January 31, 2024 • 31 mins
Have you ever wondered how the confluence of technology and construction is reshaping our built environment? Brian Skripac, a luminary in the BIM and VDC domains, stops by to enlighten us on the revolution within the building industry. His journey from architect to tech evangelist showcases the transformative potential when architects, engineers, and construction managers unite under the banner of innovation. Brian dives into his experiences of promoting a model-centric approach to project delivery, highlighting how smoother workflows are achieved through close-knit collaboration and technological integration.
The episode takes an intriguing turn as we examine the fusion of modular construction with Building Information Modeling. Brian provides a behind-the-scenes look at a recent project where this synergy played a pivotal role, enhancing transparency and efficiency from conception to realization. The conversation unveils the evolution of project documentation, emphasizing the shift towards fabrication-ready models and the intricacies involved, from legalities to risk management. We also peer into the future, speculating on the continued growth of modular construction and its burgeoning relationship with BIM as a staple in contractual deliverables.
Wrapping things up, we reflect on BIM's broader impact on the construction industry, from driving cost avoidance to optimizing resource utilization. Brian shares insights from the successes at Ohio State University and muses on the hypothetical technology that could streamline decision-making in project management. As we express our gratitude for the rich dialogue and Brian's insightful contributions, we look forward to the innovative strides that await us on the horizon of construction and technology.
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Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:12):
Welcome to Future Construct.
I'm Mark Oden, the CEO of BIMDesigns Inc and guest host of
Future Construct.
Today I'm hosting Brian Skripak, director of Virtual Design and
Construction at the DesignBuild Institute of America, also
known as DBIA.
Welcome, brian, thank you formaking the time to join me.
Yeah, thanks for having me,mark, looking forward to the
conversation, as am I, sir.
(00:33):
So, as an innovative forwardthinking, building, information
modeling and VDC leader, youhave spent the past 15 years of
your career focused on howpeople, processes and technology
can best come together andtransform project delivery
outcomes.
You also have contributed tonational publications and spoke
at conferences around the world.
Through these experiences,you've been able to promote the
(00:54):
value of your VDC expertise topotential clients to be
recognized as an industrytrusted advisor, ultimately
leading you to having theopportunity to serve as an
advisor group member and pastchair of the AIA national
technology and architecturalpractice knowledge community,
while serving on the BIM forumcommittee responsible for
authoring the level ofdevelopment or LOD specification
(01:17):
.
Thank you for your tremendouscontributions in the AES space,
brian.
I'm honored and I've activelyused and read and the BIM forum
LOD specification.
It's been a great instrumentfor us to work with.
Good to hear.
Brian, I'd love to hear yourbackground, your story and
(01:37):
education that took you into theDBIA and how the Institute has
impacted the AAC industry aswell.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah, my background started.
My degree is in architecture.
I practiced architecture forabout eight years before kind of
making that transition into theBIM world.
Back in 2005 is when I startedusing some of these technologies
.
I was working on the technologyside doing training and
(02:06):
implementation services and veryquickly went back to the firm
the design firm that I had leftto really get my hands on and
take the next step of usingthese BIM tools that I was out
educating and being kind of aevangelist for my peers to take
(02:26):
advantage of.
From there, working just in anarchitecture firm, I had the
opportunity to job transitionand I took a new opportunity at
an AE firm that also had agrowing construction management
component.
That's really where I firstkind of started learning the
design build side of it.
I was excited to take that roleand knowing what a lot of the
(02:49):
construction firms were doing,that we were working with what
was happening after design andbeing excited about that.
But seeing an opportunity toreally merge those two sides
together and having a integratedfirm where the builders and the
architects and engineers wereall under the same umbrella
really provided a uniqueexperience.
It was an exciting one thatallowed us to do things
(03:10):
differently, and that was great.
I had the opportunity to kindof serve in that role.
Our firm got acquired by CanonDesign and I spent about 10
years there.
What sort of happened is?
I ended up working on a lot ofdesign build jobs.
We were doing the same sort ofthing where we were trying to
have this kind of integratedapproach to projects, and things
(03:35):
always went so much smootherwhen they were design build
projects.
It was great.
You didn't have theconfrontation that you did on
design build jobs or see them atrisk or other things.
There was just a differentlevel of fluidness that was
occurring.
After a little while I waslooking to do something
different and first news, myformer boss.
(03:57):
She had moved on and I reachedout to her for some career
advice, looking for herexpertise, and happened to be a
random passing.
She called me back like twodays later and said hey, you
need to talk to Lisa Washingtonat DVIA.
I was like why would I callLisa?
I'm like yeah, I know Lisa.
I'm like why would I call Lisaat DVIA?
I didn't understand what thatwas at first.
(04:19):
She's like they're looking tomove forward with this
technology conversation.
She's like I think this wouldbe something interesting.
You should check it out.
It was great timing.
It was the right fit kind ofmigrating to this opportunity
where you could be a largerindustry change agent.
Now you have this megaphone ofa large membership base that you
(04:43):
can start to continue to sharebest practices with and help the
industry move forward in thislarger conversation about
designing constructiontechnology.
Whether it's BIM, vdc, whateverinnovation, digital
transformation, whatever kind ofwrapper you want to put around
it or title, it's a greatopportunity to work with other
(05:05):
forward thinking companies andhelp move that forward.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Thank you so much for that background, brian.
Really exciting material inthere I want to focus on you
were talking about the mergingbuilders, architects and
engineers under the sameumbrella.
That sounds like that was backaround 2005.
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
No, that was more around 2012.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
2012?
.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, that's when my role had switched from a firm
that was just architecture toworking for that integrated firm
here in Pittsburgh.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Yeah, that's amazing.
I usually see maybe thearchitects and engineer under
the same umbrella, but I veryrarely see that merged with the
builder.
Sounds like maybe you're aheadof the times.
What do you feel worked reallywell in that constellation and
what do you feel was room forimprovement?
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well, it was interesting because this was an
established AE firm, big Alittle E.
We had all of our engineeringdisciplines and landscape
in-house.
The construction managementgroup was this emerging service
line.
I think maybe, to start with,what didn't work was maybe being
there a little bit more at thetransition and having to see how
(06:16):
the teams had to integratedifferently.
There was some maybetrepidation of how an architect
and a construction manager wouldhave traditionally engaged with
one another at the beginning ofthe project, but when you're
all under the same roof you'repart of the same team.
Maybe some of those traditionalhabits were a little hard to
(06:38):
die.
But our leaders in theorganization Ron DeLario was my
boss at the time at Asterino.
He did a great job ofpositioning everybody to be
focused and collaborative.
They were focused andcollaborative around the models
that we were creating.
There was a lot of changemanagement that went into that
(06:59):
from moving past, not only howwe worked with our extended
design and construction teams,but also how we used a model to
communicate and shareinformation, also for 2012, 2013
, 2014,.
While there was that overlap ofabout 20 months where we were
doing that the designing andconstructing that project really
(07:20):
forward-thinking approachesthat he implemented and was
driving forward about how weshare information and use it and
trying not to be so reliant ondrawings and paper that
traditional output but certainlyour opportunity is an
integrated firm and the way wewere delivering the work changed
that, not something that wouldhave been possible in the same
(07:42):
way of a traditional designbid-bill delivery, so that
integrated aspect was a funevolution to be part of.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
Yeah, I bet it was.
I wonder.
Just as a complete side note, Ithink my guess is that most
firms stay effectively separate,not under the same umbrella for
liability purposes.
So did that ever come up inyour world and how did the firm
address that?
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yeah, I mean risk management is a big component of
that.
Going from the design side tothe construction side and having
bonding capacity, that's just awhole nother animal.
That it's just different.
It's a different approach.
Designers might want to be onone side of that and builders
want to be on the other side ofthat.
So I think it's more of just abusiness as usual approach and
(08:30):
certainly that risk managementand bonding capacity that's a
big hurdle.
I mean, a design firms is notjust going to naturally migrate
over and being able to have acertain capacity of what they
could build.
They might be designing largeprojects but certainly couldn't
manage the risk on theconstruction side of being able
to do that.
So that was definitelydifferent.
(08:52):
There was a lot of smallerprojects that led up to and
built up to those stages wherewe can do the project that I
first started on when I got here.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Well, beautiful.
It sounds like even before yougot to the DBIA, you were
changing the industry.
That's incredible.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Well, there was a lot of other people who were moving
the needle forward that I gotto be part of and learn from
their experiences and theirleadership in it too.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Beautiful Speaking of how's the work that you've done
at the DBIA differed from interms of the advisory and
shareperson roles that you'vehad throughout your career.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
Yeah, it's definitely different.
It's a different pace.
You know, designingconstruction schedules are
always kind of, you know,changing and morphing and design
dates get moved up, designdates get put.
You know, milestone submissionschange.
I think that's one of thebiggest things seeing how, you
know, dbia works on a veryannual cycle.
(09:47):
There's events and there's, youknow, monthly.
You know there's webinars,there's blog posts and things go
on a very, you know, setcadence.
So it took a little whilegetting used to that.
That was a different kind of adifferent beat, but all good.
And you know seeing the behindthe scenes of what goes on in a
conference we all go toconferences, we see one another
(10:09):
there.
There's a lot of activity thatgoes on behind the scenes of
leading up to it.
So I've been impressed andamazed at how much activity goes
on on the annual planning cyclefor that.
But it's been a little bitdifferent in the, you know,
defining best practice.
(10:30):
You know working in a firm, evenin a large firm, you know you
try to have it's more aboutstandards that you're putting in
place and well, we need to beable to do things this way in a
consistent way.
Now, when you're talking aboutbest practices, it's about
sharing with a larger audiencethe ways that you can work to
achieve the best outcome and youalso get to see what other
(10:54):
people do and how they takedifferent approaches.
You know, the beauty of ourmembership is we have architects
, engineers, we have builders,we have trade partners, we have
academics, lawyers there's thiswhole range of industry leaders
that we have that we get to seehow they interpret those best
practices and implement them andwe get a really good
opportunity to continue to takethat feedback and refine and,
(11:18):
you know, continue to refinethose best practices so they
continue to evolve in adifferent way.
And I don't think it's a littlebit different than being on the
practice side and, you know,maybe being in, not to say a
bubble, in a bat that sounds badto say it, but you're used to
the same kind of perspective andmethodology, so it's a little
bit different perspective, whichis fun to see.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Well, brilliant.
Thank you so much for sharing Ilove the dichotomy In your
involvement on the BIM Forumcommittee that's responsible for
authoring the level developmentspecification, or LOD
specification.
My understanding is there wasno formal release last year and
I'm really really excited tohear if there will be one this
year as well.
Can you share anything newthat's coming out of the BIM
Forum this year?
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, I would definitely keep an eye out for a
news press release from BIMForum here within the next
couple of weeks, definitely byJanuary.
At some point in January, hereat the beginning, we'll have the
2023 version of the LOD orlevel of development
specification being coming out,which will be great New update.
There'll be all new graphicsthroughout the document, so
(12:21):
it'll be a good next versionrelease of that document.
I've been fortunate to work onthat since the very early days.
I think it was around for thefirst publication of it, but
it's a great document that Ithink has, you know, allowed us
to have a not really a standardfor the industry, because I
think a standard means you dothis, this is when you do it and
(12:43):
this is who does it but a realgood dictionary of information
that allows us to rely upon astandard set of definitions that
the design professional whetherthat's the architect or the
engineer, the contractor, thetrade partner, the owner
everybody has a clearexpectation of understanding of
what something means when thatassembly or components at LOD,
(13:06):
whatever.
So now we have a groundwork anda foundation for how we
communicate back and forth and Ithink the big word that the BIM
forum has always used is thereliability of an element in the
model and I've always enjoyedand appreciate that term that
it's reliable to this becauseit's been thought out in this
(13:27):
way.
That's how people canunderstand how to use it back
and forth, and I think for thoseof us who work in that the
management, bdc management oreven a project management stage
to be able to use LOD as part ofa pull planning process to
really understand how thecomponents in the model will
evolve and who's going to evolvethem and how they'll be used,
(13:48):
really becomes extremelybeneficial and I think it's been
a significant tool for theindustry to rely upon.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Yeah, thanks, brian, I've really enjoyed using it.
In fact, I love how youmentioned it's a dictionary of
information.
I found it to be tremendous interms of alignment with the AEGC
and owner and any other tradepartners that might be involved
in the project.
Yeah, it's a great document orreference material to say hey,
let's at least align on theterminology we're all using and
(14:17):
that already creates theteamwork and the collaboration
once we've established thatalignment.
So, yeah, tremendous effort andthank you for you and the
larger committees.
Team effort.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Yeah, there's a lot of people working on it, so I'm
sure they appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Very cool, so maybe shifting gears.
I'd love to hear about some ofthe projects that you've worked
on, especially related tomodular construction.
For instance, you have someexperience with the Los Angeles
County USC Medical Center.
Can you explain to our audiencewhat modular construction is
and what advantages andchallenges are faced with its
utilization?
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah.
So that job that you justmentioned was interesting.
It happened to be adesign-built job and while I was
at Canon Design I had theopportunity to work on it and we
had four buildings.
It was a behavioral healthcampus in downtown Los Angeles
that was in collaboration withthe University of Southern
California and amongst thosefour buildings, which were
(15:14):
pretty much the same, there wasa lot of repetitive units.
So as we started working, wetook advantage of our modular
group at the time and said, well, how can we become more
efficient with the repetitivenature of some of the layout in
these spaces and being able tothink volumetric and modular,
and that we could constructrooms off-site somewhere else,
(15:39):
ship them and then literallyroll them into place on the
floor slab, set them down andmake your connections and
continue construction.
So, just like we hear a lotabout DFMA, design for modular
dissembl and being able to thinkabout how do we move away from
(15:59):
stick construction to anassembly of a kit of parts was
something that we really tookadvantage of and working.
So what had happened is, whilewe were working with the design
team, bim really became anintegral part in here, which was
exciting for me because I gotto play on the design side, I
(16:19):
got to play on the constructionside and I got to play on the
fabrication side and really lookat how we stitch all these
things together and thoughtabout how do we document these,
how do we model them and how dowe do all this in a way that's
transparent and keeps everybodyon the same page about
construction.
And in that environment we hadmetal-stud-framed rooms getting
(16:41):
built in Lawrence Kansas.
All of the plumbing, electricaland mechanical was being built
into those and they were beingdry walled over, shipped,
wrapped, shipped across thecountry, like I said, trained
and rolled into space.
We had about there was like 120rooms that were in there that
over the course of thosebuildings we brought together
(17:04):
and unfortunately I didn't getto see construction come to
completion on that.
But we were well ahead of doingthese shop drawings and
fabrication-ready models thatwere becoming integrated as part
of our construction documents.
And it was really exciting andit was a good learning
experience to see and understandwhere those traditional
(17:25):
construction documents, where dothey have to evolve and change?
Where were we putting too muchinformation into those documents
?
Where were we not puttingenough specificity into them,
based on how our team was set upfor what we needed to actually
detail at a shop drawing leveland fabricate, because it's very
much of a different switchright Construction documents and
(17:46):
shop drawings two totallydifferent things.
And then how do you model thosein a way where you bring all
that information together andstill have the information you
need for AHA review and codereview, even though somebody
else is doing it external to thetraditional design team.
So it was a really fun projectto work on.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
That's amazing and remind me in the audience when
that project was.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
When.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Yeah, what year was that?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
one that was 20, I guess 2019, 2020, I was working
on that was coming out of designand going into construction.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Yeah, so it sounds like.
I mean just, you'reconsistently at the forefront
because you know, modularizationhas really only started to be
an industry topic over the lastcouple of years and from the
language that you were using it,it almost sounds like there's
even room to set, you know,maybe not a standard, but again
a common dictionary ofinformation around
(18:48):
modularization and, as itspreads across the multiple
trades and key stakeholders androles that play a part of the
construction, making sure that,as you mentioned earlier,
there's enough specificity inthe document transfer.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Yeah, I think the big thing and you know, one of the
successes that we had on thatproject was, you know, as we
talk about all of theseopportunities, utilize
technology.
It still came down tocommunication and how we you
know how we strategized what wasgoing to be done in an
execution plan, how we leveragedLOD for understanding where
were the starting and stoppingpoints between the architect and
(19:27):
the fabricator, the engineerand the fabricator, where were
we making connections between?
You know, a unit that was beingbuilt in a different time zone
and getting shipped across thecountry.
You know how do you connectplumbing lines, how do you
connect electrical lines, how doyou power something that's
disconnected until it gets onthe job site?
(19:48):
And how do you know contracts,you know, play into that and
that's been one of the thingsthat excites me about.
You know what we're doing at DBAand evolving those
conversations, because it's adifferent perspective that
really comes into play and, aswe talked about risk management
before, that, that's really whatthat boils down to who can
trust, how do you trust what theperson before you and after you
(20:10):
are doing with that information?
And, as we always talk about it,it's building a right of
reliance or reliability on themodel so it can really company
the contract documents.
For the short term, nothing'sgoing to change immediately or
overnight in the fact that wehave to produce, stamp, sign,
seal contract documents.
(20:30):
But how can we make sure thatthe model is part of that
deliverable as well and can beutilized in a way that's planned
for at the outset and it's notjumping light speed ahead?
The model is a deliverable andthat's the only thing.
We're still going to needdrawings to tell the rest of the
story.
We're going to needspecifications to talk about
quality, but let's do a betterjob of relying on that entity
(20:57):
that's being created and allowit to be part of the
deliverables, and that wassomething that I think really,
that project really helped meunderstand how we can get ahead
and do that moving forward.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
I love it.
And speaking of moving forward,how do you see modular
construction evolving over thenext decade?
What kind of trends do you see?
And how do we?
On top of that, how do we mergemodularization and BIM and BDC
into the upcoming technologiesto create efficiency and
collaboration and projectoutcomes?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
I mean I have to think it's only going to
continue to grow.
Some of the other projects thatwe've done were not only
focused on interior spaces.
Exterior wall panelization.
You see a lot with MEP systemsand the racking of those.
There's just so manyopportunities to have let's just
call it a second shift ofpeople working right On the job
(21:49):
site.
They're able to take advantageof their expertise to pre-build
things.
While things are going on onthe job site, you always talk
about an increase of safety, anincrease of quality, a reduction
in waste of materials.
All of those things arevaluable and wins for any
project that I think any designand construction team and owner
(22:11):
want to take advantage of.
So if you talk about quality,just speed the market.
Increase in safety.
Who doesn't want those on theirjob site as part of their
project?
It might take a little moreplanning at the beginning.
No, it's not might.
It will take more planning atthe beginning, but the benefits
definitely provide that effortup front.
(22:33):
There's a value to that, noquestion.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
So with the increased use of modularization you get
the increased safety, you getincreased quality, reduced waste
which has a sustainabilitycomponent to it.
Do you see modularizationpotentially building into
industry standards like LEED orbest construction practices?
Speaker 2 (22:57):
Definitely best construction practices,
absolutely yeah, it's probablynot a stretch to think that
there'll be some other governingbody that'll come out, just
like we've seen with USGBC andLEED, that says these are the
best practices and the criteriato do something.
I don't know if anybody'staking the lead on that right
now, but I wouldn't be surprisedthat we see something like that
(23:20):
.
But definitely the fact thatthose best practices for
leveraging prefabrication andmodularization should be there
for any design and constructionfirm, because those are
certainly things we can takeadvantage of today and we've
seen the realization of thebenefits so far, so there'll
only be more to come.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
Beautiful.
So when we look at the AECindustry, especially this year,
there's been a tremendous amountof communication and talk about
the idea of digital twins andthe growth of smart buildings
and then ultimately even smartcities.
Those that are close to thenews will see that there's
billions of dollars planned foran investment into at least one
smart city.
So do you see any integrationbetween these concepts and
(24:03):
applying modular constructioninto those concepts?
Speaker 2 (24:08):
I think modular construction is a little bit
unique because it depends on theproject type, just like
different project deliverymodels or methods lead to
different project types.
Anything where I think you haveowners who are repeat builders
and probably have a level ofcommunication I brought my
personal understanding on itrepetition would certainly be
(24:29):
looking to take advantage ofthat.
It's probably not aone-size-fits-all Probably to a
fault.
We talk about how buildings areall unique, but there's also an
art in finding where there'sconsistency or repetition and
being able to take advantage andleveraging that to certain
aspects, so it'll certainlybecome part of it, but I think
(24:51):
it'll be dispersed and variedacross different project types.
The idea of a digital twin,though, and extending the
usability of the geometry andthe data that's being provided
to an owner post-occupancy andthroughout operations, is going
to be key and definitely besomething.
(25:11):
I mean, we're already seeingthat move forward right now, and
I think we'll continue to seethat.
I think that's an excitingopportunity for owners, which
gives them something out of allthis technology that we're
talking about.
It's not just the opportunitiesin designing construction, but
also post-occupancy.
How do you start utilizing thatinformation?
(25:31):
You talk about IoT and sensors.
How do you move to a moreproactive instead of reactive,
approach to how you maintain andoperate your facilities or
whatever that built asset isthat you're creating.
That's going to be the bigopportunity moving forward.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
I love it.
Thank you for sharing.
I think we could do a wholeepisode on the best practices
for owners, the investment thatthey make into the building
information model and that notjust providing an ROI during the
construction process, but alsoproviding an ROI
post-construction.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
It just continues to build on one another.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Right.
I wonder have you seen anymeasurements of that in the
space?
How to measure that upfront ROI, how it provides benefit
downstream?
Speaker 2 (26:22):
ROI is a tough one because so many buildings are so
different Procurement methodsand things like that.
I was very fortunate to work onthe BIM project delivery
standard for the Ohio StateUniversity and I know they had
done some work with another firmwhen they did a feasibility
study on it where it started totrack some of the numbers.
(26:44):
This was back in 2012, 2013,but they were using some of the
numbers from the NationalInstitute of Standards and
Technology Some of those NISTreports early on about
interoperability and we'retrying to benchmark those and
really normalize those againstsome projects that were
currently ongoing on campus.
I know for Ohio State theyfound I think it was a 7.1
(27:06):
percent opportunity for costavoidance on all their
construction projects.
That was their benchmark thatthey had seen.
I forget what the overallconstruction number was at the
time, but it was like $16million of potential cost
avoidance that was sitting outthere.
Again, they weren't sayingwe're going to save $16 million
(27:28):
every year if we invest in BIM,but there's a massive chunk of
time and money that if we canplan and build a framework in a
series of guidelines around howprojects are delivered and how
our deliverables are formattedfor use, there's a big
opportunity for us to takeadvantage of All the information
is there.
The design professionals, thearchitects, the engineers, the
(27:51):
builders are giving it toeverybody.
But instead of it coming in abox of paper and rolls of
drawings, let's put a datastructure and a geometry
structure behind it so, onceit's received, it can be
consumed and utilized.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Absolutely.
I love it.
I love seeing that you have theexperience on that and you're
looking at it from an industrylevel and impacting and
modifying the entire industryfor the better.
As a final question of the showand a tradition of future
construct, if you could projectyourself out 25 years and wanted
to have any device ortechnology that would benefit
(28:24):
you personally, what would it beand what would it do?
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Oh man, If I could be a mind reader, wouldn't that be
great.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
We're probably not too far away from that.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yeah, I don't know.
If you could have apredetermined notion of what
somebody was going to ask fromyou or what they were thinking
to help guide what your responseand approach to something was
and get to yes quicker, wouldthat be fantastic?
Speaker 1 (28:53):
I love it.
Cool yeah.
What would be helpful for youin terms of getting to?
Yes, is that like findingconsortium on finding getting
the committee to alignment, oris that like working with
industry partners?
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Yeah, I think it's I mean, if I think back to my
project days right, it's gettingthe right people in the room to
make a decision and having aconsensus, because one person's
perspective might be differentthan another end user that maybe
happens to not be in that roombut very likely might know
better than the person that'ssitting across from you.
Having those collectiveexperiences and knowledges to
(29:37):
pull from to get the decisionmaking is extremely valuable,
and having that collective userexperience is what makes things
better for sure.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
Great, and then having something that would sort
of accelerate that or amplifyit, so that once you get
everybody in the right room soidentifying everybody fast
enough would be important andthen once you get them into the
right room, now you know thatand you're able to move forwards
towards that consensus a lotfurther.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Yeah, there's probably some crazy downside to
that, but watch what you wishfor, but that sounds kind of
nice.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
Cool.
Well, I really reallyappreciate your help and your
partnership today, brian, andthank you for your participation
.
Really amazing to get to knowyou on the show and look forward
to very exciting upcomingupdates from the BEM Forum into
2024.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah, thanks for having me, Mark.
It was nice talking to you.
I appreciate your time.
Thank you, sir.
Welcome to Future Construct.
I'm Mark Oden, the CEO of BIMDesigns Inc and guest host of
Future Construct.
Today I'm hosting Brian Skripak, director of Virtual Design and
Construction at the DesignBuild Institute of America, also
known as DBIA.
Welcome, brian, thank you formaking the time to join me.
Yeah, thanks for having me,mark, looking forward to the
conversation, as am I, sir.
(00:33):
So, as an innovative forwardthinking, building, information
modeling and VDC leader, youhave spent the past 15 years of
your career focused on howpeople, processes and technology
can best come together andtransform project delivery
outcomes.
You also have contributed tonational publications and spoke
at conferences around the world.
Through these experiences,you've been able to promote the
(00:54):
value of your VDC expertise topotential clients to be
recognized as an industrytrusted advisor, ultimately
leading you to having theopportunity to serve as an
advisor group member and pastchair of the AIA national
technology and architecturalpractice knowledge community,
while serving on the BIM forumcommittee responsible for
authoring the level ofdevelopment or LOD specification
(01:17):
.
Thank you for your tremendouscontributions in the AES space,
brian.
I'm honored and I've activelyused and read and the BIM forum
LOD specification.
It's been a great instrumentfor us to work with.
Good to hear.
Brian, I'd love to hear yourbackground, your story and
(01:37):
education that took you into theDBIA and how the Institute has
impacted the AAC industry aswell.
Speaker 2 (01:43):
Yeah, my background started.
My degree is in architecture.
I practiced architecture forabout eight years before kind of
making that transition into theBIM world.
Back in 2005 is when I startedusing some of these technologies
.
I was working on the technologyside doing training and
(02:06):
implementation services and veryquickly went back to the firm
the design firm that I had leftto really get my hands on and
take the next step of usingthese BIM tools that I was out
educating and being kind of aevangelist for my peers to take
(02:26):
advantage of.
From there, working just in anarchitecture firm, I had the
opportunity to job transitionand I took a new opportunity at
an AE firm that also had agrowing construction management
component.
That's really where I firstkind of started learning the
design build side of it.
I was excited to take that roleand knowing what a lot of the
(02:49):
construction firms were doing,that we were working with what
was happening after design andbeing excited about that.
But seeing an opportunity toreally merge those two sides
together and having a integratedfirm where the builders and the
architects and engineers wereall under the same umbrella
really provided a uniqueexperience.
It was an exciting one thatallowed us to do things
(03:10):
differently, and that was great.
I had the opportunity to kindof serve in that role.
Our firm got acquired by CanonDesign and I spent about 10
years there.
What sort of happened is?
I ended up working on a lot ofdesign build jobs.
We were doing the same sort ofthing where we were trying to
have this kind of integratedapproach to projects, and things
(03:35):
always went so much smootherwhen they were design build
projects.
It was great.
You didn't have theconfrontation that you did on
design build jobs or see them atrisk or other things.
There was just a differentlevel of fluidness that was
occurring.
After a little while I waslooking to do something
different and first news, myformer boss.
(03:57):
She had moved on and I reachedout to her for some career
advice, looking for herexpertise, and happened to be a
random passing.
She called me back like twodays later and said hey, you
need to talk to Lisa Washingtonat DVIA.
I was like why would I callLisa?
I'm like yeah, I know Lisa.
I'm like why would I call Lisaat DVIA?
I didn't understand what thatwas at first.
(04:19):
She's like they're looking tomove forward with this
technology conversation.
She's like I think this wouldbe something interesting.
You should check it out.
It was great timing.
It was the right fit kind ofmigrating to this opportunity
where you could be a largerindustry change agent.
Now you have this megaphone ofa large membership base that you
(04:43):
can start to continue to sharebest practices with and help the
industry move forward in thislarger conversation about
designing constructiontechnology.
Whether it's BIM, vdc, whateverinnovation, digital
transformation, whatever kind ofwrapper you want to put around
it or title, it's a greatopportunity to work with other
(05:05):
forward thinking companies andhelp move that forward.
Speaker 1 (05:09):
Thank you so much for that background, brian.
Really exciting material inthere I want to focus on you
were talking about the mergingbuilders, architects and
engineers under the sameumbrella.
That sounds like that was backaround 2005.
Is that right?
Speaker 2 (05:25):
No, that was more around 2012.
Speaker 1 (05:27):
2012?
.
Speaker 2 (05:29):
Yeah, that's when my role had switched from a firm
that was just architecture toworking for that integrated firm
here in Pittsburgh.
Speaker 1 (05:35):
Yeah, that's amazing.
I usually see maybe thearchitects and engineer under
the same umbrella, but I veryrarely see that merged with the
builder.
Sounds like maybe you're aheadof the times.
What do you feel worked reallywell in that constellation and
what do you feel was room forimprovement?
Speaker 2 (05:53):
Well, it was interesting because this was an
established AE firm, big Alittle E.
We had all of our engineeringdisciplines and landscape
in-house.
The construction managementgroup was this emerging service
line.
I think maybe, to start with,what didn't work was maybe being
there a little bit more at thetransition and having to see how
(06:16):
the teams had to integratedifferently.
There was some maybetrepidation of how an architect
and a construction manager wouldhave traditionally engaged with
one another at the beginning ofthe project, but when you're
all under the same roof you'repart of the same team.
Maybe some of those traditionalhabits were a little hard to
(06:38):
die.
But our leaders in theorganization Ron DeLario was my
boss at the time at Asterino.
He did a great job ofpositioning everybody to be
focused and collaborative.
They were focused andcollaborative around the models
that we were creating.
There was a lot of changemanagement that went into that
(06:59):
from moving past, not only howwe worked with our extended
design and construction teams,but also how we used a model to
communicate and shareinformation, also for 2012, 2013
, 2014,.
While there was that overlap ofabout 20 months where we were
doing that the designing andconstructing that project really
(07:20):
forward-thinking approachesthat he implemented and was
driving forward about how weshare information and use it and
trying not to be so reliant ondrawings and paper that
traditional output but certainlyour opportunity is an
integrated firm and the way wewere delivering the work changed
that, not something that wouldhave been possible in the same
(07:42):
way of a traditional designbid-bill delivery, so that
integrated aspect was a funevolution to be part of.
Speaker 1 (07:51):
Yeah, I bet it was.
I wonder.
Just as a complete side note, Ithink my guess is that most
firms stay effectively separate,not under the same umbrella for
liability purposes.
So did that ever come up inyour world and how did the firm
address that?
Speaker 2 (08:06):
Yeah, I mean risk management is a big component of
that.
Going from the design side tothe construction side and having
bonding capacity, that's just awhole nother animal.
That it's just different.
It's a different approach.
Designers might want to be onone side of that and builders
want to be on the other side ofthat.
So I think it's more of just abusiness as usual approach and
(08:30):
certainly that risk managementand bonding capacity that's a
big hurdle.
I mean, a design firms is notjust going to naturally migrate
over and being able to have acertain capacity of what they
could build.
They might be designing largeprojects but certainly couldn't
manage the risk on theconstruction side of being able
to do that.
So that was definitelydifferent.
(08:52):
There was a lot of smallerprojects that led up to and
built up to those stages wherewe can do the project that I
first started on when I got here.
Speaker 1 (09:02):
Well, beautiful.
It sounds like even before yougot to the DBIA, you were
changing the industry.
That's incredible.
Speaker 2 (09:07):
Well, there was a lot of other people who were moving
the needle forward that I gotto be part of and learn from
their experiences and theirleadership in it too.
Speaker 1 (09:16):
Beautiful Speaking of how's the work that you've done
at the DBIA differed from interms of the advisory and
shareperson roles that you'vehad throughout your career.
Speaker 2 (09:26):
Yeah, it's definitely different.
It's a different pace.
You know, designingconstruction schedules are
always kind of, you know,changing and morphing and design
dates get moved up, designdates get put.
You know, milestone submissionschange.
I think that's one of thebiggest things seeing how, you
know, dbia works on a veryannual cycle.
(09:47):
There's events and there's, youknow, monthly.
You know there's webinars,there's blog posts and things go
on a very, you know, setcadence.
So it took a little whilegetting used to that.
That was a different kind of adifferent beat, but all good.
And you know seeing the behindthe scenes of what goes on in a
conference we all go toconferences, we see one another
(10:09):
there.
There's a lot of activity thatgoes on behind the scenes of
leading up to it.
So I've been impressed andamazed at how much activity goes
on on the annual planning cyclefor that.
But it's been a little bitdifferent in the, you know,
defining best practice.
(10:30):
You know working in a firm, evenin a large firm, you know you
try to have it's more aboutstandards that you're putting in
place and well, we need to beable to do things this way in a
consistent way.
Now, when you're talking aboutbest practices, it's about
sharing with a larger audiencethe ways that you can work to
achieve the best outcome and youalso get to see what other
(10:54):
people do and how they takedifferent approaches.
You know, the beauty of ourmembership is we have architects
, engineers, we have builders,we have trade partners, we have
academics, lawyers there's thiswhole range of industry leaders
that we have that we get to seehow they interpret those best
practices and implement them andwe get a really good
opportunity to continue to takethat feedback and refine and,
(11:18):
you know, continue to refinethose best practices so they
continue to evolve in adifferent way.
And I don't think it's a littlebit different than being on the
practice side and, you know,maybe being in, not to say a
bubble, in a bat that sounds badto say it, but you're used to
the same kind of perspective andmethodology, so it's a little
bit different perspective, whichis fun to see.
Speaker 1 (11:39):
Well, brilliant.
Thank you so much for sharing Ilove the dichotomy In your
involvement on the BIM Forumcommittee that's responsible for
authoring the level developmentspecification, or LOD
specification.
My understanding is there wasno formal release last year and
I'm really really excited tohear if there will be one this
year as well.
Can you share anything newthat's coming out of the BIM
Forum this year?
Speaker 2 (11:59):
Yeah, I would definitely keep an eye out for a
news press release from BIMForum here within the next
couple of weeks, definitely byJanuary.
At some point in January, hereat the beginning, we'll have the
2023 version of the LOD orlevel of development
specification being coming out,which will be great New update.
There'll be all new graphicsthroughout the document, so
(12:21):
it'll be a good next versionrelease of that document.
I've been fortunate to work onthat since the very early days.
I think it was around for thefirst publication of it, but
it's a great document that Ithink has, you know, allowed us
to have a not really a standardfor the industry, because I
think a standard means you dothis, this is when you do it and
(12:43):
this is who does it but a realgood dictionary of information
that allows us to rely upon astandard set of definitions that
the design professional whetherthat's the architect or the
engineer, the contractor, thetrade partner, the owner
everybody has a clearexpectation of understanding of
what something means when thatassembly or components at LOD,
(13:06):
whatever.
So now we have a groundwork anda foundation for how we
communicate back and forth and Ithink the big word that the BIM
forum has always used is thereliability of an element in the
model and I've always enjoyedand appreciate that term that
it's reliable to this becauseit's been thought out in this
(13:27):
way.
That's how people canunderstand how to use it back
and forth, and I think for thoseof us who work in that the
management, bdc management oreven a project management stage
to be able to use LOD as part ofa pull planning process to
really understand how thecomponents in the model will
evolve and who's going to evolvethem and how they'll be used,
(13:48):
really becomes extremelybeneficial and I think it's been
a significant tool for theindustry to rely upon.
Speaker 1 (13:55):
Yeah, thanks, brian, I've really enjoyed using it.
In fact, I love how youmentioned it's a dictionary of
information.
I found it to be tremendous interms of alignment with the AEGC
and owner and any other tradepartners that might be involved
in the project.
Yeah, it's a great document orreference material to say hey,
let's at least align on theterminology we're all using and
(14:17):
that already creates theteamwork and the collaboration
once we've established thatalignment.
So, yeah, tremendous effort andthank you for you and the
larger committees.
Team effort.
Speaker 2 (14:28):
Yeah, there's a lot of people working on it, so I'm
sure they appreciate that.
Speaker 1 (14:32):
Very cool, so maybe shifting gears.
I'd love to hear about some ofthe projects that you've worked
on, especially related tomodular construction.
For instance, you have someexperience with the Los Angeles
County USC Medical Center.
Can you explain to our audiencewhat modular construction is
and what advantages andchallenges are faced with its
utilization?
Speaker 2 (14:51):
Yeah.
So that job that you justmentioned was interesting.
It happened to be adesign-built job and while I was
at Canon Design I had theopportunity to work on it and we
had four buildings.
It was a behavioral healthcampus in downtown Los Angeles
that was in collaboration withthe University of Southern
California and amongst thosefour buildings, which were
(15:14):
pretty much the same, there wasa lot of repetitive units.
So as we started working, wetook advantage of our modular
group at the time and said, well, how can we become more
efficient with the repetitivenature of some of the layout in
these spaces and being able tothink volumetric and modular,
and that we could constructrooms off-site somewhere else,
(15:39):
ship them and then literallyroll them into place on the
floor slab, set them down andmake your connections and
continue construction.
So, just like we hear a lotabout DFMA, design for modular
dissembl and being able to thinkabout how do we move away from
(15:59):
stick construction to anassembly of a kit of parts was
something that we really tookadvantage of and working.
So what had happened is, whilewe were working with the design
team, bim really became anintegral part in here, which was
exciting for me because I gotto play on the design side, I
(16:19):
got to play on the constructionside and I got to play on the
fabrication side and really lookat how we stitch all these
things together and thoughtabout how do we document these,
how do we model them and how dowe do all this in a way that's
transparent and keeps everybodyon the same page about
construction.
And in that environment we hadmetal-stud-framed rooms getting
(16:41):
built in Lawrence Kansas.
All of the plumbing, electricaland mechanical was being built
into those and they were beingdry walled over, shipped,
wrapped, shipped across thecountry, like I said, trained
and rolled into space.
We had about there was like 120rooms that were in there that
over the course of thosebuildings we brought together
(17:04):
and unfortunately I didn't getto see construction come to
completion on that.
But we were well ahead of doingthese shop drawings and
fabrication-ready models thatwere becoming integrated as part
of our construction documents.
And it was really exciting andit was a good learning
experience to see and understandwhere those traditional
(17:25):
construction documents, where dothey have to evolve and change?
Where were we putting too muchinformation into those documents
?
Where were we not puttingenough specificity into them,
based on how our team was set upfor what we needed to actually
detail at a shop drawing leveland fabricate, because it's very
much of a different switchright Construction documents and
(17:46):
shop drawings two totallydifferent things.
And then how do you model thosein a way where you bring all
that information together andstill have the information you
need for AHA review and codereview, even though somebody
else is doing it external to thetraditional design team.
So it was a really fun projectto work on.
Speaker 1 (18:06):
That's amazing and remind me in the audience when
that project was.
Speaker 2 (18:11):
When.
Speaker 1 (18:12):
Yeah, what year was that?
Speaker 2 (18:15):
one that was 20, I guess 2019, 2020, I was working
on that was coming out of designand going into construction.
Speaker 1 (18:27):
Yeah, so it sounds like.
I mean just, you'reconsistently at the forefront
because you know, modularizationhas really only started to be
an industry topic over the lastcouple of years and from the
language that you were using it,it almost sounds like there's
even room to set, you know,maybe not a standard, but again
a common dictionary ofinformation around
(18:48):
modularization and, as itspreads across the multiple
trades and key stakeholders androles that play a part of the
construction, making sure that,as you mentioned earlier,
there's enough specificity inthe document transfer.
Speaker 2 (19:05):
Yeah, I think the big thing and you know, one of the
successes that we had on thatproject was, you know, as we
talk about all of theseopportunities, utilize
technology.
It still came down tocommunication and how we you
know how we strategized what wasgoing to be done in an
execution plan, how we leveragedLOD for understanding where
were the starting and stoppingpoints between the architect and
(19:27):
the fabricator, the engineerand the fabricator, where were
we making connections between?
You know, a unit that was beingbuilt in a different time zone
and getting shipped across thecountry.
You know how do you connectplumbing lines, how do you
connect electrical lines, how doyou power something that's
disconnected until it gets onthe job site?
(19:48):
And how do you know contracts,you know, play into that and
that's been one of the thingsthat excites me about.
You know what we're doing at DBAand evolving those
conversations, because it's adifferent perspective that
really comes into play and, aswe talked about risk management
before, that, that's really whatthat boils down to who can
trust, how do you trust what theperson before you and after you
(20:10):
are doing with that information?
And, as we always talk about it,it's building a right of
reliance or reliability on themodel so it can really company
the contract documents.
For the short term, nothing'sgoing to change immediately or
overnight in the fact that wehave to produce, stamp, sign,
seal contract documents.
(20:30):
But how can we make sure thatthe model is part of that
deliverable as well and can beutilized in a way that's planned
for at the outset and it's notjumping light speed ahead?
The model is a deliverable andthat's the only thing.
We're still going to needdrawings to tell the rest of the
story.
We're going to needspecifications to talk about
quality, but let's do a betterjob of relying on that entity
(20:57):
that's being created and allowit to be part of the
deliverables, and that wassomething that I think really,
that project really helped meunderstand how we can get ahead
and do that moving forward.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
I love it.
And speaking of moving forward,how do you see modular
construction evolving over thenext decade?
What kind of trends do you see?
And how do we?
On top of that, how do we mergemodularization and BIM and BDC
into the upcoming technologiesto create efficiency and
collaboration and projectoutcomes?
Speaker 2 (21:27):
I mean I have to think it's only going to
continue to grow.
Some of the other projects thatwe've done were not only
focused on interior spaces.
Exterior wall panelization.
You see a lot with MEP systemsand the racking of those.
There's just so manyopportunities to have let's just
call it a second shift ofpeople working right On the job
(21:49):
site.
They're able to take advantageof their expertise to pre-build
things.
While things are going on onthe job site, you always talk
about an increase of safety, anincrease of quality, a reduction
in waste of materials.
All of those things arevaluable and wins for any
project that I think any designand construction team and owner
(22:11):
want to take advantage of.
So if you talk about quality,just speed the market.
Increase in safety.
Who doesn't want those on theirjob site as part of their
project?
It might take a little moreplanning at the beginning.
No, it's not might.
It will take more planning atthe beginning, but the benefits
definitely provide that effortup front.
(22:33):
There's a value to that, noquestion.
Speaker 1 (22:35):
So with the increased use of modularization you get
the increased safety, you getincreased quality, reduced waste
which has a sustainabilitycomponent to it.
Do you see modularizationpotentially building into
industry standards like LEED orbest construction practices?
Speaker 2 (22:57):
Definitely best construction practices,
absolutely yeah, it's probablynot a stretch to think that
there'll be some other governingbody that'll come out, just
like we've seen with USGBC andLEED, that says these are the
best practices and the criteriato do something.
I don't know if anybody'staking the lead on that right
now, but I wouldn't be surprisedthat we see something like that
(23:20):
.
But definitely the fact thatthose best practices for
leveraging prefabrication andmodularization should be there
for any design and constructionfirm, because those are
certainly things we can takeadvantage of today and we've
seen the realization of thebenefits so far, so there'll
only be more to come.
Speaker 1 (23:39):
Beautiful.
So when we look at the AECindustry, especially this year,
there's been a tremendous amountof communication and talk about
the idea of digital twins andthe growth of smart buildings
and then ultimately even smartcities.
Those that are close to thenews will see that there's
billions of dollars planned foran investment into at least one
smart city.
So do you see any integrationbetween these concepts and
(24:03):
applying modular constructioninto those concepts?
Speaker 2 (24:08):
I think modular construction is a little bit
unique because it depends on theproject type, just like
different project deliverymodels or methods lead to
different project types.
Anything where I think you haveowners who are repeat builders
and probably have a level ofcommunication I brought my
personal understanding on itrepetition would certainly be
(24:29):
looking to take advantage ofthat.
It's probably not aone-size-fits-all Probably to a
fault.
We talk about how buildings areall unique, but there's also an
art in finding where there'sconsistency or repetition and
being able to take advantage andleveraging that to certain
aspects, so it'll certainlybecome part of it, but I think
(24:51):
it'll be dispersed and variedacross different project types.
The idea of a digital twin,though, and extending the
usability of the geometry andthe data that's being provided
to an owner post-occupancy andthroughout operations, is going
to be key and definitely besomething.
(25:11):
I mean, we're already seeingthat move forward right now, and
I think we'll continue to seethat.
I think that's an excitingopportunity for owners, which
gives them something out of allthis technology that we're
talking about.
It's not just the opportunitiesin designing construction, but
also post-occupancy.
How do you start utilizing thatinformation?
(25:31):
You talk about IoT and sensors.
How do you move to a moreproactive instead of reactive,
approach to how you maintain andoperate your facilities or
whatever that built asset isthat you're creating.
That's going to be the bigopportunity moving forward.
Speaker 1 (25:51):
I love it.
Thank you for sharing.
I think we could do a wholeepisode on the best practices
for owners, the investment thatthey make into the building
information model and that notjust providing an ROI during the
construction process, but alsoproviding an ROI
post-construction.
Speaker 2 (26:09):
It just continues to build on one another.
Speaker 1 (26:12):
Right.
I wonder have you seen anymeasurements of that in the
space?
How to measure that upfront ROI, how it provides benefit
downstream?
Speaker 2 (26:22):
ROI is a tough one because so many buildings are so
different Procurement methodsand things like that.
I was very fortunate to work onthe BIM project delivery
standard for the Ohio StateUniversity and I know they had
done some work with another firmwhen they did a feasibility
study on it where it started totrack some of the numbers.
(26:44):
This was back in 2012, 2013,but they were using some of the
numbers from the NationalInstitute of Standards and
Technology Some of those NISTreports early on about
interoperability and we'retrying to benchmark those and
really normalize those againstsome projects that were
currently ongoing on campus.
I know for Ohio State theyfound I think it was a 7.1
(27:06):
percent opportunity for costavoidance on all their
construction projects.
That was their benchmark thatthey had seen.
I forget what the overallconstruction number was at the
time, but it was like $16million of potential cost
avoidance that was sitting outthere.
Again, they weren't sayingwe're going to save $16 million
(27:28):
every year if we invest in BIM,but there's a massive chunk of
time and money that if we canplan and build a framework in a
series of guidelines around howprojects are delivered and how
our deliverables are formattedfor use, there's a big
opportunity for us to takeadvantage of All the information
is there.
The design professionals, thearchitects, the engineers, the
(27:51):
builders are giving it toeverybody.
But instead of it coming in abox of paper and rolls of
drawings, let's put a datastructure and a geometry
structure behind it so, onceit's received, it can be
consumed and utilized.
Speaker 1 (28:03):
Absolutely.
I love it.
I love seeing that you have theexperience on that and you're
looking at it from an industrylevel and impacting and
modifying the entire industryfor the better.
As a final question of the showand a tradition of future
construct, if you could projectyourself out 25 years and wanted
to have any device ortechnology that would benefit
(28:24):
you personally, what would it beand what would it do?
Speaker 2 (28:29):
Oh man, If I could be a mind reader, wouldn't that be
great.
Speaker 1 (28:34):
We're probably not too far away from that.
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Yeah, I don't know.
If you could have apredetermined notion of what
somebody was going to ask fromyou or what they were thinking
to help guide what your responseand approach to something was
and get to yes quicker, wouldthat be fantastic?
Speaker 1 (28:53):
I love it.
Cool yeah.
What would be helpful for youin terms of getting to?
Yes, is that like findingconsortium on finding getting
the committee to alignment, oris that like working with
industry partners?
Speaker 2 (29:13):
Yeah, I think it's I mean, if I think back to my
project days right, it's gettingthe right people in the room to
make a decision and having aconsensus, because one person's
perspective might be differentthan another end user that maybe
happens to not be in that roombut very likely might know
better than the person that'ssitting across from you.
Having those collectiveexperiences and knowledges to
(29:37):
pull from to get the decisionmaking is extremely valuable,
and having that collective userexperience is what makes things
better for sure.
Speaker 1 (29:47):
Great, and then having something that would sort
of accelerate that or amplifyit, so that once you get
everybody in the right room soidentifying everybody fast
enough would be important andthen once you get them into the
right room, now you know thatand you're able to move forwards
towards that consensus a lotfurther.
Speaker 2 (30:05):
Yeah, there's probably some crazy downside to
that, but watch what you wishfor, but that sounds kind of
nice.
Speaker 1 (30:11):
Cool.
Well, I really reallyappreciate your help and your
partnership today, brian, andthank you for your participation
.
Really amazing to get to knowyou on the show and look forward
to very exciting upcomingupdates from the BEM Forum into
2024.
Speaker 2 (30:27):
Yeah, thanks for having me, Mark.
It was nice talking to you.
I appreciate your time.
Thank you, sir.
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