BIM Busters: CDE platforms and BCF workflows improve collaboration

Unfortunately, I could not go to the BIM world in Munich, but I talked with several people about their impressions. The topic that came up often was the ever-increasing amount of "Common Data Environments (CDE)" in different flavors and with different specializations. They all share the same value proposition, which is quite interesting for engineers:

Use X, and the communication with the team will be without friction.?

Interesting for engineers because most of us with a technological background never learned to communicate, listen, moderate, sell and understand other people. Sorry, that's quite some statement, but unfortunately, it's true. These topics are messy, without a black-and-white answer, and most engineers don't like messy. That's why the value proposition is so compelling!?

You need moderation to improve collaboration

A technological solution to solve a complex, interpersonal topic! Wow, I want to buy it. Unfortunately, these complex problems are usually not solvable with a merely complicated solution. For this, we would need some general artificial intelligence dealing with ambiguity. Just think about Data from starship enterprise...

1. I experience it firsthand in projects. We all know the meetings where moderation means saying a few words at the beginning when reading from the recap or having unstructured discussions. In the end, the "moderator" says a few words of goodbye.?
2. I see it first hand with every BIM manager class at CAMPUS SURSEE and Baukaderschule St.Gallen Baukaderschule St Gallen, how people fail because of lousy moderation skills and, when changing a few things and performer much better. Learning to moderate in different settings takes a considerable part of the five days.?
3. I see the impact of proper moderation on the results of a project. One key learning for me is that we need to separate more between the factual discussion and the metacommunication - something that can become very difficult if you are not aware of it and the project lead with a technological background, who defines his self-worth through the know-how. (I say "his" on purpose because usually, I see it with men).
4. I see it when people tell me about coordination meetings they attended were the BIM coordinator did show one clash after the other, and everybody was supposed to participate because it was labeled a ICE session. I say on purpose, when people tell me about it, because a meeting like this is a waste, and usually, I leave the room. I encourage you to do the same!
5. I see it when I can shadow a good moderator who serves the team and the project. Unfortunately, it only happens sometimes. Recently somebody asked me if he could shadow me to learn moderation, and that scared me a little because I'm far from perfect. But I guess the one-eyed is king of the blind...

Does this mean I'm against CDEs and BCF? Not at all! They are great tools and great technology when used correctly. But when I have to choose between working on a project with a CDE or with a good moderator, I will always choose the good moderator. But in the best case, I don't have to pick and can work with both.

A few words to the BCF

When I was a young architect, I read the book Managing Performing Living by @Fredmund Malik, which greatly impacted me. Since this time, I have liked to use meeting minutes to control projects (control in the english and not in german sense). And most of the CDEs don't have proper meeting minutes connected to the BCF workflow.?

To enhance the BCF workflow, I see these requirements:

1. Bidirectional integration of tasks in the minutes of the meeting.?
2. Option to structure minutes and tasks by topic so that minutes are already the foundation for the next meeting.
3. Export and display the minutes and tasks in different formats. E.g. As a document to read, a list with additional views (easily doable in most tools), and tasks connected to the model. Having a database...
4. Interoperability between different CDEs and personal task management tools. Because now we see so many different CDE solutions, managing all the different ones becomes cumbersome. Instead of one cloud to manage all the information, the whole project sky became cloudy. And we need better APIs and standards/converters to exchange information.
5. Affordability and a low-tech approach to store the project information long-term in case of later lawsuits.

For all these reasons, I set up my minutes and task workflow in @Obsidian. When I have time and the need emerges, I can imagine writing a small converter from Obsidian tasks to BCF files and back. I can imagine it; therefore, I/somebody could program it...

So what's your experience with CDE, BCF, minutes of meetings, and how do you manage projects?

This topic of moderation is one of the most important skills