BIM and Design Briefing Integration: Feasibility Study and Conceptual System Framework Development

Abstract

Design briefing plays a crucial role to the success of a building project. Some new methods of design briefing have been developed recently, but rarely integrated with Building Information Modelling (BIM). This paper presents a feasibility study of implementing BIM in the design briefing and develop a conceptual system framework to present possible functionalities and processes of BIM-based design briefing. This study started with a series of the interviews with professionals in the industry as well as academics in various universities in the UK. A thematic analysis has been carried out to analyse the interview transcripts. The development of conceptual system framework following the software engineering method presents the major functional modules and relevant datasets of an BIM-based design briefing system which identified in the interviews. The paper also discusses on both the benefit and the potential difficulties of BIM-based design briefing, although 93 % of the interviewees agree that BIM technology should be adopted in design briefing to improve the quality of design briefing process and to involve other stakeholders and POE data in design briefing.