Organization of the process of selecting a common data environment for capital construction projects
V.I. Pronin, Commercial Director – Ingipro LLC
For citation in scientific research
Pronin V.I. Organization of the process of selecting a common data environment for capital construction projects // Economy: yesterday, today, tomorrow. 2023. Vol. 13. No. 5A. P. 239-249. DOI: 10.34670/AR.2023.54.86.078
Introduction
Large-scale digitalization processes and the introduction of information modeling technologies are taking place in the construction industry of the Russian Federation. [1] These technologies will affect the work of every participant in the construction industry. In the coming years, most construction organizations will embark on the path of digitalization. This will allow organizations to remain competitive in the market. [2] The introduction of information modeling technologies is facilitated by the requirements of Government Resolutions, regulatory bodies and the capabilities of modern information technologies. At the same time, a large number of various information systems on the market complicates the choice for companies, which leads to delays in the introduction of new technologies.
Main Contents
Leaders should plan for digital transformation in advance. [3] Let's consider a situation where an organization faces the need to select application software for digitalization of its processes. We will also assume that the company has decided to purchase ready-made software from those available on the market as the most accessible and economically justified way to solve specific problems. This means that it is necessary to organize work on studying, comparing and selecting software. We will consider systems of the general data environment (GDE) class. The general data environment is an integral element of the TIM. [4]
First of all, let us consider some approaches and practices that are not effective enough.
“Wrong People”
People with inappropriate competencies or job responsibilities are often appointed to select application software, including systems for organizing the common data environment of a capital construction project. Let's look at some of the most common examples.
To implement information modeling technologies, some companies hire a specialist with the specialty of BIM manager or, as he is called in the professional standard 16.151, “a specialist in the field of information modeling in construction” [5]TIM manager. The requirements of this standard apply to state-owned companies. This means that commercial companies can hire employees with such a position without taking into account the requirements of the professional standard. But even for work in state-owned companies, it is difficult to find people with the appropriate qualifications according to the professional standard. Such a situation leads to the fact that people with inappropriate qualifications start performing job responsibilities. If a company has managed to find and attract the necessary specialist to its staff, this does not mean that the work of choosing a system should fall solely on his shoulders. In this case, the employee will not have enough knowledge of the internal processes in the company, and also lack the authority to implement changes in the organization. It turns out that no matter how correct it may seem to hire a TIM manager as a leader of the team for choosing a SOD system, this should be done carefully.
The next common situation is to appoint an IT specialist or the head of the department as the decision maker for the application software selection. It seems like the right choice. The company has to choose some software, and who should do it if not the IT department. But there is a flaw in this decision. It is that IT specialists consider the software from the point of view of its maintenance. This means that the priority of the system selection criteria will be shifted from the fulfillment of business tasks to the comfort of the information system maintenance.
Sometimes there is a situation when the choice of application software is made by non-specialized specialists who will not be involved in the operation of the system or its maintenance. In practice, the author has encountered cases when the choice of the SOD is made by specialists of the financial department. Although these cases are less common than the situations described above, it should be noted that such a choice of decision makers is the most unfortunate. These specialists may be very professional in their field, but they will lack knowledge in the subject area for which the system is selected. As a result, the choice may be based on the subjective preferences of a particular person. Financial specialists should know how to use the capabilities of modern software. [6] The selection of such specialists as experts in the selection of application software is justified when it comes to systems according to their work profile.
“Wrong approaches”
The first approach that cannot be considered effective is the creation of a comparison table. In this way, the buyer's representative tries to collect information about existing solutions on the market. This is done approximately as follows: a table is created, where the names of the rows indicate some functionality of the system, and then this table is sent to software vendors with a request to indicate the presence or absence of the specified functionality. What is wrong with this approach?
First, the wording (function names) can often be interpreted differently. Vendors can interpret this to their advantage. As a result, the table will indicate that some functionality is present in the specified software, but in reality the customer will not receive what he expects. And even if the function we are talking about is quite clear, such as, for example, “adding a user to the system”, the answer about its availability does not give a complete picture. For example, adding a user to one system takes 3 minutes, and to another – 30 minutes. Both systems have the function, but it is difficult to imagine users who would be happy to spend so much time to perform a typical operation. This means that the indication of the presence of a function in the system does not and cannot give an understanding of the possibility of its use in a particular company. Such tables can be used to assess the cut-off criteria. For example, if a company chooses a solution that should be built only on domestic technologies, then the question about the availability of foreign components will be appropriate. There may be several such criteria, but they rarely concern specific functionality.
The next ineffective approach is to collect wishes for the future system from employees of departments that will be involved in working with this system. At first glance, this is the right action, but there is a mistake in it. It lies in the fact that specialists describe their wishes for the system in relation to the situation they are in, without using this system. In other words, these will be wishes to improve their own work without changing the methodology for performing this work. This is already a “methodological collision”, since the new system will bring with it new ways of doing work. The introduction of new technologies will inevitably lead to changes. [7] The second drawback that this approach encounters is that the wishes from different specialists are not coordinated with each other. They cannot be coordinated because the specialists formulate their wishes without having the limitations of a specific system. One question may yield contradictory answers. [8] These same wishes do not form part of any work methodology and are not linked to the overall goals of the organization.
Some organizations develop the previous approach and, based on the collected wishes, draw up a document called “Technical Assignment for an Information System”. This action is ineffective for several reasons:
In order for manufacturing companies to be able to estimate the scope of work for custom development, the technical specifications must be written by specialists.
As we can see, writing a technical specification (TS) in the procedure for organizing the selection of an existing system on the market is unnecessary. There is no point in sending such TS to vendors. Existing solutions are written based on a different logic, we can say they are written according to a “different TS”. It is possible to get a system that corresponds to your own TS only if the customer applies for a custom development. In this article, we do not consider this method of solving the digitalization problem.
Let's look at some recommended approaches and actions that can improve the efficiency of the work on selecting an information system.
The complexity of the choice lies in the need to form a criteria space of choice. [9]
“Innovation”
Implementation of a new information system in an organization is always an innovation. This activity requires an appropriate approach. First of all, the organization must be ready to change. Business processes and people will change. Attempts to implement information systems without changing old ways of working will not be successful, it is impossible to do. This means that the choice, and then the implementation of the information system, must be headed by an employee endowed with sufficient authority to implement innovations. In addition to official authority, this person must have a certain “credit of trust” from the organization's employees. He will have to not only choose a new system, but also “pull” it into the team. People are not inclined to change, which means a leader will be needed who will carry out these changes.
“Team”
The activity of selecting a new information system must be treated with the utmost seriousness. This means that the group of employees who perform this work must be appointed by an order of the organization. The work itself must not be performed on a “residual basis”, i.e. the time for its implementation must be clearly allocated in the work schedule. Deadlines, tasks, goals and restrictions must be clearly defined.
Experienced project managers who have authority in the team should be considered for the role of the team leader for selecting the common data environment. Implementation of innovations depends on the ability of managers to influence employees by serving as an example for them. [10]
To organize the work on selecting a future information system, it is necessary to appoint persons with the relevant competencies in the subject area. At the same time, the group for selecting an information system may include specialists from related departments and the information technology department, but their role will be advisory.
The system selection team can be organized using the RACI model. [11] – Figure 1.
Roles in this model:
Performers are experts from among the experienced employees of the organization, representing different departments, who will be directly involved in the work in the system. The number of experts depends on the number of departments and the size of the organization. Involving such experts has two positive implications:
experts, as representatives of the team, will serve to better accept innovations within the team during implementation. In fact, through the experts, the team itself chooses this innovation.
The person in charge is the leader of the selection group mentioned above. This employee makes the selection decision.
Consultants are employees of related departments who must track the interests of the organization during the selection process. Employees of the financial and information departments, lawyers, etc. should be involved here.
Informed – employees from among the top management of the organization who must be informed about the work carried out to select the system in the form of a report, as well as the decision taken.
By forming a system selection team in this way, it is possible to organize an objective and unbiased system selection.
As a methodology of work it is worth considering a systemic approach to making management decisions. The result of work on choosing an information system should be a report with an analysis of available alternatives.
The first stage of work is to describe the tasks
Above, we considered approaches (compiling tables, recording wishes) by which the organization's specialists try to identify the organization's needs for a future system. The most correct approach would be to describe business processes “as is” and “as should be”. A list of such descriptions is the document that should be provided to vendors. System manufacturers will indicate how these tasks can be solved using their software. And the buyer will only have to choose the methodology that suits them best. This is the most correct approach, in which one program is compared not with another by buttons and functions, but by problem-solving methodologies. At the same time, vendors are not limited to the solution method described by the customer, which makes it possible to offer the most breakthrough solutions.
The second stage is the cut-off criteria
The choice of the future information system must be consistent with the company's development strategy in the planning horizon of 3-5 years minimum. Based on this strategy and the tasks for which the system is selected, the cut-off criteria will be formulated. Systems that will be considered at the next stage of work, if they do not meet these criteria, will not be admitted to expert evaluation.
Examples of such criteria:
– security requirements, independence from foreign vendors;
no restrictions on the number of users (relevant for projects in which the exact number of users is not known in advance)
At this stage of work, it is appropriate to compare and choose the best technical structure of the shared data environment. At the moment, two common methods of building a shared data environment can be distinguished on the market:
The first is a client-server structure. It is a traditional system design in the form of a server and client sites that are installed on users' PCs. The advantage of this technology is its broader functionality. The disadvantages are poor scalability and high operating costs.
The second method of building a data processing system is the use of cloud services. This method is the next step in the development of information technology. Our state actively promotes its use. A cloud service is a system that is deployed on dedicated servers located in professional data centers or on the client's servers. Users gain access to the system via a browser on their devices. In this case, installing additional software is not required. The advantages of this method are quick deployment in a project, the ability to connect an unlimited number of people to work, work from anywhere and low operating costs. The disadvantages are less functionality compared to client-server systems.
The third stage is comparison of alternatives
By the beginning of this stage, the selection group already has a list of tasks for which they are selecting a system, a list of cut-off criteria, and there is also certainty about the technological structure of the future system.
The Pareto principle should be applied to the task list. The practice of using various information systems shows that users, for the most part, use the minimum number of functions that ensure the execution of the required work. We can select 20% of the main tasks for which the system is needed. These tasks make up about 80% of the work that users of the system need to do. The comparison of systems should be carried out precisely by these 20% of tasks. If this is not enough to identify the best alternatives, then a comparison can be made by additional criteria. This is usually not required.
After applying the Pareto principle to the task list, we should be left with 5-7 main tasks. To this list, criteria for assessing the cost of acquisition and the cost of operating the system should be added.
To compare the selected systems, you can use one of the following methods:
If there are 2-3 systems in the comparison list, then the paired comparison method should be used. One of the systems is taken as the base system and the alternative system is compared with it according to the existing list of criteria and tasks. If the alternative system turns out to be better according to the totality of results, then it is taken as the base system and compared with the next alternative.
if we have three or more systems to compare, then we should use the point or weighted assessment method. In this case, a table is compiled, where the selected tasks and criteria are indicated in the rows, a “weight” is assigned to this criterion (the sum of the “weights” is 100%), and alternative systems are indicated in the columns. Experts carry out work on assessing the presented methods for solving problems and give an assessment. As a result, we can get either one table, where the average expert assessments are already indicated, or several tables from each expert, which will need to be reduced to average values. This assessment method is described in more detail in Shcheglov's article [12]
Based on this selection, a decision is made on the choice of a system or systems. The choice does not necessarily have to involve only one system.
The fourth stage is testing
Once the work on selecting possible information systems has been completed, a real system test should be conducted. Vendors usually provide the opportunity to test their systems for 2-4 weeks free of charge. Experience shows that such testing provides little information. Future users do not test real business processes in the system, and the number of testers is usually one person, which is completely unsuitable for testing SDE class systems. A common data environment is a system that affects the work of most employees of an organization participating in a capital construction project. The best practice is to test the system on a real project. In this way, the buyer will gain real experience in using the system in relation to his organization. It is good if the SDE system has the ability to purchase licenses by projects. In this case, for testing on one project, it will be enough to purchase one license and connect all the necessary users of your organization and contractors. Do not be afraid to buy a limited number of licenses, which you will refuse in the future. It is much worse to buy the entire system for the organization and, during operation, understand that it does not suit you.
Conclusion
If the described approach to choosing an information system seems too expensive to you or it is not possible to allocate enough time from your own organization's employees, you should consider the possibility of engaging companies that professionally select and implement certain systems. In the information systems market, such companies are called integrators. In any case, there should be a system selection group within your company, but the integrator will take on a large amount of routine work.
A properly organized selection of an information system will significantly simplify subsequent implementation. Resistance to change within the team will be significantly reduced. By spending time and making efforts at the selection stage, we greatly reduce the likelihood of making the wrong choice. Implementing a system that is not suitable for the company's needs means large financial, time and reputational losses. It is important to maintain a serious approach at the stage of implementing the selected system. With the slightest weakening of control over the system implementation process, a stream of demands of a very different nature begins to grow, often useless from the point of view of business efficiency. [13] At the same time, each successfully implemented innovation is a successful development of the organization. Systems of the class of the general data environment allow to obtain significant benefits for the organization and their payback period is short.
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