A Procedure For Planning The Quality Assurance And Control For Facility Information Handover

Open Access
- Author:
- Ramesh, Ashwin
- Graduate Program:
- Architectural Engineering
- Degree:
- Master of Science
- Document Type:
- Master Thesis
- Date of Defense:
- November 21, 2016
- Committee Members:
- John Messner, Thesis Advisor/Co-Advisor
- Keywords:
- Building Information Modeling
Quality
Facility Information
Handover
Owner
BIM Execution Planning Guide
BIM Planning Guide for Facility Owners - Abstract:
- Building Information Modeling (BIM) is a means to achieving the delivery of a facility and its information. There are some progressive capital facility owners who have mandated BIM, especially with its potential to assist with delivering facilities information for maintenance and operations. Some of these owners, have previously had to address inefficient and inconsistent information handover process at the end of a project. Initial research had identified that owner organizations were still trying to manage the quality of essential facilities information generated, documented over the course of a project and delivered at its completion. This research established a procedure for planning the quality assurance and control for facilities information handover. This procedure is applicable to all institutional owner organizations who have previously adopted or mandated BIM in their facilities delivery system. The procedure allows for owner organizations, along with project teams, to systematically identify qualitative areas of concern when documenting and delivering facilities information, and to eventually define ways to manage them. The planning procedure is developed using basic procedures previously defined in quality management literature. The process goes through a five step procedure that includes: 1) Identify Facility Information Users; 2) Understand User Needs; 3) Translate Needs to Quality Attributes; 4) Establish Process Controls; and 5) Define Product Controls. The process guides the implementer through these five steps, providing questions that need to be asked and areas that need to be considered before the next step. The procedure also adopts quality attributes and their generic definitions from a previous study, as the primary areas of concerns that have to be addressed by the implementer. These definitions, through this research findings, have been modified to better suit the problems this procedure seeks to address. By listing and addressing these quality attributes, it provides the implementer a systematic way to address the possible and most common areas of quality concerns that have been identified through the initial research findings. The procedure was assessed through interviews with potential implementers. The results show that quality attributes initially adopted and defined before assessment were comprehensive and adequately defined, with a few modifications. The overall procedure defines a systematic way to identify the stakeholders within an owner organization, identify their goals, list their concerns and plan a quality management strategy to delivering useful and usable facility information. By implementing or frequently revisiting this procedure, owner organizations can minimize the effect of poorly documented and delivered facility information that may be rendered useless for effective operations and maintenance.