The built environment’s professional bodies will be key to the adoption of the revised information management mandate.
That was one of the main messages from Dr Anne Kemp OBE, technical director at AtkinsRéalis and chair of nima, who is leading the task group drafting the revised information management mandate. She was speaking during a recent a webinar about the revised mandate, staged by Construction Management and BIMplus, in association with Ideagen Mail Manager.
Given the uncertainty created by this year’s general election and the Department for Business and Trade’s statement that it would be difficult to effectively enforce a mandate, Kemp emphasised the role of professional institutions in giving the revised mandate the momentum it needs.
“The mandate is tricky. From a government perspective, they’re saying ‘you know what, really we can’t mandate. We’ve called it a mandate, but it doesn’t really have the teeth. So if you can get organisations, professional institutions, to sign up to a charter or an agreement, and then within their sphere of influence or authority, they can then mandate for their members or their employees that they need to now follow these overarching rules, which are then specific rules that may be for relevant to a planner, a maintenance crew, a plumber, the regulator,” she said.
Actions relevant to each profession
Kemp further emphasised that there would be no requirement for everyone to know everything about information management: the vision is that professional institutions will mandate actions (from the mandate’s principles) relevant to their members.
AtkinsRéalis senior programme manager Alex Backhouse is working with Kemp on the revised mandate. He revealed that the task group has received more than 60 expressions of interest to be involved in the consultation for the mandate. Furthermore, there has been over 26 hours of consultation with more than 150 individuals via industry bodies.
The task group is planning further engagements with the industry at UK Construction Week, Digital Construction Week and nima’s autumn virtual conference.
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