Answering the Research Questions

Part IV – Discussion and Conclusion

60 Digitalization as Driver for Standardized Specification and Design of Buildings

Part IV – Discussion and Conclusion

Digitalization as Driver for Standardized Specification and Design of Buildings 61 engaged in the intermediate community required. Tools from other design methods should be included in relation to understanding of constraints and decision making workflows, as it seems that this is a weakness in the tested APM methodology. Furthermore, the APM methodology is simple in its approach to validate design proposals but could benefit from including improved decision making tools as the ones described in Section 6.1.

It is a clear misunderstanding in the AEC industry that digitalization is able to create collaboration and strong communities. Instead it is important that an efficient design process must be in place before implementing digitalization initiatives. If the right management practices are in place, digitalization can improve knowledge sharing, planning and decision making processes and thereby further improve the efficiency of the design process.

12.2 Sub-question 2

How to manage product information within building design to support the desired design process?

Product information must be seen in relation to the specific design process in each individual project. This will often make information requirements project specific and the information system setup must be supportive of such required flexibility – including design and simulation tools and their information exchange interfaces.

Essentially, there is a need to narrow the flow of information between product models and designers (cf. Section 4.1). This can be done by focusing on what information is design specific and needed by others. To formulate such requirements, needs must be related to specific use cases by using for example the IDM package methodology. In relation to geometry, there is a need to simplify the way requirements are specified using a LOD framework, but such a framework must address concretization specifically to avoid misunderstanding.

To match the needs in unique and fragmented AEC projects, standards related to information management must be modular as there is otherwise a clear risk that standards will counteract the intentions in an efficient design process. It must be avoided that standardization takes ownership from the design team members. Instead standards should be used to eliminate doubt and allow for a pragmatic understanding of the design problems at hand. The IDM package methodology and generic LOD framework developed in Paper A, B and C supports these needs. Ensuring simple access to information in the product model is for this reason also a key concern and shared data repositories with product information must be set up to accommodate this need.

12.3 Sub-question 3

How to manage process information within building design to support the desired design process?

Process information is related to tasks of various kinds and their relation to other elements such as organisation (work breakdown), time (scheduling), functions (clarification/changes), product (feedback/coordination) and status (workflow). Tasks can be identified in several tools and processes and solved in several other tools and processes.

Part IV – Discussion and Conclusion

62 Digitalization as Driver for Standardized Specification and Design of Buildings Work packages consisting of one or more design tasks must be well-defined in relation to their information needs and the planning of work packages must be completed so that an efficient information flow is achieved. The IDM Manager developed in Paper B allow for such abilities to manage work packages efficiently. Other types of tasks, such as clarification or decisions, should also be defined unambiguously, captured in a structured manner and be part of the continuous planning and prioritization process, but they should not be part of the planning in the IDM Manager as they do not influence the information flow. The management of tasks in the AEC industry could for this these reasons be supported by using a combination of the IDM Manager, to manage IDM packages, and one or more task repositories based on the BFC format as described in Paper F to capture and store tasks. For the task repositories to capture the range of task types identified in this research, the BFC format needs to be expanded and the proposed schema architecture in Paper F could be used as basis for such expansion.

The APM methodology provides a solution to how tasks can be utilized efficiently in building design.

For the method to be successful, it is essential that the task repositories allow for efficient integration with other systems used. Moreover, it seems essential that the way tasks are managed must promote for dialog and discussion because the case studies in Paper E clearly indicate that collaboration is not efficient if tasks are only assigned in a system as opposed to a face-to-face dialog.

12.4 Primary Research Question

How should information in building design be managed to support an efficient building design process?

The primary goal for managing an efficient design process should be to integrate information, organization, process and product. The IPD framework (cf. Section 7) can contribute to create the required contractual arrangements and ensure motivation for such integration. Essentially, the goal for the AEC industry should be to implement solutions similar to PLM systems used in manufacturing to support the required integration. To achieve this in the AEC industry, the entry barriers for using PLM systems must be lowered. The MFPP methodology proposed in Section 11 summarizes the findings from the scientific papers and allows for lowering the entry barriers for integration and digitalization within the building design process. The MFPP methodology is for this reason a proposal to manage both information and the building design process as such.

The MFPP methodology relies on easy access to structured data. In the solutions developed in the scientific papers, the IFC, IDM, and BCF standards from buildingSMART are used to ensure open and easy access to data. The IDM and BCF standards need adjustments or expansions to be supportive of the MFPP methodology, but the industry needs in both cases are well documented and would benefit considerably from such adjustments or expansions. The MFPP methodology is a contribution to a next and challenging step for the AEC industry where both information and several different design methods, tools and workflows needs to be integrate. Such integration is a prerequisite for improvements to tackle the low productivity still troubling the AEC industry.

Part IV – Discussion and Conclusion

Digitalization as Driver for Standardized Specification and Design of Buildings 63