutions for implementing and improving its operations. Wills Bros, being a principal contractor working on infrastructure projects since over five decades has indeed transformed into a progressive digital organization in just two years time.

Two years ago, when we started to deliver BIM compliant projects focused on Maybole Bypass project and Glasgow Airport Investment area project [INAUDIBLE], Wills Bros had a heritage of having paper-based processes in the business. For a contractor, having paper-based processes in this century is something to improve on.

So Wills Bros employed Autodesk Solutions to improve document management and field management capabilities across [? slight ?] projects. So at the moment, Wills Bros has been delivering Glasgow Airport Investment Project-- thus I'll be using the term GAIA-- And Maybole Bypass Project. Both of these projects in Scotland. And another project that's in a joint venture in Northern Ireland that's the A6 Londonderry to Dungiven Project.

In this class, we'll be focusing mostly our lessons learned and the journey for the first projects mentioned in the slide. The question is, why as a forward-looking organization, an organization like Wills Bros should have BIM on projects? BIM is not just for buildings. Building information modeling is for infrastructure as well.

There are various reasons why BIM is beneficial for a project, such as it has the capability to have better collaboration across teams such as [INAUDIBLE], contractor, subcontractor, designers and other project stakeholders. Definitely by having building information modeling elements on a project, a contractor can have sufficient time and cost savings.

Using Autodesk BIM 360 field and docs, Wills Bros found out that at least we were able to save 70% of our conventional time. And this was done recently when my colleague Michael will be presenting onwards in this presentation. We work on different matrices to find out how we were working before and how we have transformed using BIM 360 Solutions.

Definitely as a contractor, it was a contractual requirement to have BIM on projects. And we all are aware of that in the UK, all public projects satisfying a particular criteria required at least BIM level two. Moving forward.

Glasgow Airport Investment Area Project, that's [INAUDIBLE] Renfrewshire Council involves construction of two major bridges, one pedestrian bridge and one roadway user bridge on Black Cart and White Cart rivers. A good number a good length of roadways, new roundabouts and pedestrian facilities. This project was started back in 2019 and taken forward with the client and project stakeholders.

What you see in this slide is a snapshot of the federated model for the Glasgow Airport Investment Area Project. You can see that the federated model you hear exhibits the pavement, the road markings, street furniture hubs, bollards, signs as well as the landscaping. The designers worked on to populate the federated model and then the model was used to view access and understand the project in a better way-- much better way rather than simple 2D or paper-based drawings.

This is another view of the same federated model where you can see how, at a particular area on a project, the street furniture is how the pedestrian walkways are going to be, what signs would be and how the landscaping model works. So all the individual models when integrated from a federated model, such as you could see here, pavement, landscaping, curbing, streetlights, street furniture, traffic signs and the pedestrian walkway bridge.

So the benefit of using Autodesk Solution is that any person on the project team working, as long as they have access to BIM 360 docs, they can simply log in and then access the common data in Word and view model elements. Here you can see and actually visualize how the bridge is looking like and how many number of piles it might have, what kind of railing it involves, what can be the construction sequencing. And it can also help an existing site agents what can be a particular quantity or a particular measurement for a bridge model element.

Using Autodesk software such as Navisworks, this can always be class detection to find out if any particular reinforcement versus ideas ducting or our [INAUDIBLE] system versus curbing have any clashes. And they were identified ahead of the construction, which again, resulted in cost and time saving as well as client satisfaction. Moving onwards to Maybole Bypass project.

This is, again, over five kilometer. It will [INAUDIBLE], bypassing the town of Maybole. The Maybole bypass project is a significant infrastructure upgrade in Scotland's national routes, connecting Glasgow with Republic of Ireland via connection and Glasgow cities.

So this project, again, used Autodesk BIM 360 solution as a [INAUDIBLE] environment and field management function for quality management. The project also has the Federated model, as well as individual models. And the model stored on the CDE, which can be used and accessed by the project team involving contractors, people, as well as the client, and [INAUDIBLE] organization.

So what was the framework basically for adoption? You have a digital solution while working on projects for Maybole or [? Gaia. ?] So the two fundamental features for BIM 360-- that is the BIM 360 Docs and BIM 360 Field-- have been greatly used on the projects at Wills Bros. So I'll just be speaking about in more detail in next week's [INAUDIBLE]

The document management. As per PAS 1192 or ISO 19650, for a BIM compliant project, CDE or [INAUDIBLE] environment as per the requirement. While going to the market and seeing different solutions being offered, a SharePoint by the Microsoft or document management by Autodesk.

Personally, I like document management as a BIM coordinator. Because document management for Autodesk BIM 360 offers many different capabilities, such as managing folders-- as per ISO 19650, document distributions, publishing drawings, creating workflows-- so that the drawing or a design element can be pushed up from a design team to the construction team or the client using the defined workflows and the [INAUDIBLE] features.

Another element that I liked about is the document compare option. You can always compare drawings, be it in PDF format, or CAD format, or Autodesk supported Navisworks formats, or model [INAUDIBLE] format.

Or even if there are simple Microsoft Word documents. They can always be cleared. Which would give you a difference of what has been a revision. How and what changes have been made. Document management feature also offers 3D or 2D viewing, markups.

Personally, working on an infrastructure project where-- although the design is complete. But given the site conditions and waiting nature of the jobs, you always need revisions and drawings. From a design coordinator's perspective, Markups feature that Autodesk BIM 360 offers is best.

Using Markups, you know, whenever there are design changes, such as simple DSI for a particular element [INAUDIBLE] to be changed. Instead of revising whole of the drawing, a markup feature can always help you and [INAUDIBLE] site instantaneously. What has happened and what is to be changed. Rather than people ending up using [INAUDIBLE].

From the document controller's perspective, you know, whenever on a big project, what millions of pounds-- you have multiple documents being generated. And a document that controllers ought to be ensuring them they are being stored in the right folders.

So the Desktop Connector and off-line sync feature [INAUDIBLE] offers is simply a document controller [INAUDIBLE] documents in designated folders. And they're getting sync online automatically from your computer, rather than [INAUDIBLE] and uploading each and every document.

There's some additional capabilities from document management that we have used on our project, which include insight and reporting, and getting a feedback of who has access to what documents [INAUDIBLE]. Definitely, that depends on administrative rights or the users using our CDE.

This has significantly helped in, for example, a particular person actually opening up the document. And then us having a digital footprint of when the document was accessed, by whom, and at what time, and how many times.

This is another view of our document folder system at one of our [INAUDIBLE]. Briefly talking about the design reviews or internal document reviews-- traditionally, Wills Bros or any other contractor has a system of a design package getting designed and then getting submitted physically or via email or where Google Drive links or share drive links to the consultees or to the client.

Whereas, Autodesk BIM 360-- although we had to invest a couple of months before we could ensure the system was fully functioning because of design teams, as well as the consultees. Or the client getting aware of how this work or reviews were defined. And [INAUDIBLE] work accordingly.

So we had internal design review and external design review. So internally, whenever a document would push from the design team to the design coordinator. That would involve an end design review. And if accepted and approved, it would go on automatically to the design for submission or approval or rejection or any comments back.

So this would again save a lot of internet space or a lot of [INAUDIBLE] work by [INAUDIBLE].

Moving on to the field management capabilities. Again, Autodesk BIM 360 offers field management to ensure quality. So Wills Bros, as a contractor, again, had, paper based inspection templates for various works, such as compaction of [INAUDIBLE] or construction of structural elements, or environmental checklists, or concrete core inspections, or other quality elements typically on an infrastructure project.

The need was increasingly felt last year when, unfortunately, , we had COVID 19. This is because instead of having a manual-- if we had a manual, paper-based system. It would involve multiple, physical contacts on paper, as well as [INAUDIBLE] people working on the site.

We had already a digital solution here. Where our existing templates were converted into digital templates. And the workflows were defined. So instead of manual templates, the checklists were digital. And people used or the site used digital templates. But to save a lot of our time, as well as appropriate action in remarkable times.

Another function was that we have benefited as the issue management, as well as [INAUDIBLE] that I will be speaking shortly on. So this is a typical view. Where we have our RIWs. And then once an RIW is assigned [INAUDIBLE] significantly, automatically get a notification. That this RIW is supposed to be action, for example, by a [INAUDIBLE].

And once that is [INAUDIBLE], the site agent or a structural engineer or an artwork's agent automatically knows that this has been action accordingly and undisclosed, which then helps know that the quality team that OKed this inspection is complete or next [INAUDIBLE].

The field management function of Autodesk BIM 360 not only helps you work online. But even if you are not connected with the internet. So our site agents-- as a site team, people are equipped with the iPads. So that using the app of field management they can access documents anytime on their site.

Particularly the weather like Scotland, where you can't carry drawings or papers in rainy weather on the field-- using iPads, again, helped save significant time and cost on the site for accessing drawings. Again, the offline function for managing quality, such as answering checklists or any other inspection templates offline, help site people for managing the site in a better way.

Again, BIM 360 Field is helpful in the commissioning and handover stage for clients or contractors like us. So I'll be speaking about [INAUDIBLE] in the next few slides.

Here in this slide, you can see how the digital footprint is there for a final sign of digitally. In this regard, the designer site representative has just signed up using his mobile phone or tablet device on the app. And that makes the particular inspection [INAUDIBLE].

Moving onwards, I would just now be explaining how Wills Bros has transformed [INAUDIBLE] federated models for 4G and 5G on both of our projects, Maybole and Glasgow airport. 4D-- all of us are well aware of what is 2D and what is 3D. But if we add an element of time, the 3D becomes 4D.

And if the element of cost is added to 4D, that becomes 5D, in terms of building information modeling. So here you can see a bridge element coming up together, starting from [INAUDIBLE], to construction of apartments, to launching of beams, and then starting [INAUDIBLE] levels, to pouring of the [INAUDIBLE] slab, and then continuing on to complete the approach slabs.

This was important to understand and find out what best approach would be. And what time and resource would be needed, if we were to construct a bridge. So instead of planning on simple projects-- and Microsoft Project are simple programs-- the additional use of Navisworks and InfraWorks, Which are again, Autodesk software.

To come up with 4D solution, again helps to a contractor and as the site team visualize what resources are needed at what time. And what constraints might be. Particularly, that need to be addressed in action proactively by the team. So again, BIM 360 and Autodesk software are again a great tool for construction modeling.

This is something I, as my role on the project, I really like about-- the model comparison [INAUDIBLE] that's offered by Autodesk BIM 360. Whenever-- I spoke earlier on it, as well. Whenever a new version or a same file is available, is a feature that you can always replace the earlier version.

In this case, you can see on the site where it is [INAUDIBLE] so the Federated model has been replaced with a newer version. But as a person working on a project that has loads and loads of information-- and the project is of significant volume, in terms of work quantum-- you need to only focus on what [INAUDIBLE] design changes, in the particular element on the job.

So as a BIM coordinator, I can always use the feature function to compare the two documents and then get results-- where and what changes have been made. This also helps design managers and the project managers to know proactively.

We have used BIM 360 Docs to access particular information at times where particular decision making was involved. For example, our structures agents would need to know and visualize how many piles are there quickly, rather than going through detailed drawings. Or what volume of concrete is needed on particular pole for a particular section on a bridge, rather than sitting and calculating manually. Or simply measuring the distance between two particular project elements quickly, rather than trying to understand and applying factors on [INAUDIBLE].

That's the snagging works. From the quality perspective, snagging works are important when completing the sign off and moving onwards to complete the project. So Wills Bros has defined an internal process for the snagging works.

So any particular section-- section engineer or a site agent-- can log in to the BIM 360 Docs, access the model, and then just click on a model element. And then assign it to a particular type and assign to a particular person. And assign [INAUDIBLE] and location for the project. So instead of manual snagging lists, using the issues function as a snagging works can help site teams and ensure satisfaction by the client.

Just concluding to my part of the presentation, before I hand over to my colleague, Michael, from Autodesk. For our audience from this class, I would say, start by small steps. If you really want to transform a digital journey. Start by implementing, taking small steps on your journey, just like us.

Use the right tools by understanding what your requirements are from the clients, or from the business, or from your project teams, or from the organizational perspective. Stay connected with people, like Michael, and great organizations, like Autodesk. So that you're always aware of what's happening and what's new on.

I would say that-- just share your feedback. Personally, our story with Autodesk has been great. Because we have always been aware of what our project [INAUDIBLE]. And our feedback has always, definitely been valuable for Autodesk.

Because we, as a contractor, have to provide feedback on developments like field management. Where Michael connected us to the developers in the US. And our feedback was immediately put in and resulted in overall product and feature enhancement.

So finally, ACC can be used for civils. And it's just not for buildings. That's my presentation, before I move on to hand it over to Michael. Thank you very much.

MICHAEL GOEHLER: Many thanks, Ziyad. And also, many thanks to Marcin. Great presentation. And I would like to continue this presentation on how Wills Bros actually collaborated together with Autodesk.

So during the time Wills Bros was onboarded and adopted to BIM 360. They have also partnered with Autodesk to navigate this upcoming digital change within the organization. With a customer success program here in Autodesk, we strive to make this change actually as seamless as possible.

So my role in this process was the assigned customer success manager dedicated only to Wills Bros. As post-sales point of contact, first, I established an internal Wills Bros steering group around Marcin and also Ziyad.

Which act as basically as connection point between end users, technology partner, Autodesk, but also, the overall Wills Bros deployment strategy. This group consisted of different personas from different disciplines, but also different power users, as well.

Further, we agreed on training objectives. Which were priority to Wills Bros team. And also then afterwards, we delivered those bespoke trainings by our deployment specialists.

During the entire journey, also this offered transparency but also insights-- what Ziyad just mentioned-- of the actual product development and the roadmap. And linked the feedback, which was really valuable from the Wills Bros team, back to the Autodesk product team. This helps Ziyad and also Marcin and the team to understand upcoming BIM 360 releases, as well as being actively part of the product development as such.

And lastly throughout the engagement, the customer success team worked with the Wills Bros steering group to identify and measure efficiency gains in their processes. Which have led to a metric-based outcome story. Which was then also communicated through the different stakeholders of the Wills Bros organization. Which Ziyad also mentioned earlier in this presentation, of the 70% efficiency gain.

On the next slide, we can see then that at the moment, Wills Bros are still using BIM 360-- what Ziyad mentioned-- for all the construction management workflows. But over the last years, Autodesk also has made efforts to extend the current platform and has worked to integrate several solutions into one. Therefore, BIM 360 has evolved into the unified platform called Autodesk Construction Cloud.

The new platform combines best in class technology to support workflows, spanning-- as you can see in the picture-- from design phase, all over to the plan, build, and operate phase. With data shared across all the different phases.

This can help to analyze the data and to identify priorities and resolve problems early already in the life cycle of a construction project. With a unified platform, also integrations of other applications are possible to really customize your own workflows, as well. In case you might use also other third party applications.

And with this, I would like to finish off this presentation. And still wish you a nice day here at Autodesk University 2021. Thank you.