By Sam Norledge, Head of Smart Buildings, LMG
Published on: 30 June 2025
We talk a lot about “digital transformation” in construction. Phrases such as “smart buildings”, “data-driven design” and “seamless operations” are part of a digital lexicon that promises a more connected, efficient and intelligent built environment.
As part of this digital transformation, billions are invested in Building Information Models (BIM), which are designed to capture every detail of a building’s design and systems for use throughout its lifecycle.
And yet, time and again, the result is the same. Data gets trapped in the same old silos, and we end up with expensive digital systems that simply don’t deliver real-world value. And the facility managers (FMs) – the people who actually run the buildings – are effectively left with something they can’t use.
I’ll never forget a flagship government project I was on back in 2015. We modelled everything to perfection. On handover day, the FM took one look and called it a “museum of data”.
“It was beautiful,” he said, but “totally disconnected” from his live systems. His response – from a decade ago – still resonates with me. Why? Because all too often these models are built by the industry without any consideration for the user, their requirements or the information they need.
Building bridge for digital buildings
Of course, there is a simple fix. And it’s staring us in the face. Instead of adding ever more complexity, we simply need to build a link between the BIM asset IDs and the building’s maintenance system.
Once you create that link or bridge, the two sides of the equation – the Asset Information Model and the digital building – can finally communicate. The information starts to flow. And that “museum of data” comes to life, turning information from something static into something useful and relevant.
It’s a solution that owes a large part of its success not to technology but to the way we approach a problem. Instead of a design team pushing a BIM model “downstream”, we need to start with the end in mind.
That’s because in most cases today, the design team creates a BIM during the early stages of a project. They build it based on what they think is needed, then pass it “downstream” handing it over to construction teams before it finally reaches the FMs. The snag is, this one-way flow often misses what the end users actually need to run the building day-to-day.
And that’s why we need to reverse it. This is the “Smart-to-BIM” flip.
Reimagining the approach to building design
By doing it this way, the customer calls the shots, defining what they need the building to do and how they need to operate it for the next 30 years. In effect, they create a “shopping list” of data they want for the BIM model, turning the whole process from a “data push” into a “data pull”.
To me, this is exactly why the Master Systems Integrator (MSI) role is so crucial. And I should know, since my day job involves running the Smart Buildings team at LMG. I’m also involved with buildingSMART UK & Ireland.
And like other MSIs, that puts me right at the interface between the data from BIMs and the real-world systems that make a building tick. It means we can act as the natural bridge between the clean, structured data of design and the messy, dynamic reality of a building in use. Our job is to untangle this mess and translate it into a clear set of data requirements for the designers.
Simple solutions delivering excellent results
This simple act of translation makes sure the model is useful from day one and prevents the madness of having to re-tag and rebuild data after handover, something which is both time consuming and costs a fortune.
In fact, it’s an approach that has now been named as part of gathering industry-wide recognition. It’s called the “Project-Operations Gap” and it underlines the disconnect between how buildings are designed and how they’re actually run.
This isn’t simply a question of branding. It’s important because naming a problem is the first step to solving it. And since everyone involved – customers, designers, facilities managers and integrators – has a role in fixing it, it’s good to know that everyone is working off the same page.
What’s more, with artificial intelligence (AI) becoming increasingly mainstream, the timing couldn’t be any better. With better data, it can be used to predict when equipment might fail, optimise energy use and help facilities managers make smarter decisions, faster. The Smart-to-BIM revolution isn’t about more tech, it’s about using the right data in the right way to create truly smart buildings.