Assessment and need should commence before any lead appointed parties are engaged, and it is here where the appointing party considers their own needs, determining why works are to be carried out. From this, the appointing party will establish the information requirements, information standards, and project standards at the organisational level before specifying the project information requirements. This stage is broken down into a series of activities that will need to be completed by the Appointing Party under the Information Management Function in accordance with clause 5.1 of I.S. EN ISO 19650-2:

Appoint individuals to undertake the information management function

For this stage, the appointing party will be responsible for identifying and engaging with the individuals to undertake the information management function of the project. As per I.S. EN ISO 19650-2, the information management function encompasses the responsibility and authority of the appointing party, lead-appointed party, or a third party of the activities in the information delivery process. This may come from their own organisation or from a lead appointed party or a third party. In the instance a lead appointed party or third party is appointed to undertake the information management function, the appointing party shall establish the scope of services.

Here, the appointing party shall consider the responsibility, the authority, and the competency of the prospective lead appointed party or third party[1]. In Annex A of ISO 19650-2, there is a template for clarifying which activities will be undertaken by the individuals engaged in undertaking the information management function using a RACI table. The UK BIM Framework also provide a template for an Information Management Assignment Matrix to support Part A. It is recommended that this activity is carried out as early as possible.

Establish the project’s information requirements

Information requirements specify what, when, how, and for whom information is created in a construction project. It is at this stage that the appointing party shall establish the project’s information requirements (PIR), as described in I.S. EN ISO 19650-1:2018 (5.4), addressing the questions which the appointing party needs to be answered at each of the key decision points throughout the project. The PIRs also inform the exchange information requirements (EIR). Therefore, it is imperative that they are properly defined as they are fundamental to the delivery of information needed as set out in the EIR.

In carrying out this activity, the appointing party shall consider the project scope, the intended purpose for which the appointing party will use the information, the project plan of work, the intended procurement route, the number of key decision points throughout the project, the decisions the appointing party needs to make at each key decision point; and the questions to which the appointing party needs answers, to make informed decisions[1]. This activity should be carried out before tendering for the first lead-appointed party appointment.

Establish the project’s information delivery milestones

Following this, the appointing party shall establish the project’s information delivery milestones in accordance with the project’s plan of work. These information delivery milestones will determine when the information models will be exchanged amongst the delivery team and delivered to the appointed party.

In doing this, the appointing party shall consider: the appointing party’s key decision points, information delivery obligations, the nature and substance of information to be delivered at each key decision point; and the dates relative to each decision point that the information model is to be delivered[1]. This activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment.

Establish the project’s information standard

The project information standard shall establish any specific information standards required by the appointing party’s organisation in any given project.

Here, the appointing party shall consider: how information will be exchanged, the means of structuring and classifying information, the method of assignment for level of information need, and the use of information during the operational phase of the asset[1]. This activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment.

Establish the project’s information production methods and procedures

For this activity, the appointing party shall establish what is required by their organisation within the project’s information production methods and procedures.

In doing this, the appointing party shall consider how existing asset information will be captured; how new information will be produced, reviewed or approved; the security requirements and how to share information, how the information will be delivered to the appointing party[1]. This activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment.

Establish the project’s reference information and shared resources

Here, the appointing party shall establish the reference information and share resources with prospective lead appointed parties during the tender process or appointment. Ideally, native format and open data standards should be used whenever possible to avoid duplication of effort and interoperability issues.

By doing this, the appointing party shall consider: existing asset information(asset data structure/classification), shared resources (such as document templates, 3D object libraries, or style libraries), and library objects defined within national and regional standards. Existing survey information and existing drawings, photos, fire drawings, planning information, reports and any information that will lead to a successful project and avoid delays both at tender stage and construction[1] . This activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment.

Establish the project's common data environment

The common data environment (CDE) is a platform enabled by workflows that hosts information about an asset or project and makes it available to project participants. Before any information is shared between the appointing party and the delivery team, the CDE solution with workflows in accordance with industry standards must be agreed upon. It is the responsibility of the appointing party to implement the project’s CDE (or delegate the implementation to a third party) to serve the overall requirements of the project and support the collaborative production of information (5.6). Alternatively, the appointing party can also outsource the hosting, management, and support of the CDE to a third party. To comply with I.S. EN ISO 19650, a CDE solution shall enable:

  • A Unique ID for each information container based upon an agreed and documented convention comprised of fields separated by a delimiter. The naming convention set out in the Irish Annex of I.S. EN ISO 19650-2 is an example of what could be used.

  • An assigned value for each field from an agreed and documented codification standard.

  • Each information container is to have the status (suitability), revision and classification (as defined in ISO 12006-2) assigned.

  • The ability for information containers to transition between states (Figure 9)

  • The recording of the name of the user and the date when information container revisions transition between each state.

  • Controlled access at an information container level.

The CDE workflow will facilitate the organisation and management of information across the whole lifecycle of the asset using four states: work in progress (WIP), shared, published, and archived (Figure 9).

While this activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment, it is strongly recommended that the project CDE be set up prior to issuing the invitation to tender to allow the information to be shared securely with tendering organisations.

Work in Progress (WIP)

The WIP state will be used for information that is being produced by the task teams. Any information containers in the WIP state should not be visible or accessible to any other task team and should do so once it has been successfully checked, reviewed, and approved for sharing. The quality assurance and technical review will compare the information container against information delivery plans and ensure it is as per agreed standards, methods, and procedures. This state and transition are the responsibility of the originating task team.

Shared

At the shared state, there is the opportunity to provide coordination, constructive feedback, and collaborative development of the information model within the delivery team. Here, the shared information is made available and visible to the delivery team but should only be read-only. If an information container requires editing, this should return to a work-in-progress state for amending before resubmitting it in the shared stated.

Before transitioning to the published state, a review/authorisation transition will take place before sharing with the appointing party. In this context, this may also be referred to as the client-shared state. The transition to published will occur for each information delivery milestone as specified by the appointing party’s EIR. It is the responsibility of the lead appointed party to compare all the information containers against the relevant information requirements for coordination, completeness, and accuracy. Information containers will have their states changed to published if they meet the information requirements. If they are not accepted, the information requirements should return to work in progress for amendment and resubmission.

Published

All information that has been accepted as a deliverable and authorised for use by the appointing party will become published information. Like the shared state, all information published will be read-only and must be the most current authorised version of the information container. At the end of a project or during the asset operation phase, both the PIM and AIM will only contain information in the published or archive state.

Archived

The final state of the CDE workflow will be used to store all information containers that have been either shared or published throughout the information management process. This also provides a record and an audit trail of the development of such information containers. Here, the final definitive version of the PIM will be archived before transitioning to the AIM to support the operations and maintenance of the asset.

Figure 9– CDE Concept (ISO, 2018)

Establish the project’s information protocol

The project information protocol (formally BIM Protocol) is a document that is incorporated into contracts, setting out the rights, roles, and responsibilities of the parties in accordance with I.S. EN ISO 19650-2. It is the appointing party’s responsibility to establish any associated license agreements that will be incorporated into all appointments.

Here, the appointing party shall consider any specific obligations of the delivery team relating to the management or production of information, warranties or liabilities associated with the PIM, intellectual property rights of information, existing asset information, shared resources, use of information and licensing terms in the project, and the re-use of information following the appointment or in the event of termination[7]. This activity should be carried out before tendering the first lead appointed party appointment.

Summary

By producing all the information as outlined in Assessment and Need, the appointing party will have all the information necessary for tendering. All relevant members of the appointing party team and key stakeholders should have full access to all the information outlined at this stage before proceeding to the invitation to tender. In this next stage, the prospective lead appointed parties will also have the project’s information standard, reference information and shared resources shared with them as they prepare their tender response.

[1] Organisation and digitization of information about buildings and civil engineering works, including building information modelling (BIM) - Information management using building information modelling - Part 2: Delivery phase of the assets (I.S. EN ISO 19650-2:2018)

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