Managing Space, Assets, and Maintenance through BIM to FM

NICK STEFANIDAKIS: Hi, this is Nick Stefanidakis with Archibus Inc. I'm the managing director of the Archibus product line within Space IQ. And very excited to be here today to talk about managing space, assets, and maintenance through BIM to FM. So let's take a look.

So, as you hopefully have seen, the goals of this session or the learning objectives are to aim at addressing the following questions. So what is this BIM thing anyways? This BIM to FM thing anyways? How does BIM help with managing space and assets?

If I'm going to do this, where do I even start? What is a facility management IWMS system? We're going from BIM to FM, so what does that mean in the facility management side?

What are the key elements of a BIM execution plan for FM, for Facilities Management? And what does BIM to FM look like in action? Let's take a look.

So I thought I'd start with just a really high-level overview video that we had put together that talks about leveraging the rich BIM data that we can use during the design and construction process to manage our space, to manage occupancy, assets, maintenance, all of the things that happen within the building once we take occupancy of that building.

And as you can see, we're connecting assets to what's happening in the real world and the facility. How we're leveraging energy or using energy. How we maintain those assets. So there's just lots and lots of use cases for the data, including how we occupy the space. And with today's world of hoteling and agile booking, there's lots and lots of data and use cases for this rich data that we can use in the occupancy phase of a building.

But there's lots of challenges. There's challenges that facilities managers and corporate real estate executives face every single day. We have aging buildings, aging machines within the buildings that are keeping them running-- HVAC, pumps, elevators. And there's a lot of waste. As Energy Star reports, 30% of energy is wasted through poor efficiencies in our systems.

Our spaces might not be very comfortable. Maybe they're too hot or they're too cold or the lighting isn't just right. And we see a lot of maintenance-related failures that are not due to equipment age but just because we don't necessarily have the right maintenance programs in place to keep them running optimally. So there's lots of challenges that we have and there's ways in which we can try to improve that.

And that can really start in the early phase of design and construction. But as we know, I'm sure you've all seen variations on this theme before, operations really represents the largest portion of the total cost of ownership of a building's lifecycle. Something like 20% to 25% of the total cost of ownership of a building happens in the operations phase, in that 30 or so years of occupying the building after handover.

And so how do we really work in those areas to try and optimize that? And through proper facilities management, planning, being a good steward of the assets that we have within our buildings. So these are some of the challenges that we're faced with.

So one of the things we want to look at is-- the theme of this presentation is around BIM to FM. So how can we enable, in the design and construction phase, a lifecycle management process that's going to help us easily transition from BIM, our BIM models that we're using in the initial requirements and design and construction and even in commissioning, ultimately up to the handover process.

And this really gives us an opportunity to hit the ground running by having all of the data that we need in order to operate that new asset, that new building, and all of the things that keep that building running, as efficiently as possible, as quickly as possible, and without a lot of extra manual work around collecting the data manually. Going through reams and reams of paper. And we've probably all heard the horror stories.

So the goal of this presentation, this course, is to first of all talk about some of the benefits of occupying and operating a building and some of the benefits of a system that is connected and started in the BIM in design and construction and facilitate the process and then the ongoing maintenance within the building itself or facilities management. So we have difficult space and facilities challenges throughout the occupancies. We want to create spaces and experience to attract and retain the best talent.

We want to be able to leverage data that we might have available to us to help us plan and make sure that we are operating our facilities according to how they're being used, how they're being occupied. BIM, BMS systems, occupancy sensors, all the technology that we have to support us is great, but sometimes, they don't have the full solution. So really what we need is a system that can take all these great sources of data and aggregate that data into a system that we can use not only for a single building or a campus but across our entire portfolio.

And centralize that data and reduce the amount of upkeep and optimize the data itself in terms of where we store that data, where we manage that data. Some of the data is design data that we don't really need to use in the management, but there's a lot of management data. Things like the operating parameters of the assets, hours that they've been running, if a piece of equipment is replaced, the serial number, the individual asset details for that asset. We don't necessarily need to go back to the source and update that every time that there's a change.

So what we want is an integrated solution that is able to pull all that BIM and BMS and operational data. Also bring into it other sources of data. Corporate data. HR data. Data that we might have in our space management system if it's not part of the integrated solution. Really bring all that data and develop a platform that we can use to really operate the entire building or the entire portfolio.

And of course, one of the best sources of that data originates in the BIM model. And we want to talk through how we get to that information. Part of the process is we have this notion-- and we've been hearing more and more about it-- and Autodesk is creating great utilities and tools to help us visualize that information. So having an IWMS that's BIM aware and can connect to, visualize, help us walk through and see the physical space, see the physical assets, before we ever leave our desk and go out in the field and see what's happening in the real world.

Leveraging the data. Maybe we have telemetry or BMS information it's feeding us. And we can see all that information, raise a ticket, or do whatever we need to do before we go out in the field and see exactly what might be wrong in that situation. And there's lots and lots of other use cases. Things from space management, just visualizing the space or the assets, implementing a BIM-based asset and maintenance program where we get really rich data from the BIM models that support our ongoing maintenance without that initial data gathering and job crawl that we'll hear a little bit about.

Integrating with IoT data, whether it's measuring how many people are in a building or in a space, how the building is operating, temperatures. All that data can really help not only provide a more comfortable environment, but as the technology evolves, even self-monitoring or self-healing facilities as the technology allows as we move forward. So there's so many use cases, both today and really excited to see all the new use cases that we'll see in the near future.

But now, to the point of this presentation, what are the things we need to think about if we want to implement a BIM to FM? So there's lots of considerations that we need to take. And we need to start with, what do we think are those keys to success to have a successful BIM to FM journey? And like most projects, it really starts with having clearly defined needs.

If we don't know what we want in the end, it's really difficult to define what we want to tell our architects, engineers, all of the people that feed into the process how to model. What to put into the model. So we really need to understand what those needs are at the end of the project, at handover, in operations, to really inform the project.

We also need to have an idea of what's going to be the system of record for which type of data. Obviously, the graphical data is going to start in the model. We're not going to replicate that somewhere else and manage the graphical data somewhere. But we do need to manage the ongoing operational data.

So, as we create maintenance work orders, for example, there's really very little value in putting the maintenance work order records back into the model. So we need to define, what is the system of record for which type of data? And it could even be down to specific attributes of an element in the model.

It's always important that we're talking about the same language. We're talking the same standards when we define what we're putting into the model, into our inventory. And this may be an obvious thing, particularly if you already have a well-defined standard and you have an FM system and a maintenance program. You may already have a standard and you just need to define that and put it into the requirements for your BIM projects and everything should be good.

If you don't, the next big project that you have or next large construction project, this might be a good time to think about data standards around how you classify assets, how you name assets, how you name spaces across the organization if that's not well-defined or consistent. And then what classification standard do we want to use or ontology do we want to use? There's so many choices.

We need to identify what assets that we want to actually capture the data. We don't need necessarily need all of the data for every element in the model to feed into our FM system. That's just unnecessary data in the system. It can cause bloat and just a lot of data to wade through. So we want to identify the types and the specific kinds of assets that we want to pull attribute data, along with the element information, into the FM system so we can maintain those. We can perform, define preventive maintenance schedules, execute maintenance, inspections, and all the ongoing operational things that we need to do.

And we want to move to more of a digital job crawl in commissioning so we're not-- again, we're not dealing with the box of papers at the end of a project that we have to go through to define and put in all of the data and asset information from the construction project. So we'll talk a little bit more about each of these keys to success.

So the first one, clearly defining needs. We really need to, as an owner, set the expectations of what we want from this BIM to FM journey. Why are we doing this? What do we expect to achieve? What benefits do we expect to achieve?

Are we even ready for this? Do we have the systems in place? Do we have the people in place? I'm going to jump to the last bullet. If we do this, do we have the people and the systems and the processes to manage that data in the future?

And then, of course, what information do we really need in order to run our facilities, to manage our assets, to manage our space? So we really have to define what those needs are up front when we're going into any new BIM project like this or BIM to FM project.

I talked a little bit about designating a system of record. As any good data governance program would indicate, you really need a single source of truth for every specific set of data, every attribute of data. So again, what are those maintainable assets and which of those attributes that are associated with those assets do we need to manage? Which ones are we going to manage in the FM system downstream versus managing that as a data element in the model.

So maybe the location, the size, the shape. All of that information that lives in the BIM model itself should stay in the BIM model and that's where it resides. But as we move into operations, we're further attributing the assets. We're adding transactional things that happen to it. That obviously or should stay in the facility management.

And some may need to flow back into BIM. And that's OK if we need that to inform a future remodel or things that happen downstream after the construction. And then what is the workflow? How do we get the data from these systems? From our Revit model into the facility management system. And how do we maintain it?

And then, as I mentioned, what data, if any, should flow back into the model? And there's certainly valid use cases of names, IDs, things that we want to incorporate back into the model so that, again, if we're doing future work, the data that we need is available in that model.

I talked a little bit about selecting data standards and classification ontologies. And really, this is important so that when we're looking at our data, we can organize the data. So if we want to look at all of the chillers, do we have a way of quickly filtering our data down to all of the chillers or of a particular type? Or is it a hot water pump versus a cold water pump? Are we able to get that information very quickly?

And again, do we have a system in place today? If we do and it's working, there's no need to reinvent the wheel. So we just need to apply that, put that into the new project or the new contracts for that project.

If it meets our needs, great. Why is it meeting our needs? Is there a way we could improve it? If it's not, why isn't it meeting our needs? And maybe we need to go and look for a new system or to see what's wrong with the classification or the data standards that we've selected. And maybe we can just come up with an improvement over what we have.

And then what's the right classification system for us? There's lots of volumes written on UniFormat versus OmniClass. And we're not going to get into that here, but it's important to have a classification system or an ontology for how you classify, how you name, how you qualify all of the data in your models in your FM system. And they need to agree.

And then finally, which systems should be classified? Not every element needs to be classified in a way that it's going to end up in the facility management system. Certainly, everything in the model should have some classification. Even if it's not a maintainable asset that we need to worry about in operations from a maintenance perspective, still, everything should be classified so that the model is as effective and usable as possible.

And then who's responsible for entering that data? There's lots of people involved in a project, and it's good to define that data governance or that responsibility upfront. Is it the architects and engineering? Is it the construction agent? Is it commissioning? Or are we going to collect that after handover? So it's good to get that defined upfront so we know where that data is going to come from in the design all the way through construction and handover process.

And then we want to validate the model. There's lots of great tools. The BIM interoperability tools within Revit are great for looking for whether or not all of the data that we need-- there may be some configuration of the options for that feed or specific case, but it can be a great tool to validate that the chosen classification system that you've used has been applied to all of the elements in the model, as identified in the original requirements.

And we need to understand how we want to use the data after construction. And really, that's going to be defined in our initial requirements. That's going to define how much detail we need to put into the system. If we don't need, in maintenance, to know the finishes or certain attributes of an asset, then maybe we don't need to invest in putting that information in upfront. Or if there's very specific things that we need, and they may be specific to some assets and not others, we want to make sure that we're really putting in the data at the level of development that we need to support our operations as we go forward into facilities and maintenance in the future.

Again, we want to identify the maintainable assets. And really, this is important because again, we don't want to bring everything across and just bloat our system with all of this data and really recreate the entire model in our facility management system. We only want the information for those assets that we really need to maintain. Elevators, HVAC equipment, plumbing equipment. The things that maintain, that we need to maintain. The things that can break. Things that need regular maintenance or inspections for maybe regulatory reasons.

So it's really important that we use our system, our classification system, as a table or as a guide of which things we're going to integrate with the FM. How we're going to identify those. What level of detail we need for each level of that classification.

And then again, what are those attributes? Both the common attributes across that family or type, or think of those as type parameters, that are common across that particular type of element in the model versus, as we get into the next phase of commissioning, where we're adding more information to those assets, to those elements. Things that we will find during commissioning or install. What is the serial number? The install date? Any operating parameters that are unique to that specific instance of that type of asset.

And then when do we collect that? Are we defining that at install, during commissioning, or is it something that the owner is going to collect after handover? And then we want to make sure that we have an efficient process for collecting that data. There's lots of tools in the field that can be used that can be tied directly to either the model through the cloud and BIM 360 or through the FM system and the tools that are available in the FM system to further attribute the data with that instance or as build information on the specific field units in the building itself.

I'm going to talk very briefly about building information model. I mean, I think anybody that's here in this presentation is well aware of a Building Information Model, or BIM. Again, we're really focusing on the information piece of the BIM that we're working with.

So, in real practice, there's the operational piece of modeling the spaces, modeling the assets, putting those attributes into the space and making sure we capture the things that we need. If it's a fire door, we want to know what the fire rating is of that door. So the key information that we need to really manage the assets.

So again, who are we modeling for? What data is required? And what level of detail is necessary to support our ongoing operations? These, again, we're trying to pose the questions that we need to ask upfront, so that we can collect the information or make sure that the data is added throughout the design and construction process.

And again, there's lots of different people involved. There's lots of different phases of the project that are adding that information. And we want to make sure that, while the models-- these models have lots of value for collaboration, for design, analysis, generating all of the deliverables and submittals and commissioning, but throughout that process, we're building up a library of information that we can use to, if we're going to go down the BIM to FM journey, use in the facility management phase or operation phase of a building.

And again, you talked about a few of the use cases earlier. Certainly, very common one is space management. How do we optimize the use of space? How do we ensure we can get the right balance of people into the space so that we're as efficient as we can be but we're not making the space uncomfortable or too hot or too warm?

We want to manage our assets. We want to understand where those assets are, what the operating parameters are for them, what are the maintenance procedures. And all that information is collected throughout this process. We can support that and track that across the whole portfolio.

When we think about BIM, we're usually we're talking about new construction. We may already have a portfolio of lots of other buildings and this is just one building that's going to get added into our overall asset management strategy, or building operations, if we're talking about maintenance. Or inspections if we're talking about regulatory compliance and we have to have a tracked process and auditable tracked process for performing inspections or maintenance. Because when the auditors show up, can we produce the evidence that we have performed all the necessary maintenance inspections, repairs, and have that evidence somewhere in a system.

And again, as the total lifecycle cost of the building happens in the 25 to 30 year operating period, what can we do to optimize that? So tracking things like energy consumption, energy management, CO2 emissions, things to try and reduce the overall cost and make that lifecycle cost of the building as efficient as possible. And all of that is easier if we can start with good data and we understand how the building is supposed to operate and we have the tools to operate it effectively.

Let's talk a little bit about what is a facility management system. We've been talking about it but really haven't introduced the concept very well. So let's take a chance to do that now. When we talk about facility management, there's lots of different terms for it. You might hear it referred to as an IWMS, or Integrated Workplace Management System. You may hear it referred to as a CAFM, Computer Aided Facility Management, or CMMS, Computer Aided Maintenance Management System.

Generally, those are all used fairly interchangeably, but IWMS, FM system is roughly what we see here on the screen. These are the functional areas that we see. We tend to look at them as three categories. There's workplace, there's performance, and portfolio. And you can see the different functional areas associated with each of those.

So if it's to support the occupants and the interactions that the occupants have with the building or the spaces, we think more about workplace. If we're talking about keeping the operations running and the availability of the facility high, the comfort of the facility high, we're talking about performance. Energy management, maintenance, reducing risk or identifying where the risks are so that we can mitigate those risks as much as possible.

And then the portfolio itself. As we are operating the building and we have major repairs to do, we can use this data to roll up into capital projects and our planning cycles. And then managing, at the real property or at the portfolio level, our entire, I guess, portfolio of buildings and locations.

So again, what are the benefits of an FM or an IWMS system? So why are we doing this to begin with? Well, there's things that we can benefit from in a FM or IWMS solution. We certainly want to streamline our operational processes. That's always going to reduce costs and make our processes smoother, more reliable, improve financial performance, reduce costs.

Inform our investment decisions. And I like to think about this in terms of closing the loop. So, as we do a design to a construction process, occupy the building, see how the building performs-- what assets work, which ones don't, what maintenance procedures work, which ones don't-- what have we learned from that building or buildings, the portfolio, in our FM system that we can apply as learnings into further future investments or projects that we might go into in the future?

I mentioned earlier, compliance. Tracking and demonstrate compliance with whatever regulations that might be applicable to your building or organization. Knowing where the risks are and mitigating those risks. Improving comfort and services that are available for the occupants.

As we think about things today and as people are returning to work, lots of services and things are needed for the occupants to ensure that they feel safe in the building. That they're physical distancing and all of the things around a safe return to office are being handled by the facility and the people that operate the building on behalf of the employees or the occupants and visitors. It may not enhance the reputation, but certainly if you have episodes where there's a compliance violation or something, maybe energy consumption, that can harm your reputation. So there's certainly a corporate or an organizational reputation effect of not having a good FM or maintenance program.

Being able to demonstrate social responsibility. A lot of talk around environmental social governance and we're seeing more and more of that. And that's only going to get more important as we move forward. And improving organizational accountability. By putting in processes and workflows that hold the departments or the organization accountable for the assets and the resources that they use within an organization or within a building, it can really help drive down costs and operational efficiency.

We talked a lot about questions we need to ask. Things that we need to do upfront. You know, how are we classifying data? What assets are maintainable? What do we need to know about those assets?

That's all great. We defined all that. But how do we then use that in the real world to ensure that we have a project deliverable at the end that we can consume? And a lot of this is in what's known as-- I'm sure you've all heard about BIM Execution Plan, or BEP. And I did a little googling around before this to see what do people refer to a BIM execution plan as or what are the definitions. And there were a couple of things that stood out.

The first one, it makes total sense. A foundational framework to ensure successful deployment of BIM-enabled projects. It makes perfect sense. My next bullet, the key is good planning of the design to engineering to construction process. And this is the one that I struggled with a little bit because it stopped at engineering to construction process. And what I would argue is that the BIM execution plan should extend into operations process. And that's why we're talking about how do we get this data.

How do we put it somewhere, in our contracts or in our BIM execution plan, the rules, the expectations that we have, for all of the vendors, all of the contractors that are involved in that design to engineering to construction process to ensure that we have a smooth operations process. We want to minimize downstream surprises. Establish the goals, the tasks. All of the things that we need to do should be outlined in that execution plan.

And I'm really-- again, I'm focusing on thinking about what we put in the execution plan, its impact on how we're going to operate the building once we take it over. So that data that we want to collect. The FM data that we need. And also, it should specify any non-model data that we need, added to the model. If there are things that we want attributed to those assets in the model, what are they and what form should they be put in? Whether it's information about specific assets or spaces. That should really all be spelled out in the contracts and the BIM execution plan.

And again, just to show it in a single page, for operating-- post-construction operations-- we want to know that we have the data that we need to manage our space. What detail do we need to know about our spaces? What information do we want? So that when we bring in the floor plan data, the space data, from our models into our space management or IWMS, we have what we need in place to quickly create, publish that into our FM. And can start managing and occupying and putting people and organizations into that space.

And then obviously, if we're talking about the assets, what do we need about those assets? How do we get the right information and capture that? And what we're going to do now is take a look at just a real short video of BIM to FM in action. And show just an example. This is certainly not the full extents of a BIM to FM.

But what we like to do is have a direct bidirectional integration with Revit so that we can pull those parameters, that data from the model that we have configured-- again, based on our rules within the BIM execution plan, our classification system. All of the attributes that we have specified in the classifications that we have identified that we want to use. All of that data.

The field data that was maybe collected during commissioning. All that information. If it's in there and we validated it, we want to then navigate the model and look at that information for ourselves. Ensure that, as we work graphically or as we're showing here, filtering down and looking at specific types of assets, specific information about those assets if we want to look at all the equipment and maybe just focus on mechanical equipment, quickly scan through. Make sure that the data is where it's supposed to be. It's classified the way that we have agreed.

And then from here, initiate the process of mapping both assets and space data to our system. And ideally, if this is part of an existing system, the mapping should have already been done because we're using our existing classification system. So that we know that a room ID in the space plan is equal to a room number in the model or whatever the attribute mapping is that you might have.

But the process starts by telling our FM system what building and floor that we're mapping to. And then from there, everything that we capture from that particular floor, all of the spaces, all of the assets, the system's intelligent enough to know that these spaces are as they're labeled based on the attributes. That the equipment that we catalog or that we have maps to our FM system are captured in the right room, just based on the model information itself. We can infer the location of assets just based on where they're placed within the model.

And then, when we're ready to integrate, if we need to, we can apply a numbering scheme so that, as we bring the information in from the model, it may already be associated with every asset. But there are tools that exist to apply whatever our numbering scheme is to the spaces or to the assets, as we're showing here, very, very quickly and easily. Numbering multiple assets or spaces in a single action within the model.

Or what we call cataloging or editing individual assets from the model. And applying-- here, we're applying our standard data from the FM system into the model as an attribute to the model. So again, if we have a system and we want to make it available to the vendors or contractors as they're doing their commissioning or as they're putting their assets into the system, they can specify attributes from the FM system and apply them to the model itself.

And then of course, because all of this data coming from individual models of different buildings, different locations, different countries, all that data is integrated and it's loaded into a single system, which allows us to search across our entire portfolio and see where all of the-- I think that was a Johnson Controls asset that we were just looking at-- where are all of those assets across our whole portfolio? What's the maintenance history on those? And is that the best asset that we should use going forward?

And you can make, as we mentioned earlier, strategic purchasing decisions based on the types of assets that you're using, the maintenance history, the cost performance of those assets. And then finally, visualizing the spaces. So if we need to go into a space and try to figure out if we're going to shut down an HVAC system, what rooms are impacted by that? Because the FM system is spatially aware, we can identify with those connections are. Or if we want to see what a space looks like before we go out into the field, we can go out and capture that information.

So so many valuable benefits to having an effective BIM to FM strategy and leveraging technology to get us to a really good place after handover and into operations. Well, thank you for your time. And I really look forward to the rest of the sessions.