A thesis submitted in partial fulfilment of the requirements of the University of
Wolverhampton for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD).Building Information Modelling (BIM) has been well recognised all around the world
as a technology driven approach that can bring radical improvements in construction
productivity. There is considerable demand for using BIM in the KSA due to the large
scale of its construction industry that needs to improve its productivity to overcome the
persistent problems, such as project delays, planning inefficiencies, and waste of
resources. The aim of this study is to investigate how the KSA construction
organisations are implementing BIM for competitive advantage. Qualitative research
approach was adopted to collect and analyse data from 46 BIM professionals. As part of
the analysis of the interviews, content analysis was employed. The unit of analysis
adopted for this study is the ‘construction industry’ and the embedded unit is ‘individual
employee’.
The KSA construction industry is heading in the right direction for implementing BIM,
however it is lacking BIM knowledge and does not understand BIM as a set of
requirements. Therefore, an industry wide awareness-raising programme on the concept
of BIM needs to be developed and deployed. The existing education and training
programmes need some reorientation. Furthermore, the KSA construction organisations
would not survive if they choose not to use BIM. BIM is widely used during planning
and design stage. The four most important drivers for BIM implementation are: client
pressure, competitive pressure, to improve collaboration, and government pressure.
Eleven challenges were also revealed in this study of which organisational culture for
change is the key challenge for adoption of BIM in the KSA construction organisations.
Leaders of a change process need to realise that most changes within an organisation
will usually cause and expect some change in its existing culture and sub-cultures.
Therefore, having a better understanding of the effects change has on the sub-cultures of
an organisation, group or team, will in turn help leaders of a change process better
understand the resistance towards the change itself, and provide a more realistic
approach on how to manage it. A BIM implementation framework is developed for the
benefit of KSA construction organisations. It is recommended that KSA construction
stakeholders including the government and professional regulatory bodies should work
together in ensuring that the enablers of BIM adoption such as the provision of
regulations and industry standards guiding the implementation are provided and
strengthened to make the industry ready enough for BIM adoption
