Who is a BIM specialist, and what do they do on a project
Who runs the information model on a project, what each role answers for, and how a client can tell whether a practice really works in BIM.
Different people draw different disciplines, often in different software. With two or three of them, coordination holds on email and memory; with ten it falls apart, and each set starts carrying its own version of the truth. The BIM specialist exists to stop that: the model stays the single source of data, and every drawing is generated from it.
What a BIM specialist does on a project
The work starts with the brief. Before the first line is drawn, the team fixes what level of detail each stage needs, which formats the results are delivered in and who answers for what. Without that agreement a model is either overloaded with detail at concept stage or too thin where installation details are already required.
Then comes the model itself: bringing architecture, structure and services into a common data environment, checking clashes and returning them to the discipline leads with the location attached. A duct running through a beam costs an hour on screen or a week of downtime on site. The difference is when it was spotted.
At the end the specialist prepares the model for handover. The client receives drawing sets, the federated model, the record of resolved clashes and quantities taken from the model. The model stays with the client as an asset information model, for the people who will run the building.
Specialist, coordinator, manager
The titles are often used interchangeably, though the responsibilities differ. A specialist, or modeller, works inside the model: building elements, holding the structure and the discipline of the data. A coordinator owns the seams between disciplines — federation, clash checks in dedicated software, the update routine. A manager owns the method: practice standards, templates, the BIM execution plan, requirements for subconsultants and training.
On a small project one person covers all three. On a large one they are separated, because whoever is modelling has no time left to watch the method, and the other way round.
What the standard says
The ISO 19650 series, adopted in Ukraine as national DSTU standards, describes contracting parties rather than job titles: the appointing party, the lead appointed party and the appointed parties. The client sets the information requirements, the lead appointed party answers them with a BIM execution plan and carries responsibility for delivering the federated information, and the appointed parties produce information within their disciplines.
The standard is explicit that information management is a function rather than necessarily one person: it can sit with the client, with the lead designer or with a separate consultant. The practical consequence for a client is simple. Job titles live inside a practice, liability lives in the contract: a claim goes to the party that hired the coordinator, not to the coordinator.
Where the requirements come from in Ukraine
Building code DBN A.2.2-3:2014 permits design documentation to be produced with information modelling and defers the requirements for the content and exchange of information to the design brief, in line with the DSTU ISO 19650 standards. In other words the scope of the model, the level of detail at each stage and the delivery formats are set by the client, in the brief and in the contract. If none of that is written down, the word BIM in a proposal guarantees nothing.
What it costs and what it returns
The cost of running a model is visible at the start and comes back during construction. On the Hilton Aquarium hotel in Atlanta, documented by the Stanford Center for Integrated Facility Engineering, the investment in BIM was 90 thousand dollars, or 0.2 per cent of the project budget, against a benefit of 600 thousand attributed to eliminating clashes (CIFE Technical Report TR171).
The second verified figure comes from a peer-reviewed study in the Journal of Civil Engineering and Management. On a public sports facility of 25,661 square metres, modelling and design review cost 192 thousand dollars against a total effect of 915 thousand, a return of 476 per cent (Lee and Lee, 2020). The mechanism is the same in both cases: a mistake found on screen costs hours, the same mistake found on site costs weeks.
What to ask a practice
The BIM execution plan. Whether a template can be seen before the contract is signed. It should name the roles, the file naming rules and how often data is exchanged. An answer along the lines of «we will write it after the concept stage» means there is no process.
The common data environment. Where the models live, how the client gets access, and whether work in progress, shared and published information are separated. Exchanging files through messengers is not a data environment.
The clash checking routine. How often disciplines are federated, in what software they are checked, what the report looks like and who closes the issues. Looking at a three-dimensional view by eye is not a routine.
Level of detail by stage. Whether there is a table stating what the model must contain at each stage. Without it the model is either overloaded at the start or empty at the finish.
BIM at AIMM is led by Maksym Miatko, chief engineer and co-founder of the practice, BIM ambassador and mentor to the team, with 24 years in engineering and construction. How the model works at each stage is set out on the BIM design page; the team is on the about page.