MTBIM

Mountain biking & BIM

There has been a real movement in recent years for suburban, middle-aged men to spend outrageous sums of money on high tech mountain bikes, don lycra outfits and head out to the hills on a weekend.
I’m afraid I am one of them, although in my defence, I do my best to avoid stretchy synthetics.

The key thing to remember when you are hurtling down a rock-strewn hillside is:

Don’t worry about the small stuff, worry about the big stuff

That is to say: don’t look at the ground immediately ahead of you and concern yourself with things like small branches & apple-sized rocks.
Keep your vision in the distance to spot the boulders, precipitous drops and the general flow of the trail.

You need to pick a ‘line’ early and stick to it, rather than swerving around minor obstacles at the last second. The suspension on the bike will absorb the small bumps (and even some quite big ones).
You essentially look where you want to go, not where you are just about to go.

You must be quick-thinking but committed. Changing your mind half way through a tricky patch (when it looks a bit scary) is bound to end in disaster.

What does this have to do with BIM ?

Perhaps this could be applied to many things in life, but since this it is the topic of this blog, I will explain how it relates to BIM.

Many businesses & their BIM-folk focus just on the small stuff of technical BIM minutae (pebbles & twigs) and forget the big stuff like strategy and process (boulders & chasms)
BIM plans often cover the small stuff in excruciating detail, but often miss the fundamentals of who does what, when & why. The critical thing often missed is the required result (getting down the hill in one piece).
You can do that by taking many different paths. The important thing is not how you do it, but just that you get there.
Many individuals and companies believe that having the latest gear (carbon-fibre bike and titanium components in the MTB world, or latest applications and hardware in the BIM one) is more important than skills, capability or fitness.
In BIM terms, a lack of comitment and last second swerves in direction is manifested by “let’s just do it in CAD to get the drawings out the door”

I’ve covered many of these issues in other posts on this blog so will not repeat myself, but have included some links below

Summary

Determine where you want to get to, and the important parts of the path.
Don’t look just ahead of your front wheel. Try to spot the big opportunities & risks and don’t worry about the small stuff.
The gear (technology) matters, but not as much as you think. Strategy & ability is more important than technology.