Embarking on a Thrilling Journey Through BIM and VDC: Insights and Experiences in Construction Technology

Ready to embark on a thrilling journey through the high-tech world of Building Information Modeling (BIM) and Virtual Design and Construction (VDC)? Prepare to gain invaluable insights from our esteemed guest who has been at the forefront of implementing these innovative technologies in the construction industry. They'll be sharing their hands-on experiences, from the highs of tangible benefits to the lows of formidable challenges. As a BIM manager, I'm also going to offer my perspective on managing large-scale projects and how BIM is revolutionizing our working methods.

Keeping up with rapid technological changes can be daunting, and this is particularly true in the construction industry. Our guest, a seasoned professional in project management and construction technology, will shed light on the trials and triumphs of evolving tech. Get ready to peek behind the curtain at our consulting process—from the inaugural meeting to the all-important stakeholder feedback. We'll also discuss the careful navigation required to ensure standardization and company-wide tech adoption, setting the stage for more comprehensive future discussions.

Choosing an implementation partner for BDC and BIM technologies is a critical decision, and we're about to demystify the process. Understanding the problem at hand and leveraging technology to discover solutions is central to our discussion. We'll explore the importance of an external voice to guide and challenge the team, ensuring optimum results. By the end of this episode, you'll have a clearer understanding of how to address pain points and provide effective solutions. We invite you to join us for this captivating episode, as we delve into the fascinating future of construction technology. Buckle up and get ready for an enlightening ride!

Contact the Future Construct Podcast Produced by BIM Designs, Inc!

• BIM Designs, Inc.: minority-owned, US-based, union-signatory preconstruction technology firm, offering turnkey BIM modeling, laser scanning, coordination management, and other VDC solutions to the AEC industry.
• Schedule a free consultation: sales@bimdesigns.net.
• Subscribe to our weekly blog and our Future Construct Podcast
• Suggest a podcast guest

Chapters

• 0:03 Background and Experience With BIM
• 7:38 Consulting Process for Construction Technology
• 22:50 Proposal Meeting and Decision Criteria
• 38:21 BIM Implementation Vision and Timeline
• 44:09 Plan Meeting on Pain Points and Solutions

Transcript

Chanh Tran: 0:03

Besides from the title and everything, it's helped with implementation of new programs and software to our users in the office in the field. I also work on the operation team dealing with our process procedures, training etc. So this all came about. Our leadership team it's always had the vision of utilizing VDCs and BIM at our company for a while now. But with all the priorities and projects coming in, everything can busy. It's been an ongoing initiative for about as long as I've been at LS Black.

Chanh Tran: 0:45

So recently there's a reintegration of this idea and thought around BIM and utilizing it. So they asked me hey, can you go out there and find us some consultants that have experience in building out a BIM team from beginning to end? Our goal is in beginning we're going to be outsourcing the work. Have this partner if they have internal drafters and people, that technician that can do it good. If not, do they know people and can recommend people to work with us? Then eventually this consulting would eventually fade out as our team grows internally. So it's high-level view. That's that. Then I sent you the visions. I guess all of the categories that we want to focus on VDC and DEMON, and that email.

Luke Lightning: 1:55

Thank you.

Ashly Coggins: 1:56

Excellent. Could you tell me a little bit more about your background with BIM, what more specific experiences and Gotcha.

Chanh Tran: 2:08

So good question. My background is actually in construction. I started in a field and then I moved into project management. I started with my old company. I used to work for Lifetime Construction, lifetime Athletic, lifetime Fitness, if you guys heard of them. So I worked with them for about 10 years and about five years ago. We want to integrate construction technology into the way we operate but we just have a really challenge of having that person that can connect technology to reality. Construction is more of a traditional old school approach to thing. It's just slower when it comes to growing. So they engage me with technology. So I have a little background on BIM, very basic stuff. I've been part of some BIM execution plan that we did on some of our projects. I've looked at models, how to operate a model and stuff like that Not actually build it out but can drive it in coordination meetings and stuff like that. But no, I do not have any drafting experience or any actual doing experience of BIM, more of like an oversee or management level.

Ashly Coggins: 3:29

So, and when you say management level, are you participating in design coordination meetings or is it mostly just referencing the model in the field, or can you share?

Chanh Tran: 3:45

a little bit. Well, both I've done both. One in pre-construction I've worked with all these design teams and our self-contractors kind of lead the meeting to get everyone on the same page to go through those coordination meeting. And then we have our drafters and our tech that actually does the integrations and the class detection and the fixing. And then I also, once we get to the point of production, I've done meetings with self-contractors on site to kind of mostly age-back contractors for overhead ceilings and stuff like that in closure to help facilitate that piece of work, above ceiling MVP work, to get that into production.

Chanh Tran: 4:32

But never really went past that. We never really wrapped it all together to send out a complete as-built package. We never got to that point because there's always been section of this as project A and section B is like project C. So there's never been on one project. So on one project I just wanted all the design coordination up front, all the LFIs, all the self-gatherers fast, you can.

Chanh Tran: 4:56

And there's another project who the person that's only driving the model is our HVAC contractors and I was with the general contractor. So I kind of help facilitate that with them, with the other self-contractors. The other self-contractors that didn't really have a lot of firm experience. So it was a partnership between me and our HVAC contract that kind of drove those meetings and it was mainly just to get the age-backs equipment up above the ceilings, Because that company policy is we won't build anything unless we have a proof model and that was unique for us and that never did and it worked well. I said yes for the HVAC contractor. It worked well. It was a challenge for some of the foaming contractors and the electric contractors.

Ashly Coggins: 5:45

But your experience with the mechanical contractor using it that part worked well.

Chanh Tran: 5:50

Yeah, it took us a little bit of time to get used to, because in past we've always approved 2D submittals, shop drawings, stamp it and then proceed. This go around, even if we get that, they wanted a approved Claxie section model that they put together before they could do so it was kind of a different, but it worked out well in the end. We didn't have a lot of rework when it comes to HVAC.

Ashly Coggins: 6:16

You did not.

Chanh Tran: 6:17

Yeah, did not.

Ashly Coggins: 6:18

OK, good, awesome, yeah. So my background is construction as well, construction management. I went to school in Colorado State their construction management program and then worked for Turner Construction for a couple of years and then Fleur, which is actually an EPC Engineering Procurement Construction Company, and built a very large mega project, mostly on the life science side, and so you don't really have a choice on those projects. It's complex enough that you have to use BIM and basically all the contractors have to use BIM because it's just that level of complexity and so that's and I kind of touched BIM a couple of times but on one project was the BIM manager for a billion dollar facility, multiple buildings. So I went from knowing nothing about BIM to knowing all of the things about BIM, at least in that point in time, just because I got to. When you have five different projects or buildings on the same site and over time you kind of get to rapidly learn from all your mistakes. So it was a great opportunity in that sense. And then mostly on the I've done project management, but also very closely tied to construction technology in general. So there's the BIM piece, there's the specifically, but then there's all kinds of other construction tech piece. So that's what led me to BIM designs actually was the interest in construction technology, and we tend to focus on the LOD 400, that's where most of our clients come from. But and then there's times where we get to play in other spaces and so it's always fun to.

Ashly Coggins: 8:10

It's just it's honestly. There's so much opportunity and so much rapid change. It can feel even for myself this is all I do, right, but it still feels like I'm always on my back foot trying to learn the new technology, just because it changes so quickly, and so I'm super excited about the opportunity. You're not your experience is not. You're not alone in your experience. I think all over the gamut you've got small companies, very large companies and folks lists kind of similar feedback that they did this on one project or this other thing on one project, but there wasn't that standardization or there wasn't that company-wide adoption on the construction technology side. And so what I wanted to do today is meet with you and kind of give you a high-level overview of our typical, the ways that we typically engage with clients that need a similar consulting that you've identified, and kind of get your feedback and see if that you know matches kind of what you had in mind.

Chanh Tran: 9:24

Gotcha, that works, thank you.

Ashly Coggins: 9:26

Awesome. So typically what we would do is we would engage in there's usually a group meeting, we call it the kickoff meeting, and there's a particular exercise because the person who we're our counterpart right which I think would be you, our counterpart may have a list based on feedback you know, or personal experience or who knows as that starting point of what you're envisioning and to make sure that we have the full teams buy-in on the types of problems we're trying to solve. We like to start with that kickoff meeting and we run this exercise where everybody kind of brain dumps all the different you know solutions or problems that they want to solve and then as a team we kind of prioritize those and if your list and your vision is based off of feedback from your team, we would expect similar results, right, but it's kind of a touch point, it's a checkpoint. Maybe there's things that have shifted, maybe certain stakeholders weren't included, but it helps us really start set the tone with the team so that they feel that engagement right from the beginning, that they're able to contribute their thoughts or concerns or whatnot. And then obviously we would work very closely with you to shape that roadmap, if you will, to just make sure we're aligned on what you feel is the priority, because all stakeholders don't necessarily have that visibility right. But my point is that it's a group exercise and that really helps engagement and feedback and, you know, just kind of aligning on the overall goal. Really it just helps on the implementation side because people feel bought in from the very beginning versus a directive being handed down right.

Ashly Coggins: 11:25

So once we have that kickoff meeting then you would have identified the stakeholders ahead of time and it's usually we usually like to talk to somebody from every department. So on the safety side, detailing side, project management side, we also like to talk with previous clients, you know, or end users, depending on which type of client we're working with. So there could be some external folks as well to get feedback from. And we're usually looking to. You know what worked well, what didn't work well, what information do you find yourself needing and not having? You know what inefficiencies are you seeing, because it all seems to relate back to construction technology in some way and more specific to really expected then. So in that stakeholder feedback we kind of usually there's some themes that come out of that and it usually acts as a good check on that initial kickoff meeting to say, okay, in the way that the team prioritized there is that also what we're seeing in these one-on-one stakeholder interviews. And then we have another group meeting at the tail end of that to basically confirm that roadmap. So we would have talked with you offline after that initial meeting, we would have you know, let you know kind of what that stakeholder feedback was and so you would have input going into that that second group meeting. And in that second group meeting we're basically kind of presenting this is what we found right. So this was the feedback initially. This is kind of this is what matched, this is what didn't match and this is kind of what we recommend from a roadmap perspective and in that they should be able to see their feedback incorporated at some level, even if it's on a roadmap.

Ashly Coggins: 13:26

You know, on down the road and I'll just give you a quick for instance sometimes people say their starting point is we really wanna do 5D. You know that's our huge priority pain point, whatever. So sometimes people expect that to be priority number one. But depending on where the company is as a starting point, right, it's not priority number one because there's like three steps that need to happen before you get to that point right. So that's kind of the that's the type of detail that's laid out in that roadmap. Is that these are the things that we're gonna tackle in order to achieve that first priority. Does that make sense so far?

Chanh Tran: 14:09

Yep, nope, Awesome. So my only question is this typically happens after. I guess this, for my point is that this is what we're talking about right now. It's kind of like just understanding each other more, but what you're talking about is after we come to an agreement and we selected this team as, and then, from that point forward, Okay, I just wanna make sure.

Ashly Coggins: 14:36

Yeah, yeah, absolutely. This is absolutely because we have getting a proposal together that I guess, if what I'm laying out to you as far as process, if it didn't match kind of your expectations or what you feel is needed, then I would need to know that now so that we incorporate whatever-.

Chanh Tran: 14:55

Gotcha.

Ashly Coggins: 14:56

We need to into the proposal right, which is why I'm kind of presenting our typical. But obviously there's different needs, every client has different needs and so we can adapt. But that kind of fundamental layout that beginning, middle end of that first phase we found works really well in any sort of organizational change management, whether it's project controls, bim, doesn't really matter what the topic is, it's the overall approach to yeah.

Chanh Tran: 15:29

I agree, yeah, yeah, gotcha. So I just wanted to make sure, because Luke and the other partner I don't remember his name, mark Mark yeah, so we had this conversation and kind of what you're talking about is more of a next step, which totally I'm glad we were talking about this, but for the meeting next week, I just want to make sure that you have an understanding of that, what it is. So, pretty much what we want to do is sit down with some of our leaders in each team, stakeholders, and they're going to quickly go through kind of their vision for VDCs and BIM and hopefully by the end of that meeting, you can put together to us a proposal based on the list that was in that email, and then what you said makes a lot of sense about meeting with them again in a group and then individually, because you have to, that's. I agree that you need to be able to understand how we operate, not just through one meeting, but to multiple meetings and individual meetings as well, to really understand, and not only with us, but with our partners from design and subcontractors, because they're probably going to have a different perspective than a person who thinks we are what we are right.

Chanh Tran: 16:50

There's certain stuff that and issues and challenges that some people in my LSC that we can't. So no, I like the game plan After we sign up for goals. I just want to make sure we're not skipping the part before the proposal. Does that kind of make sense?

Ashly Coggins: 17:07

Yes, so it is. I'm glad that we're doing that it's. I always love hearing the feedback and just trying to understand what problem they're trying to solve, and obviously, the better we understand that, the more accurate our proposal can be. We've done this enough times, though that we have a, it's not necessarily blocking us from giving you a proposal. Okay, right, that type of feedback, because it's sort of just inherent to the plan, the overall plan. But so, yeah, so no issues at all for having that meeting. Love that we're doing that, and if you needed any sort of clarity beforehand or if you had any questions from us, feel like the team might have questions. Then we can also be prepared to answer those.

Chanh Tran: 17:56

The one thing I would say is our leadership team is very new to BIM and VDC, so it will be good if you can somehow use your experience and your expertise and I'll do the same to kind of guide the meeting to something that's more obtainable versus some stuff that they've visionary 20 years from now is something that's really not applicable to our business.

Chanh Tran: 18:23

At the end of the day, we want BIM to help improve our profit. I'm just gonna be straight out. It's to help improve efficiency, which includes right, which will bring us more profit, more projects and grow the company right, and sometimes people's vision or the agenda might always not relate to growing the company. Okay. So I kind of want to use your expertise, based on kind of the size of our company. We do 100 mil, 150 mil a year, a lot of federal projects, some commercial. So kind of using your expertise to kind of help guide that meeting as far as helping them what typically other companies do and what we should do versus what they want to do. Okay, and then from that point you can have enough information to give us a proposal.

Ashly Coggins: 19:23

Yeah, they won't have the idea.

Chanh Tran: 19:27

The idea is it's very similar to that category that I gave you the 1-5 year plan or something like that. Yeah, but those are really industry standards and you can Google and find those categories.

Ashly Coggins: 19:40

Yeah, absolutely, and those are what I would call solutions, right, like the map that you sent us.

Ashly Coggins: 19:46

Super helpful to see kind of where your head's at as to what you feel is important in the timing of those. That's great to have going into any of those meetings and in that let's see how do I say this. And ultimately it's still a solution, and you want your stakeholders to be bought into the solution, and so usually I think the first step is identifying a problem statement, and you just did that. Right. You said, hey, we want to find a way to employ construction technology in a way that helps us maximize profitability, right. So having that problem statement and starting out whether it's this next meeting that we're in or the first meeting after a proposal would be agreed to, right, meeting with that problem statement to keep people focused, and it's okay. I'm used to people throwing out all kinds of solutions that are like I want to fly to the moon, like crazy things that would be, that are so far down. That's okay. People feel heard because their idea or their solution to solving that problem of how to maximize profitability still makes it on the roadmap.

Chanh Tran: 21:09

It just may be like on the far end of the roadmap, right? I think what you said in the beginning there is perfect. I think we should start out with a meeting saying, hey, identify a problem that we need to solve. I think what you just said, what you told me, is perfect. To kick off the meeting, to set the expectation how the rest of the meeting will go, is that we're not trying to understand things that you dream up and driving road trip over Thanksgiving or something. It's something that we can actually apply and see results. Not this year, next year, but at least we see results and we have a goal. Not something you thought of when you were driving six hours home to Thanksgiving with your family.

Ashly Coggins: 21:53

So what you said?

Chanh Tran: 21:53

is perfect.

Ashly Coggins: 21:54

Oh, good, good. And if you don't have another agenda for the meeting, what I would actually? Because I am tempted, just naturally, when you're getting all those folks in the room, I'm tempted to jump into that first step, right where we are doing that idea dump. And it's any idea, I mean, it's just like word vomit, right? And if you're not ready to go there, if you don't want to, you're not ready for that type of engagement. The step before that one, then I would say it's still helpful to get their pain points and so keep it focused on the pain they're feeling and not a solution, right, so that we get better alignment going in, because the problem statement may be slightly different from, you know, maximizing profitability. Maybe there's a different problem statement we need to tackle. And so if we, how does that sound, if we were to have that meeting where they could kind of brain dump the pain points that they have, what's creating issues in their day to day work life? What are your thoughts on that?

Chanh Tran: 23:09

Yes and no, because I don't want them to also be a venting session where they start looking outside of kind of our scope, which is what problem does BDC and BIM solve?

Chanh Tran: 23:22

They might go to some operational stuff that has nothing to do with them.

Chanh Tran: 23:28

So I would like to I mean understanding the problem they want to solve with them I think it's kind of the vision of that meeting so that it's enough for you at the end of the day, what I want to get out of that meeting is this team has enough information so you can help us come up, that you can come up with a proposal to help us grow or implement BIM right, and whatever the question you may need to ask you can ask.

Chanh Tran: 24:00

There's no limit to that. So, just as I'm thinking right now that's kind of where my head is at is that at the end of that meeting I really want you to have enough information to have a proposal ready for us. And if that has to do with you doing an issue dump where they're throwing up all kinds of visions and stuff at the board and then you use your experience to kind of guide them and put them into a quantum-erotic order to achieve it, that's fine, I kind of want to leave that up to you and the expert. How have you done it with all the companies? Because you have more experience than I do and it comes understanding enough to get a proposal ready.

Ashly Coggins: 24:46

Yeah, honestly, based on what you're describing, I do think we have enough to have the proposal, because you're not describing anything that's atypical of a client or a company. We would engage with Anything that would help me. The only thing that would help me dial it in more are those pain points.

Chanh Tran: 25:07

Okay.

Ashly Coggins: 25:09

I don't know what I thought in case I change on that. But if I heard, and honestly what I'd be looking for is, is there a broad consensus on the pain points?

Chanh Tran: 25:20

That's the thing. That's the thing that I'm afraid might happen, and an hour meeting might become two hours, because there might be a disagreement on what the pain points are, and then one thing led to another thing.

Ashly Coggins: 25:34

Got it.

Chanh Tran: 25:34

Yeah.

Ashly Coggins: 25:36

So the beauty of this, and we'll have to figure out how to do it. If we're doing it remotely, we'll have to figure out. I think maybe there's probably some pre-work where folks could, because the first thing, what I would normally first ask for is for them to give me all of their pain points. What are the things that just create a rub with them that every time they have to do it or they need a certain information or they have to talk to so-and-so or whatever. What are those points where it just makes them just go? I'm so annoyed and what are those things? And they could send those to me in advance and I could go ahead. And because we won't have enough time, it's not even time issue, because I have ways to manage that piece. It's more so.

Ashly Coggins: 26:24

It's harder to do some of this when you're not in person, and then there's added pressure to make sure that I'm interpreting things in real time.

Ashly Coggins: 26:33

So, having them send and I could send an email with this or send you an email with a specific language for them to create that list, and then I could come to them and say, okay, getting feedback from the team, and understand that, working with Chan, that these are the things that these are the pain points the team is feeling. And then usually I spend like a one minute. A timed it's not debate, or if there is a debate it's a very timed, strict debate, right, so you've got two minutes to feedback here, but before I have the job, because I can be really tough on people in those moments, so before I have the job, I usually don't try to get into that. I think it would more so just be a recap of this is what we've heard from the team so far. Is this, you know, or any surprises here? And I can kind of get a sense of that consensus from that conversation and then we can, we can prioritize later once we actually get going with the the, the, the.

Ashly Coggins: 27:38

After we're past the proposal point.

Chanh Tran: 27:40

Gotcha. Yeah, it'd be nice to have, like the light version of, I think, what you said I agree with, but I think that's more of once we come to an agreement with each other that we're moving forward to yellow as partners. I think I really want you know you to dive in and have those hard conversations and challenge our leaders to get to that point. I just don't think this meeting is totally ready for that.

Ashly Coggins: 28:03

Yeah, I might not get the job.

Chanh Tran: 28:06

The thing is that I don't want to waste your time right when we're still in the selection process.

Ashly Coggins: 28:12

Yeah yeah, no, okay.

Chanh Tran: 28:15

I want to be fair to everyone, because time is money, right, and I don't want you to do this and then turns out there's other things. You know that we went with someone else, blah, blah, blah. Right, I don't know what the reason is, but I just want you to have enough information to get the proposal and then we can, that leaders can make a decision on who to move forward with. And from that point on, I agree with you 100%. We need, we need to go to that granular level to get to understand what we really need and the problem that we're trying to solve. Okay, we're doing the technologies to solve a problem, right, right, and at some time we don't understand what that problem is, unless we have an outside voice challenging us on what those problems are.

Ashly Coggins: 29:01

Absolutely yeah. And when you speak to the selection process, what is your decision criteria?

Chanh Tran: 29:10

I'm not trying to hide information from you. I actually don't know. Okay, I actually do not know, I know. Talking to our leadership team, I think it's about finding the right partner, and for us, for them too, it's not only the resources, but have you done this before? I think that's the other big cut here, for have you successfully shown that you've done this with other best construction companies before too? Then I'm pretty sure, before we select, there's going to be another meeting where, most likely, one of our leaders will probably lead that meeting. They go through like an interview process. Really, my thought behind this whole process is okay, I meet individually with the consultants to give them overall view of what we need and then have a meeting with our actual leader. You have enough information to come up with a proposal. Then, after that, I'm pretty sure there'll be an interview process and then a selection. Does that sound fair, because I don't want to use too much of your time either.

Ashly Coggins: 30:33

No, that makes sense to me, because if the decision when we submit a proposal, who would you say the decision maker is for deciding whether whoever it is that's submitting proposal which one?

Chanh Tran: 30:50

It'll be a team of probably me, pain or VP of operations and our VP of business development, because, at the end of the day, every other team you learn that meeting coming up next week or the week after you meet with our pre-con team, the head of our pre-con, you meet with the head of estimating, you meet with our business development VP, you meet with the operation VP, this marketing. There's our corporate control which controls our technology and accounting. But at the end of the day, those accounting, it, estimating, we all fall up to VP, which is VP of business development and VP of operations. Then the interviewer's expulsion will be a little bit smaller but at the end of the day, those are the decision makers at that level.

Ashly Coggins: 31:58

Okay, excellent, in that case, I appreciate the opportunity to be in the room and hear. That cements my feel that I wouldn't like to hear from them if the same folks that are making the decisions are going to be in the room are roughly the same folks.

Chanh Tran: 32:18

Yeah.

Ashly Coggins: 32:18

I think, making sure I understand their pain points, because that way I can make sure the proposal reflects that and they feel heard.

Chanh Tran: 32:25

Yeah.

Ashly Coggins: 32:26

I think that would be really important. Then it would be helpful if you could give some thought, maybe get with the team to just try to understand. Is it about exhibiting that past performance and what does the right partner look like? You spoke to finding the right partner. What is that right partner? What traits does that right partner exhibit? That would be really helpful to us just to make sure. Just honestly, make sure we are the right fit. Depending on what you define as the right fit, it may not be the right fit and maybe we know that before we even get to the proposal. I sense that it definitely could be for sure just in the interactions that Luke had described. But I think getting more definition around that would be helpful just to making sure that we have what we are putting together is meeting your team's expectations.

Chanh Tran: 33:34

Yeah, gotcha, I guess you have more of a actual questions, or do you want us to? Just because I honestly I don't know if they know the answer to that, because this is something that's new to a lot of us. I think it might be based on the proposal, what's in the proposal, how well you understand the company, but the thing is there's always going to be that phase two, which is we define a partner and you're going to come in and spend the next I don't know how many months understanding who we are. A lot of stuff right now is going to be based on your resume, really.

Ashly Coggins: 34:23

Yeah, it sounds like that, for sure.

Chanh Tran: 34:27

Yeah, if I can answer that question right now is what I would say Right now. For me, it's like interviewing someone to join our company. We don't know until we know. All we can do is look at the resume at that point and decide who we want to interview with.

Ashly Coggins: 34:42

Yeah, no, that's super helpful. I'm glad I asked that question because I'm glad that you're offering such transparency as well, because normally we would focus our proposal on basically saying this is what we're going to do for you. We don't spend a lot of time capturing what we've done in the past. But, knowing that that's important, that you'll want to be able to see that Super helpful because I can make sure, whether it's part of the proposal or presentation or a conversation, I can make sure that we are able to show you Similar engagements that we've done and how those are forked out.

Chanh Tran: 35:23

Yeah, Then I sent the email. I sent the different categories, that we want them, but I also sent the second half of it. I know with our VP of operation he put that part together. I know that's important to him making sure that the proposal include all those items.

Ashly Coggins: 35:49

Would you say for the team that we'd be meeting with? Has that what you sent us? Has that been pretty much socialized with all of them, or is it going to be a surprise to any of them?

Chanh Tran: 35:59

No, because the five-year plan has been talked about for like 12 months now. It's something they've all seen the bullet points of consultant service we're looking for. So that was it 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11, 12. So that 12 bullet point is something I know of VP of operation really wants to be part of the proposal.

Ashly Coggins: 36:29

Luke the bullet points. Those were on the other screen we looked at right.

Chanh Tran: 36:33

Yeah, the email I sent, I think, last Friday. Yeah, the test file is what we put together of needs and wants with BIM, then the bullet points of what we're looking for in our consultant service. I know what the resume we talked about.

Luke Lightning: 36:54

Do you want me to pull them up real quick, Ashley? I have the email here.

Ashly Coggins: 36:57

Yeah, Because if you feel like that's well socialized with the group already, that's essentially probably the same feedback I would hear from the pain points. I would imagine I'm just thinking on the fly here but probably what it makes sense to do pull up the five-year plan real quick, and then we'll come back to this part.

Luke Lightning: 37:21

Sure Should be here here.

Ashly Coggins: 37:24

Yeah, so probably what I would. Let's see I may end up having. When Luke and I looked at this yesterday, it made sense. Probably my only question I had in that meeting is why five years to do this? What's stopping you from doing this in three years?

Chanh Tran: 37:52

That's what we don't know. Okay, this list right here is based on the knowledge that we have internally right now. Okay, and it might be wrong, I can tell you that, okay, we don't have an expert BIM person that has done this for a company before, when they started at zero and grew it into a part of the process and part of the way a company conducts business and construction. I don't have the experience. I don't think anyone else in our company has the experience.

Chanh Tran: 38:25

They might say they have, but I don't believe we do, and I'm just being transparent with you. Right, some say they do, but when I talk to them they don't. So this is based on that. So there's no saying that, oh, this can't be done in a year, we don't have the experience. So we were being very conservative and I thought, yeah, so does that kind of answer your question? Yeah, absolutely.

Chanh Tran: 38:49

This thing can all be like using your expert opinion and you telling us that, hey, maybe fabrication and mechwood design can be done in three years if you do this and this and this. So we're open for it, when we're just looking for a partner that's really want to help us grow to that point understanding that they will be phased out at a certain point.

Ashly Coggins: 39:10

Yes, yeah, no, we love being phased out. Yeah, I get bored if I have to stay around too long. Yeah, so I think that it's definitely a good fit from that standpoint. But, yeah, and it depends like the timeline, some organizations, the timeline this would be overachieving for some organizations because they're they really struggle to make decisions or they're really bought into their current processes or any number of things. Other organizations, they could probably do this in two to three years, no problem. And so it really just does depend on the team.

Ashly Coggins: 39:50

So I probably I'll probably have some questions around that that would help me get a feel for how quick the team could, because that was my gut feel. Is that the team, that it could be, that it's a the team legitimately needs this much time just for the organizational change piece. And then there's a couple, and so I would. I'd have questions around like how do you do it now? Like the layout, how is that done now? And, particularly with the problem statement you laid out, how do you see that that would help your profit margin? Right, if you could maximize or optimize the way that you do layout, how would that help you?

Chanh Tran: 40:36

Yeah, no, that's kind of where the subject matter expert can answer that question a lot better than I can, right?

Ashly Coggins: 40:44

now.

Chanh Tran: 40:45

Yeah, there'll be another one.

Chanh Tran: 40:47

Yeah, we'll have a director of estimating will be there. Director of field operation will be there as well. So we're going to have a lot of our mid-management and above people that will be there, and that's why I kind of it's kind of more people than I want to, but I don't have a choice. But that's why I kind of want to use your expertise to kind of guide the meeting, but without going into in depth, like we already agreed to our partnership enough, so you have information where we can effectively navigate the meeting, where you can have a proposal by the end of the meeting enough information to get a proposal by the end of the meeting without going way into depth.

Chanh Tran: 41:34

Like we already signed you guys up, that kind of makes sense and we're kind of on the same page on that.

Ashly Coggins: 41:42

Yeah, absolutely To be honest with you, just to give you some feedback, you're already the fact that you'll have a roadmap and that you've been talking about this for 12 months. You're already really far ahead of a lot of people that we start engagements with. They don't even have this list. So you've already made a lot of progress and the next step is just vetting the list, really figuring out what tweaks need to be made, either because of capability or priority, or there are a couple of different factors there. But you'll have done a lot of great work already, even without a consultant, so that's something to celebrate for sure. I probably will start the meeting with that acknowledgement to the team, because that is really helpful. That's why I already have so much clarity of what's needed for the proposal just from this, so I can focus that meeting and just kind of asking some questions specific around this and then managing the time in a way that we don't get stuck into anything, any one specific thing, and focus on whatever clarity that will improve the proposal.

Chanh Tran: 42:59

Gotcha and then. So, as of right now, what I've told them this is what I told them before I even talked to anyone. It's like kind of the meeting is based on. So marketing, what is your vision for BIM Estimating what is your vision for BIM Fuel operation? What is your vision for BIM? Is that the right agenda or do you have something else in mind? Because my agenda right now is just going down each team and have them lay out what they want. What does good look like in them? That's the question I laid out to them and I don't know if that's the right approach. I'm leaning on your expertise here. Is that the right agenda or do you want to go through this list?

Ashly Coggins: 43:48

Typically I would really push off solutions and even this is a solution Because it's so easy to argue about the solution but most people and it's very easy to find consensus when it comes to the problem or the pain point. Understanding those pain points help me understand. Is this the right list? So, for example, if I were to go into that meeting and just say, okay, estimating, tell me what your biggest pain points are in estimating or operations. What are your biggest pain points?

Ashly Coggins: 44:25

Say, estimating, says, oh, my biggest pain point is I have no idea what benchmarking I should use or what our average, whatever it is, then I'm going to look at this and I'm going to because I see proposals there and I see question mark. My question would be there are lots of areas that BIM can help in order to provide that benchmarking or to complement that benchmarking right to enable the benchmarking, but I don't see that listed as an item. So they may have benchmarking settled. In that case, I want to know more to make sure that the BIM plan basically executes in the way that they've already had set up. So I really do think it is, rather than, what solution do you see? Because they may not know, but they definitely would be able to speak to the pain points they have.

Chanh Tran: 45:29

Okay, so you want to focus more on the pain points?

Ashly Coggins: 45:35

I really do what I've observed in the past. When you jump to the solution piece, I'd even be hesitant to pull this up to share it with the team, because it just becomes really easy to debate the solution.

Chanh Tran: 45:52

Yeah, no, that makes sense. Okay, no, that changed my mindset. No, I like the idea If you want to approaches as one of the pain points and then have you provide us what the solution looks like. Yeah, no, that does make sense.

Ashly Coggins: 46:12

Well, and, believe me, I love coming up with solutions all by myself in a vacuum. But the approach we take is first to build that collaboration to basically facilitate the team to create their own solution, Because I'd have the same solution probably for everybody, but it's not always the right fit based on that organization. It's more so we're facilitating the process to help the team get to the solution. Then we're able to point some things like okay, you can do that. Here's some pros and cons to that. Ultimately, if the team needs this to weigh in, we have some clients that say, look, we have no idea at all whatsoever. You can ask us, but we're not going to know the answer. I still always ask Okay, Then ultimately, if I may need to make that decision because I think it's the right fit for what they are running into, then that's not a problem. But collaboration is definitely a focus of ours in the process.

Chanh Tran: 47:17

Okay, gotcha. Okay, then, based on how I have it in my head right now, based on our conversation today, we want to start out with you explaining we're here to what the statement that you made earlier I forgot what you said, I can't wait for a word, but to understand our pain points of each one of those teams and then, from that point on, I guess, do we go through this list.

Ashly Coggins: 47:53

Let's see In that meeting is an hour.

Chanh Tran: 47:55

It's up to you. I didn't put a time to it. That's my next question after we have an over-high-level view of the agenda. It's like how much time do you need?

Ashly Coggins: 48:07

I would start with an acknowledgement to the team. Set a common vision. What are we trying to achieve? A lot of times, that's the problem statement. We want to figure out how you can incorporate construction technology to improve your profit margin. In order to do that, I want to check in with everybody to understand their pain points. What are their biggest hurdles? They feel and not everybody can speak to that specific problem statement. Pre-construction, for example, may not be able to. I'll give that a little bit of thought and dial the common vision in. But then I would go around to each of the departments and I can ask them their pain points. Typically I ask them to write it down on stickies because it can get pretty lengthy. Some people like to talk and it'll get a lot of time with a couple of people. It would be good if they came prepped with those, if they could share them in advance, because then I can maximize the time in finding consensus between the groups.

Chanh Tran: 49:22

Is there a limit to what you want to put within three or five pinpoints, or do you want them to have an open-ended?

Ashly Coggins: 49:30

Yeah, no, I like three to five. We'll do the open-ended after we do the engagement.

Ashly Coggins: 49:35

That's where they can put all the pain points they ever want, but in this one, yeah, I think it makes sense to limit three to five. If they could send those in advance, then what I'll do is based on the feedback. I won't necessarily put this on, the wouldn't necessarily show this, but the questions I ask would be very much informed by what's showing up here and what I'm seeing in their comments. If I see complete consensus across the board, then I can show this right from the get-go Right.

Chanh Tran: 50:11

Got you. Yeah, Right now, what I have is introductions, problem statement. And you want to go by teams, by individuals.

Ashly Coggins: 50:23

It's actually. If they could send the problem statement in advance. Okay yeah, then they could always read those aloud. We can have them read their top three.

Chanh Tran: 50:37

Okay, problem statement. Then the pinpoints.

Luke Lightning: 50:44

Are you saying problem statements are the same as pain points, Ashley.

Chanh Tran: 50:48

Yeah, that's where I'm trying to wrap. Is that one thing, or is that? Are you looking for a sense of the company's problem statement of why we need them and then go on to the pain points of each individual teams? Or is each of your teams supposed to come up with one statement of the problem and then the pinpoints? Or do we just skip the statement problems, go straight to the pain points?

Ashly Coggins: 51:15

So we'll do introductions, I'll do an acknowledgement, we'll set a what we call set a common vision. So what are we trying to achieve from this? Okay, then pain points, and if I get their pain points in advance, then we should be able to build that problem statement closed with the problem statement. Okay, I would, because if I get their pain points in advance, I'm still going to have questions. So we'll build in when they're discussing their pain points, they'll present them and then I think we just need a little bit of time for me to ask questions and then the answer them.

Chanh Tran: 52:00

So what are you looking to define in the common statement from us? So I just want to prep our team for it, so that we're not fumbling around that agenda.

Ashly Coggins: 52:14

If I get the pain points in advance, I don't know that they do need to create a problem statement.

Chanh Tran: 52:20

Okay.

Ashly Coggins: 52:22

I think I would present a problem statement based on the pain points.

Chanh Tran: 52:27

Okay, so you would present that part I got you.

Ashly Coggins: 52:30

And then get their feedback to make sure that I heard them.

Chanh Tran: 52:35

Okay, got you. Okay, that makes sense now. Thanks for doing that.

Ashly Coggins: 52:43

Yeah, no problem.

Chanh Tran: 52:44

I appreciate that that helps a lot.

Ashly Coggins: 52:48

Okay, good.

Luke Lightning: 52:49

I just want to be mindful. I think Chan has them two o'clock in four minutes Okay.

Chanh Tran: 52:53

Oh, yeah, I do yeah.

Luke Lightning: 52:56

So, Chan, sorry, should we schedule this meeting offline instead of right now? I was thinking we'd take some time to schedule it now, but what do you yeah let's schedule it offline I have to look at the calendars too.

Chanh Tran: 53:11

Okay, but based on this meeting, it seems like I have some homework to do with the team, so probably next week is not a good week anymore. It's probably be the first week of December, okay, great. Because a lot of people are not even working this week, so I can't help anyone and I'm thinking at least an hour.

Luke Lightning: 53:32

Okay, does that sound right, ashlee?

Chanh Tran: 53:34

Yeah, whatever time you need. If you need an hour and a half, let me know. I just need to know in advance.

Luke Lightning: 53:40

Should we do an hour and a half and then, if we don't need it, we could just-.

Ashly Coggins: 53:42

Yeah, since we're doing introductions, yeah, let's do an hour and a half.

Luke Lightning: 53:45

Okay, oh, I think you lost them. Uh-oh, maybe I don't know if he meant to do that or it looked like he was I don't know if I can call him back in actually.

Ashly Coggins: 54:00

It's okay, we can follow up with that piece, right Okay?

Luke Lightning: 54:06

Oh, he's trying to get back in. Okay, hey Chan.

Chanh Tran: 54:12

Hey, it's all right. My laptop died even though it was plugged in, no problem. My battery's just working, so I don't know why my laptop died, so I have to call you on my phone.

Luke Lightning: 54:21

No problem, teams sucks the energy out of my laptop. I don't know if you're on a Mac, but-.

Chanh Tran: 54:26

No, we're on a PC, but yeah, I don't know what happened.

Luke Lightning: 54:30

Okay, all right.

Chanh Tran: 54:31

But sorry, the last thing I heard was an hour and a half for now, and then something, something, and then it just died.

Luke Lightning: 54:38

Okay, so I was just saying let's schedule it for an hour and a half and then if we don't need it, we can call get the time back.

Chanh Tran: 54:45

Okay, gotcha. No, I know I really appreciate you helping define the agenda. That's really helpful. It's just really nice to know there's expertise in guiding this process. I really appreciate it. I know the reason why we're doing this. I'm being honest we just don't have the expertise. We just don't.

Ashly Coggins: 55:06

Absolutely. It's honestly facilitating this type of thing is really challenging. It's something I really love doing, but most clients, most companies don't have the expertise.

Chanh Tran: 55:17

Yeah, it's just that we just have a lot of people who's experienced pieces and pieces of it and like, oh, this is what we want, and this is what we want, oh, this is cool to have. But then this is how it's really challenging putting it all into a true timeline and organizing it, and we just don't have that expertise. So I mean, we have a lot of opinions. I have my opinion about what you put it in the next guy. I have opinion and I can tell you it's not a line.

Chanh Tran: 55:45

So, this is nice. No, I appreciate it. Thank you for the conversation. Thank you for your time. If I don't talk to you again, have a happy Thanksgiving.

Luke Lightning: 55:52

Yeah, I'll follow up with you by email, shannon, and then we can try to aim. Maybe we could just put something like tentative on the calendar so it's blocked off for the four of us. So I think Marco will want to be here too, if he can, and then at least we have a hold, and then if it doesn't work, we can always move it around.

Chanh Tran: 56:09

Okay, perfect. And then I got some homework to do with our leadership team.

Luke Lightning: 56:14

Good luck with that. All right, shannon, thanks a lot. Thanks again for the opportunity. Hopefully see you meet you in person sometime in Minneapolis.

Chanh Tran: 56:24

Okay, definitely, thank you.

Luke Lightning: 56:25

All right, take care. Okay, bye, thank you, thank you, Thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you, thank you.