September/October 2019

PE Report
NCEES Offers BIM Project Guidelines

The National Council of Examiners for Engineering and Surveying has issued guidelines for design professionals when using building information modeling on a project. The document, released in June, provides strategies to enhance the successful use of BIM and offers a project-specific execution plan, project role definitions, and direction on properly signing and sealing deliverables.

The following are some of the recommendations:

BIM Model Use

How the BIM model will be used from project inception to construction to post-commissioning must be defined up front and accounted for in the project cost estimate. Examples of usage topics include model ownership, turnover to the owner at project conclusion, involvement of the project team in model preparation and development through the life cycle, use for structural detailing, cost/schedule inclusion, and products that will be produced.

Responsibilities and Scope

Each design professional working with a BIM model will have responsible charge for a portion of the project. It’s imperative that each design professional clearly define his or her primary role and scope of responsibility, particularly where the professional’s scope boundaries align with those of another discipline.

Lead Design Professional’s Role

Each project team should appoint a lead design professional to oversee the BIM model development to ensure that communication channels are effective, that schedule milestones are achieved, and that the model manager is efficiently and effectively completing his or her responsibilities. This person should have a working knowledge of the scope of all design professionals, documents to be produced, and project design and goals in total.

Model Manager’s Role

The model manager reports to the lead design professional and serves a role in coordinating the development of the BIM model and data import, consistent with the execution plan’s stated needs. The lead design professional must ensure that all design professionals have participated in the BIM model to the extent of their responsible charge and scope.

Sign and Seal Deliverables

At a point in project development agreed to by the owner’s team and per the owner’s agreement with the project members, the licensee shall affix a seal and signature to only that part of the products from the BIM model for which he or she is responsible. A digital archive of the design professional’s final product at the completion of each project phase shall be retained in the BIM model archives.