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Recent critiques of the BIM literature describe it as largely devoid of critical theoretical perspectives and theorisation capable of explaining the nature of change in work practices in a holistic manner. In response, the authors argue from a theoretical standpoint, that implementing BIM within professional work practices (as activity systems) induces their evolution through dysfunctions created within the systems and their resolution. Cases of professional organisations in South Africa that have implemented BIM within their organisation and in multi-organisational projects, helped to develop new theoretical insights into how professional work practices evolve using activity theory-based re-description of the data. Changes in professional work practices were analysed sequentially within the framework, confirming theoretical propositions and revealing the dynamics between and within the interconnected system of actors, their object, tools, rules guiding work, roles they assume, and the stakeholders. Essentially, the findings imply that the implementation ofBIM significantly changes work practices within organisations, but gradually and over time. This supports an evolutionary, rather than a radical or revolutionary, view ofBIM-induced change. This theoretical perspective could explain future dimensions of change in professional work practices involving BIM, and indeed similar work mediating tools.

Purpose Critics of claims about building information modeling’s (BIM’s) capability to revolutionize construction industry practices describe it as overhyped, fallacious and therefore suggest that there is need for a more critical examination of its change impacts. Others have posited that the changes BIM induces are evolutionary rather than revolutionary. In this vein, the purpose of this paper was to undertake a careful analysis of the nature of such changes to distil actual changes that happened, and the type of agency that brings such changes about. Design/methodology/approach Drawing from appropriate qualitative research strategies, data was collected through key informant interviews from consulting organizations in South Africa that have implemented BIM within their organizations and on projects. Findings Changes in organizations’ work practices were evident in their workflows, formal/informal methods of interaction, norms, leadership and authority structures, remuneration and the way work was conceived or conceptualized. Furthermore, changes in organizational work practices do not solely occur through the direct agency of the BIM tool’s implementation. Instead, BIM-induced change occurs by delegated, conditional and needs-based agency – which are not mutually exclusive. Originality/value The nature of changes in professional work practices could be misconstrued as being solely because of the actions of agents who actively participate in implementing BIM. The discussion in the literature has, therefore, been advanced from general to specific theoretical understandings of BIM-induced change, which emphasize the need for construction stakeholders to actively participate in developing the innovations that drive change in the industry rather than hand the power to drive change to BIM authoring and management application developers who have less stake in the industry.

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Purpose The relatively low capital cost and contributions to mitigating global warming have favoured the continuous construction and operation of nuclear power plants (NPPs) across the world. One critical phase in the operation of nuclear plants for ensuring the safety and security of radioactive products and by-products is decommissioning. With the advent of digital twinning in the building information modelling (BIM) methodology, efficiency and safety can be improved from context-focus access to regulations pertaining to demolition of structures and the cleaning-up of radioactivity inherent in nuclear stations. The purpose of this study, therefore, is to propose a BIM-driven framework to achieve a more regulation-aware and safer decommissioning of nuclear power plants. Design/methodology/approach The framework considers task requirements, and landscape and environmental factors in modelling demolition scenarios that characterise decommissioning processes. The framework integrates decommissioning rules/regulations in a BIM linked non-structured query system to model items and decommissioning tasks, which are implemented based on context-focussed retrieval of decommissioning rules and regulations. The concept’s efficacy is demonstrated using example cases of digitalised NPPs. Findings This approach contributes to enhancing improvements in nuclear plant decommissioning with potential for appropriate activity sequencing, risk reduction and ensuring safety. Originality/value A BIM-driven framework hinged on querying non-structured databases to provide context-focussed access to nuclear rules and regulations and to aiding decommissioning is new.