A few thoughts.....BIM and altering our Industry

As a young (ish) person in Construction, female and sitting in a very small minority group of independent consultants I find myself constantly wondering why the perception of our industry and the same themes continually arise. I previously worked with a clear group of people, diverse, young and vibrant when part of the BIM2050 team and I learnt a few things about myself and others when involved in this team. I learnt that we all continually change, that we all continually want to address important issues in Construction and above all that we were all passionate about making this industry a better one.

Having removed myself from practice, I now work with teams across the board, from Architects to Contractors, Secondary schools and training boards and clients I am finding that I can see a very clear distinction about what everybody believes the truth is and what it actually is! I work with kids, with CEO's, with technicians and designers. I work with all types of people which allows me to learn from them. Especially the young. The truth is that as much as we can all discuss change, technology and BIM, we need people from all areas to help us to promote and share this. 

There are a few themes here that I would like to therefore touch upon. 

Firstly- Women in BIM. Yes, I Created a group. Yes I am passionate about seeing women in senior roles. But, by no means is it about drawing young women into these roles! The facts are that we have plenty of young women enrolling daily in Construction related roles (even more in fact than men in some courses) so there is no problem here. Children and young adults will have a passion for a career which will ultimately force them to select those degrees and in turn become those types of professionals. We worked hard as part of BIM2050 to understand where the numbers were lacking and it was certainly not at the younger end. 

Unfortunately, through no reason or fault of our own, the issue is about retaining female professionals in Construction. 

Having worked closely with people in the UK in Australia and in the US I have to say that in my opinion, that the UK is the furthest behind when it comes to a diverse construction industry. I am saying this because we need to change it and I am currently looking at campaigns and ideas to do so with help from friends (but i need more help!). I still need to survive, eat and sleep so I can only allocate a certain number of hours a day to this cause. 

Another area I need to discuss is that those who are helping industry grow, the usual BIM suspects in the UK, I need you to get out there too and support this. It isn't about women moaning about why there aren't enough of us in these roles.... Its about us trying to work hard and grow a diverse and healthy space for us in industry, its not only about BIM, the issue is much much larger. If we don't address this we'll fail at growing a healthy and happy industry which will thrive on diverse and varied leaders. 

Another point I would like to touch on  is that even though we are utilising technology …yes its changing how we work, helping us to achieve better results ..blah blah blah..we've heard it all before. What we are neglecting to remember is that there are still only a small number of people who will lead this. Leaders and managers are one minority. Here in this miniority …and in particular in the BIM / Tech space….the number of young women, or women in general is even smaller.  

The solution is not black and white. It is something we need to address, change and grow from and acknowledge that without help it will not and cannot be achieved. 

So I guess with this, I leave the question open and I ask you to share and help me to try to change our industry just slightly for the better because if we don't start addressing this now we'll not see positive results moving forward. 

Autodesk University 2014 ....Almost here!

As the year draws closer to an end so does the end of all our BIM related speaking events. I was lucky enough to speak at BIM Show live and RTC Europe this year and although both were successful and discussed our current integration with IFC and BIM, this time I chose to discuss and speak about a different topic - Reality Capture.

We all are aware this is a hot topic and one that aligns to the development at Autodesk and in general in the Construction Industry globally. The aim for this class, and similar to the class I presented with Angel Velez regarding IFC, was to offer realistic and current scanning workflow integration for Architects and Designers. As this was both a technical and practical offering again I wanted to present with a BIM friend who came from a Surveying and advanced scanning background - who else was there other than Matt McCarter (aka @oatfedgoat).

I am very excited about presenting this year at Autodesk University as it is my second speaking engagement at the event, yet my first in the main conference which is terrifying and exciting at the same time. Last year I spoke with my BIM2050 friends, Neil Thompson and Rachael Atkinson discussing our work with the BIM Task Group and influencing the future of our industry. It was a great class and also helped us to integrate with the Education community at Autodesk.

This year the class we are presenting will discuss current Surveying practice and integrated workflows with Laser Scanning but also how we as architects need to use the information to deliver our services and work more effectively with existing conditions and building projects. It will discuss our experiences with scanning data, technical information requirements when commissioning scan data and practical solutions to using the information successfully. We are excited to be presenting at AU, not only because we represent the UK BIM community but also because it allows us to share our knowledge and work toward educating the BIM capabilities of industry internationally.

I have also orchestrated another Women in BIM event this year which will draw in some heavy weights in the BIM community as well as provide a platform for women in all industries with a technical focus to share ideas and discuss how we can adequately continue to aid the numbers of women in senior roles in Construction. This is still a prevalent issue in Construction and one in which cannot be ignored, therefore we do hope that this event does enable a discussion and promote young women to be involved in Construction. I will be looking at promoting and integrating these types of discussions back in the UK in 2015 so please do follow both @becdecicco and @WomeninBIM for updates.

On that note I look forward to seeing everyone in Las Vegas and good luck to all my UK and international BIM colleagues on their presentations too!

See you in LV!

Its all about Perspective..

It is all about perspective. I wanted this blog to mark the beginning of my return to sharing ideas, collaboration methods and understanding new ways of working and growing in the Construction Industry.

As humans, we continually challenge everything, the way we think, read, relate, interact and learn. Learning is one of the most important parts of being human, not only in our early formative years but through our teens, twenties, thirties and beyond. I realised last week that the art of teaching is not about communication or knowledge, it is about connectivity. Relating to individual people on different levels, relating to their needs, their desires and their thoughts is what ultimately will drive them to want to grow.

Education is an area I will always stay connected to. Not only because I love to teach, but I love to learn. I learn from those older than me, those younger than me, those more intelligent than me or less, those stronger or weaker. I learn every day.

With this in mind, I wanted to post that those people who do engage in education, who want to make the world better, who want to leave a legacy behind, generally do this without any end game. It is not about what we can gain commercially from this, rather what we can gain as human beings to help us to grow and appreciate the things we do have every day.

BSL 2014

Day one and the first keynote kicks off with Professor David Philp.

A positive message and a strong introduction to a two day event. 

Follow the blog and the #BSL2014 for updates over the next few days.

Rebecca De Cicco
Steering Group Lead
CIC BIM2050

www.bim2050.org 
M +44 77603 69 883
Twitter: @becdecicco