Don't be a Keyboard Warrior Manager!

"Keyboard Warrior" is an expression that hails from the gaming community; it implies a person who mainly does their fights from the keyboard with no human interaction.

This is similar to what I see a lot among digital design managers and BIM coordinators on projects. Many Digital Design Managers (DSL, from now on) tend to prefer not to be onsite in the project office and do their job through emails, message boards, and online meetings, often with the idea that it makes their day more efficient. I would like to argue that this is not the case.

Remember the value of coffee machine chit-chat!

I consider the DSL to be the oil in the system that makes everything go smoothly. To make sure the processes are smooth, you need to have an ear to the ground, which you certainly don't have if you are not present and accounted for.

There are so many signals and information you get talking around the coffee machine or just walking and having a chat with all the BIM people in the different disciplines that you wouldn't have gotten in any other way! This makes you able to act on challenges and symptoms of challenges before they become a real issue.

Learn when to talk and when to email

When you send an email on a complicated matter to several people, you assume something about the recipient's understanding of the issue and try to explain accordingly. That assumption is often wrong in one way or another. The recipient also assumes something about you when they read your email, both based on your intent, tone, and the content itself.

This often leads to looooong ass email threads that take days/weeks to resolve. A better way of communicating your issue would be to walk over to the person in question, discuss and agree on the matter, then confirm what you agreed upon in an email.... And 30mins later the issue is cleared up and agreed upon... I’ll argue that this is a lot more efficient than 392839 email replies over several weeks and will give you all that time to focus on other matters.

What kind of management do you prefer or practice? What do you think the future holds for BIM managers deciding to mostly work from home? Reach out if you want to chat with us, we'd love to hear your thoughts.