This is the third in a series of articles on the five states of digital transformation.

“Developing” is one of five important states identified in the Global BIM Network’s newly released Playbook. The Public Sector Construction Digital Transformation Playbook explains how the states of justifying, mobilising, developing, implementing and scaling form the journey of a successful digital transformation programmes.

Developing ensures that the new way of working introduced by the transformation programme is clearly defined and communicated. It involves creating a collaborative framework of standards and guidance which defines the requirements for a standardized approach to digital transformation. Engagement and two-way communication between the programme team, key stakeholders and industry are essential. This helps ensure the framework incorporates existing best practice, international standards and new digitally enabled processes.

Key challenges for personas

The Playbook outlines the role of three user types, or personas, in the developing state.

The policy / strategy persona usually provides leadership and governance. This might include providing the authority to convene appropriate stakeholders to support the development of the collaborative framework and call for the action of enabling organizations, such as national standards bodies. This persona might also be responsible for implementing policy, legislative and regulatory interventions in preparation for the gradual introduction of change through implementing and scaling.

Within developing, the transformation programme persona usually undertakes most of the actions under the leadership and governance of the policy / strategy persona. The elements of the collaborative framework are developed, aligned with defined workstreams and core team roles. This framework provides the requirements and guidance to support the new way of working resulting from the transformation programme. Various stakeholder groups are often involved in developing the framework. This helps capture diverse perspectives and areas of expertise, and builds commitment to the change.

The procurer / owner / operator is mainly concerned with implementing change. They may represent stakeholder groups, receiving communications from the other personas and providing input on the current state, collaborative framework scope and implementation needs. Specific procurers / owners / operators may also be selected as early adopters of the transformation within the implementing state.

Five considerations

The following considerations are addressed in the developing state:

• Understanding the current state;
• Balancing the adoption of existing approaches with local needs;
• Defining an achievable maturity level that increases over time;
• Engaging stakeholders; and
• Conveying a complex solution with simple ideas and messaging.

Typical outputs

In the developing state, typical outputs are:

• A collaborative framework
  • Standards and norms
  • Guidance and templates
  • Legal and contractual deliverables
  • Learning frameworks
• Events and communications

Examples of such outputs and many other resources can be accessed via the Global BIM Network’s online Information Collection.

Read the Public Sector Construction Digital Transformation Playbook

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Look out for the next in our series of articles on the five transformational states.