BIM collaboration: A conceptual model and its characteristics

Relationship management has become an important issue for both academics and practitioners in construction project management. Few study provide a clear picture of what specifically constitute collaboration in a construction project in the existing literature and the practical approach. Limit research focus on developing a collaboration theory in construction management. The advent of Building Information Modeling (BIM) has been proved to be helpful for improving project coordination and productivity. However, widely adoption of BIM does not change the fragmented nature of construction sector. An understanding of how to promote such collaborative relationships in BIM enabled projects is crucial to achieve the full potential of BIM. By analysing the characteristics of collaboration from a management perspective and investigating current BIM implementation strategy, this research develops a conceptual model of collaboration in BIM enabled projects and identifies main factors of collaboration. The model categorizes collaboration into three dimension, they are collaboration team characteristics, collaborative environment, and collaborative process. Model also presents high level of collaboration can result better project outcomes and participants satisfaction. This model can be generalized to construction sector and standardized to collaborative process for future BIM implementation.