Gareth McGlynn [00:00:05] Welcome back to The Preconstruction Podcast. This is Episode five of our BIM/VDC series. Our guest today is Chad Holbrook, the director of VDC with W.E. O’Neil By day and woodwork Craftsman by night. Chad has 12 years in the BIM/VDC space with the likes of Kitchell, Barton, Marlo Mortensen and Now W.E. O’Neil n Chicago. During the podcast, we discuss everything from our friend spot the excitement and challenges of starting VTC for w you a prefabrication and how detailed models have become. There is no doubt in Shad’s mind that BIM/VDC is the future and how it will become the foundation of safe, reliable and accurate construction for all of us. As always, let’s hear from our sponsors. First up, its steward, Carol, president of Bank Technology.
Gareth McGlynn [00:01:01] That’s followed by Scott, who is managing the Advancing Preconstruction Conference in Vegas court this coming November.
Stuart Carol [00:01:18] Hey, everyone. I’m Stuart Carol. The president back technology. We are based in Dallas, Texas, and we are a preconstruction software company. We were founded in 1996 and we’ve really been focused on the world of preconstruction. We believe that preconstruction is where the biggest decisions that impact the outcome of a project occur. And we believe that through the use of technology, we can enable all users to make better, more informed preconstruction decisions. The net result of which is to make the world a better place. We’re excited to announce our partnership with NEACH. And one of the things that really excites me is bringing preconstruction professionals the opportunity to get certified in our latest product, Destiny Estimates. It’s our belief that if we can help you understand how integrated preconstruction and preconstruction data lifecycle can benefit your business, it will ultimately improve the preconstruction services that you bring to your customers. And we’d like to announce that we’re going to be releasing this at the end of Q1 and it’s available to anybody that’s a friend of Miach.
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Gareth McGlynn [00:03:22] Chad Holbrook, welcome to the preconstruction podcast.
Chad Holbrook [00:03:26] Thanks for having me. I appreciate it.
Gareth McGlynn [00:03:27] Gabe, thanks for coming on. Chad, just for the listeners and the audience that don’t know, you, give us a quick antrel.
Chad Holbrook [00:03:35] So I’m I’m the director of CDC for WB O’Neill and the Chicago office. We’re a national general contractor. We have offices all over the country. But my role is to bring BDC them and innovation to our company, whether that means laser scanning, drones, you know, A.I., all that kind of cool stuff, all the toys. That’s that’s what my role is with my company.
Gareth McGlynn [00:03:59] All right. Good, good. And then back, if I can take you back to your degree days. Computer graphics degree. Give us an idea of how that came about and then your your path and then to the DC.
Chad Holbrook [00:04:11] Right. So I’m a boilermaker. I went to Purdue University and I do everything graphics. So it’s a you know, I’ve been around construction since I was probably 15, 16 years old and my grandfather was a woodworker. So I’ve always been around the crafts and the trades. So, you know, when I went to school, I got, you know, I didn’t know what I wanted to be when I grew up. I thought, I want to be an architect. I quickly found out that wasn’t for me and kind of stumbled into two computer graphics where I learned everything from Web design, logo design all the weeks, you know, manufacturing graphics. And, you know, my school was one of the first beta tests forever. Well, before Autodesk even had their hands on it, so. Wow. So, yeah, I’ve been using RAM for quite some time. You know, learn how that all worked. And then, you know, a few years out of school, I stumbled into this. So that’s kind of I ended up here.
Gareth McGlynn [00:05:05] And Purdue Jeremy earned a degree. Did you touch on Revit or did you know Revit?
Chad Holbrook [00:05:10] We we we were a beta tester for it when it was RTC, which was the real founding company, and that was back in ninety nine two thousand eight. And the is wrong with the with the cheap printed label on it.
Gareth McGlynn [00:05:23] That’s a better version. 1.0. Yeah.
Chad Holbrook [00:05:27] We were beta testing for forever and it’s changed a lot since those days.
Gareth McGlynn [00:05:31] It would be nice to see a CDO with that on it wouldn’t it again.
Chad Holbrook [00:05:34] I worked for it all over the place. I must have gotten rid of it at some point.
Gareth McGlynn [00:05:38] I know I will turn up if you’re anything like me and my family were harder show. I can’t wait to go through it in ten years and see what. See what I find. Good. So I mean Revit. And that’s one of the biggest topics that we’re going to discuss, because I want to get into that in more detail. But it’s basically Gravett, after you degree, give us a quick idea of the next five, six, seven years and how you got into full blown VCM.
Gareth McGlynn [00:06:07] And Ben, because I’m sure like all of us during college, we don’t really know what you want or what you want to do. We almost got to test the water with as many things as you can, and then you find a nice little kind of niche that can turn your head and go, you know what? I would love to do that for the rest of my life, right?
Chad Holbrook [00:06:25] Yes. So right out of school, I became a trust designer, of all things. I didn’t have a degree or any knowledge of anything structural. But I did know a specific piece of software. And it wasn’t Revit, unfortunately. And then, you know, I kind of I kind of went from different job to different job because it was around September 11th. So my my startup company kind of ended up being like a six months internship, so to speak. But, you know, I got Indictee and I was like, I t’s not really for me. And believe it or not, a buddy that I grew up with and went to college with. You reached out and said, hey, I’m a joint venture with this big company, you know, and we’re building this hospital right across the street from where you live. Would you be interested in why do we need a 3D model? I said, sure. So, you know, that’s how that’s how I got back into it. So I went in and interviewed and showed them how I knew how to use, you know, Revit and SketchUp and all these different things. And that’s how I that’s how I kind of stumbled back into the BBC thing, because when I was in school and ran, it existed back in those days that wasn’t you know, Bembe wasn’t really a key term. Right? It didn’t it didn’t exist at that time. So they’re like, hey, now you’re a beam guy.
Chad Holbrook [00:07:34] I’m like, okay, I have to go. I had no idea that that was the start of it. Right. Right.
Gareth McGlynn [00:07:40] It’s brilliant because, I mean, that gives you an idea of not the the fortunate experience of being into it, but it just gives you an idea of throwing yourself at something. But I would imagine Revit and SketchUp, even if that pain they were there was little adoption, that was it was kind of very, very, very new within the hospital project that you discussed. Give us an idea of how you use it, what your role was.
Chad Holbrook [00:08:08] So my role was it was the Bhim coordinator. I worked for Mortenson at that time. And, you know, they basically threw me on the job and said, hey, you know, here’s here’s the structural concrete foundations and footings and. We need to remodel this, and what we did was we created. I think they call them IWP is integrated workplan. So they put these. Basically, what they were was they were the concrete was cut up into sections. So the what we would do is we would we would send out just a section of the foundation walls to the job team. So so they knew that they poured from point A to point B on that day. We had done all the calculations on how much concrete they needed for that day. How many embeds, how much rebar or all that kind of stuff. And it was all included on that one print instead of them going through various different prints in order to figure out how to build that one specific floor. So that was that was kind of how we were utilizing Revenant that point in time. Now, we didn’t we didn’t go back and recreate the structural portions of the building or the architectural. But we did utilize it for those for those footings and foundation plans.
Gareth McGlynn [00:09:17] Brilliant.
Gareth McGlynn [00:09:18] I would imagine going on especially Martinsen architects and designers, the client that you have to, like, not sell them on the benefits of Benmore or give them an idea, because I think there’s a good opportunity for us to give it the listeners there. Maybe the graduates are the junior people that are thinking, BIM/VDC, give them an idea of what BIM/VDC is at a kind of a stupid level for me.
Chad Holbrook [00:09:44] Right.
Gareth McGlynn [00:09:44] Because there will be a lot of give them BDC experts that do listen to this. But for those people that are not up to speed with us, give us a quick overview.
Chad Holbrook [00:09:53] Sure. So, you know, Bembe is building information modeling. It’s basically taking the 3D model and adding know intelligence to it. So when you when you model, you know, so I can read it, for example, when you model your in plain view, you’re drawing this this wall and it shows up. It’s four lines. But when you go into 3D, there’s 3D data there. And if you click on that wall, you can gather out, you know, how much you know, you can take it to the point of finding out how many thuds and how much drywall, a square foot of drywall and all this kind of stuff. So it’s it’s basically building intelligence into the model. So, you know, I love sketch ups. Don’t don’t take this the wrong way. But SketchUp is not Bembe, right? You know, it’s it’s a bunch of lines and planes that are connected and kind of built. It’s very powerful, but it doesn’t really doesn’t really fit that Bill Revit does, although you can still build some models and Revit don’t have, you know, intelligence on them. But, you know, Bembe has kind of in the industry, it’s kind of gotten to that level of being like Kleenex. Right. You know, everything every tissue is a Kleenex. Right. So it’s kind of gotten overused and washed out. So I think it’s become it’s evolved a little bit. And I think that’s where the BDC, the virtual designing construction has come in. Right. So, you know, all the BDC guys tend to be the you know, all of the guys that play with all the toys and nobody really knows what they do in a black ops guys. You know, they’re out flying drones and working with robotics and doing scanners and all that kind of stuff. So, you know, I think we’ve kind of some of it’s at least a transition away from that Bembe persona to a more of a BDC in construction technology side of things. But it all is based out of that, you know, the beam. And it’s just kind of continuing to evolve. And in another five years or whatever, we’re gonna be called something else.
Gareth McGlynn [00:11:39] Yeah. Exactly. How much of it is Revit? Because, I mean, I speak to obviously the engineers side of things. It’s a total rabbit. But for someone like a shelf within a team, within a large general contractor, how much rabbit do you need to need to know how much how much? Raverty You need to understand at a low level. At a high level. You need to be able to you need to be a rabbit expert.
Chad Holbrook [00:12:04] I don’t know if you necessarily need to be a remet expert, but I think you need to be at least familiar with it. For example, I hired an engineer at a school a couple of years ago and I hired for my old program because, one, she knew Revit and she was a go getter. Right. And so it was really beneficial that she knew Robert. And now I know when things come in our door that we need to supplement models or we need to create models from point clouds. I know I can lean on her to be able to do that because she’s familiar with it, you know, so. So I don’t think that it’s necessarily, you know, you have to be an expert at it, but I think you need to be able to know enough to be able to get over the hurdles. But then also be curious enough to be able to explore and try out new things as well. I’ll admit I’m I’m not around that expert. You know you know, people come to me all the time saying, hey, can you build this rabbit family? I’m like, hey, I don’t know anything about family.
Chad Holbrook [00:12:55] And so you don’t necessarily have to be an expert, because I think I think the reality is that most of us only use a probably about 30 percent of what that program can do. And we’re in and we’re more than, you know, efficient at what we were, you know, performing our jobs.
Gareth McGlynn [00:13:10] Good. Give me an example. That’s a good topic. So that that lady, the young Gary Neal, modeler, rabbit expert, come out of college. So she’s two years and they give me an understanding of what happens on a day to day basis with the project for how he received the George from the engineers, the architect, and she remodels and populate them. Give me an idea of what her job would entail.
Chad Holbrook [00:13:34] Right. So she’s you know, she earned titles of D.C. engineer. So, you know, it can mean all kinds of things. Like right now she’s she’s leading the coordination on a job. So she’s had to learn how to use and Atlas works and how to run clash detection, how to kind of manage the process and all that kind of stuff. But on the rabbit side of things, you know, we’ve got a project that we went in and laser scanned the entire building because we had no as goats. The drawings are not the greatest in the building kind of juk jogs all over the place. So it’s kind of there’s no consistent like here’s level one, here’s level two. It kind of jumps up all over. So she’ll go in and she’ll take those drawings from an architect who has drawn this stuff up and and model it based off what they’ve done. And then also cross-reference it from the point cloud and model off the point cloud. So, you know, her day could be various different things, but she also knows graphics, too. So, you know, she’s very versatile. Shouji is able to come up with site logistics plans and those kinds of things. And then I have another BDC engineer that works for me who who who loves the multimedia and he loves doing 3-D renderings and animations and, you know, those pump up videos that we give out and presentations. So, you know, I you know, I, I think I’ve asked them all to be jack of all trades. You know, I’ve even told them. I said, I don’t want you guys to be a one trick pony. You know, I think you guys are good because you have your expertize in certain areas. But I also want you to be knowledgeable about what others are doing so that you can jump in and help when necessary.
Gareth McGlynn [00:15:09] Good. Good. And hope a partner does. If we’re dealing with and you’re speaking to graduates that are thinking about a career and then BBC, how important is it to be up to speed with Revit or to be trained in rivets?
Chad Holbrook [00:15:23] It’s important to at least know, you know, know the basics. You know, obviously you don’t have to know all the ins and outs but know the basics. You know how to model stuff, how to give views, how to export stuff out, how to go in and, you know, turn things on and off. You know, it probably goes a little bit deeper than that. But but I definitely don’t think somebody has to be, you know, a rivet expert. You know, I’m Revit certified at least a couple of versions ago. But, you know, if I saw that on somebody’s resume, I would definitely it would definitely piqued my interest for sure.
Gareth McGlynn [00:15:56] I could take it. So give me an idea of projects that you’re working on right now and on how important the BBC is.
Gareth McGlynn [00:16:03] So you still I mean, you’ve worked with some great companies, Martin, also Kitchell, Barton, Lollo. I know you w w e o name. How hard was it in adopting or promoting them? And did you see this and these companies? Was there different company that liked it and didn’t like it?
Gareth McGlynn [00:16:21] One of the challenges,.
Chad Holbrook [00:16:21] But it’s kind of all over the place as far as like adoption and, you know, some some places, you know, like Mortensen, for example, there, they’re the leader right there, a leader in seeing them. And they’ve got great leadership over there. I don’t know that I would be in my career where I am now if I hadn’t been part of that, you know, for a while. But there are organizations out there that struggle to implement these kinds of things. They just some some organizations just don’t see the value, understand the value.
Chad Holbrook [00:16:55] And I’m not talking about any of the ones that I’ve that I’ve worked for you listed. But but it is it’s a mixed bag. It just depends on. How much your leadership has gone in? Right. If you’ve got the mindset like we’ve done it this way for for 30, 40 years, we’re in work. We’ve been just fine. You know, I think that mindset is eventually going to come back to bite you. Because if you don’t, I think I saw a test statistic at one time. It was like for every one year you wait to implement some innovation in them, you know, every five years behind competition. And I really think that that is true. Right. You know, you can’t use the same tools today and expect, you know, you know, better, better outcomes in the future. So it is important to embrace this. It is important that leadership understands the value. And I think that was one of the things that really enticed me is that to come to is that they said, hey, you know, I’ve talked to him for years before they hired me. And I said, you really need to hire me. You really need a boom VTC team. And finally, they called me and said, hey, we’re ready. We’ve got to do this. And so they brought me on and, you know. And I’ve been happy with how how leadership has really embraced this and really, really wanted to push this the limits.
Gareth McGlynn [00:18:09] All right, good. Because I was there was there no been department before you arrived?
Chad Holbrook [00:18:15] We we did a lot of our outsourcing. We we worked with a local architect who we still work with today. And he was just kind of holding down the fort and, you know, as best he could with with other things he had going on. And he was doing great things. I think a company just realized that it was time to bring it out, somebody full time so that we had a team that was really dedicated to this because we you know, six months before I showed up, they bought two laser scanners to give out your scanning and then everybody scanned. So who’s going to run this?
Chad Holbrook [00:18:47] We need to meet this guy. Yes, we need a VTC guy to do that. So, you know, they bought they invested in some technology and didn’t really know what to do with it.
Chad Holbrook [00:18:56] And I think it was just they realized it was time, right? They were interviews and stuff. And their competition was just, you know, putting out these things. And really, guys, we have to do this.
Gareth McGlynn [00:19:07] Yeah. That’s I think that’s where the penny drops and change is is difficult for any any construction company. And it’s it’s it’s it’s difficult for any industry. But when you see your competition producing these beautiful models and just being able to sell so much easier all this, they want to do that. But then all this, I would imagine you would be an advocate for actually been BDC. That’s a good part of it. Probably about 10 to 15 percent. But actually, this is where the real value is. They better buildings, better coordination, better collaboration, being able to present overtaxation with just cost, mitigate risk whenever the penny dropped.
Gareth McGlynn [00:19:44] But there’ll be even needed. And you said, yeah, the fancy buildings are nice and the models are nice.
Gareth McGlynn [00:19:49] But actually, this is what I can do to your bottom line.
Chad Holbrook [00:19:52] Yes. And I and I think that’s where it comes in. It’s just not pretty pictures, right?
Chad Holbrook [00:19:55] It’s you know, we go into buildings, so we do a lot of renovations in Chicago and we do a lot of renovations of buildings that are built in the 20s and 30s. Right. So craftsmanship back then. I can’t argue with that. It was amazing. You know, you go into these buildings and these way these guys did things without the technology we have now is just outstanding. But they’re as built. Schools were seriously lacking. So we go in and we you know, like we had an owner who didn’t want to pay for any technology. And I said, all right, but I think you really need it. And they’re like, you know, we don’t pay for it. I said, OK. So we went in on our own dime. We we went and spent the time. We scanned this place.
Chad Holbrook [00:20:32] We came up with an asthma model and we were able to improve the coordination process because they were they were just having struggles with it because they were the beams in the floor were said to be here and here and here. When we went in and scanned it, they had been they all shifted a little bit. So we were able to fix that process. And afterwards, the owners. All right. Now I now I get it right. So it’s you know, you don’t always get those people are like, yeah, we want to do this. But I you know, there’s a value there. Right? We go out and we buy drones, you know? And everybody’s like, oh, they got a new toy. Right. But the idea is that there’s there’s an end game with this. Right. We buy these things and we’re like, OK, now let’s find a way to utilize it the way the way that we can benefit our processes and benefit are in product.
Gareth McGlynn [00:21:22] Yeah. Yeah. And what’s the what’s the exciting part for you right now when it comes to BTC? What’s the thing that gets you at a bad and goes, you know what? I can’t wait to this kind of improves or this adaptation comes up. Comes along.
Chad Holbrook [00:21:37] You know, lately, I’ve really been excited about how prefabrication can really. Help our industry, especially with where we are right now. You know, when, you know, I hate to be topical, but the whole cold thing, right? I mean, the amount of people that we’re having on job sites can be in the hundreds, if not thousands, depending on the size of the job. But if you prefab a lot of this stuff off site, you can actually put those people in an uncontrolled environment in a warehouse or factory or whatever it might be to build those components and then only put a handful of people on a job site to actually install that stuff. I can I really see and I don’t know if we’re necessarily there yet as far as the technology goes and all the and all the product providers. But I could really see that as being something that can really improve how we deal with with job sites, you know. And pandemics and stuff that we’ve got going on right now. And then, you know, the augmented reality star are the artificial intelligence stuff that we’ve got coming. And, you know, there’s there’s providers out there that, you know, they’ll take video and they’ll give you a report back like, hey, you’ve got you know, instead of four ladder’s that you had on site last week, now you’ve got 24. I think you’re I think you’re you know, you potential for accidents or incidents is going way up. You guys probably need to do ladder safety or, you know, you’ve got all these guys huddled in this one space and they need to maintain six feet of this. And maybe it’s time to have a Toback’s talk and say, hey, guys, remember, we have to wear face masks and we have to be social distance and, you know, those kinds of things. So. You know, the just the things that are coming out right now, it’s it’s it can be mind boggling.
Chad Holbrook [00:23:18] You just kind of have to you kind of have to make sure that you keep you keep your focus on what you know, on what’s important and not get distracted by all the little pretty shiny things that are coming out.
Gareth McGlynn [00:23:31] Yeah, I totally agree. And I think it’s got come this stage now in culverts, probably accelerated it as they end up. Adaptation was was pretty consistent over the last five years. It was going in the right direction, but it’s kind of just accelerated the fall from like third gear and the fourth gear in the first gear. So it’ll be interesting to see what comes out of Colvert. I think it would be good in the long term. I just maybe six months, a year after Colvard. It could be it could be a little bit of teasing. Like what what’s beneficial or what’s what’s really can get a real return on investment.
Chad Holbrook [00:24:03] Yeah. And we’ve had it, you know, this is all forced us to look at things differently instead of us. You know, when we go out to a job site, walk before we’re presenting on a job, you used to send an army guys, right? You send out 10 guys you send up to superintendence a project manager. And, you know, now they call us up and say, hey, grab the 360 degree camera and and document the site for us. So we’re utilizing some 360 degree technology with our cameras and we’re going out and documenting the site with one or two people tops, and then putting it up on the cloud and sharing it out with our entire team. And now our entire team is familiar with the site, you know, without having to put themselves in harm’s way or whatever the case may be. So this is really forced us to change a lot of the ways that we we we approach things.
Gareth McGlynn [00:24:49] Yeah. And I think it’s going to be the company as a whole is going to lean on you much more. And you’re gonna. I mean, lean on you much more will meet on the pressure, but you need a bigger team. But you mentioned that that 360 can on site, that main spot is a thing that comes up quite a lot in this series up been BTC. Yeah. What a great tool is a mania. Is that would you would. I mean, the guys here in the office would actually like a spot in our office. Know what he would do. I don’t know. But they just want to look at him. So would you be pushing for a spot? Can you see the benefits of.
Chad Holbrook [00:25:22] I see the benefits of them. You know, when I first saw you back in November or whenever I walked around the corner and there’s this little orange or this little yellow dog and I’m like, guys, it’s over.
Chad Holbrook [00:25:34] It’s half right.
Chad Holbrook [00:25:37] But now I see these case studies and I see these videos of what this thing can do. And it’s really, truly amazing. You know, the one thing that I really struggle with and I’m sure a lot of the technology I struggle with is the cost. Right. It’s really hard to justify, like the the investment in some of these things, even though there is a benefit on the other end, it takes a little bit of time to build up that case as to say, hey, if we spend this money, this is these are the benefits that come out of it. Right. But, yes, that that thing I’ve watched some videos, you know, they’re using at a job site not too far from my house right now. And they post videos like every week. And I see these this thing out there, it’s it’s pretty cool with what it can do. And I think the potential for for it growing and becoming more naum on job sites is is close. It’s very good.
Gareth McGlynn [00:26:28] It’s exciting. It really is. I mean, hopefully it’s like anything water comes out at the beginning. The costs are high. But once we get we’ve got to get a couple of competitors in there. We’re hoping they’ll be at a cheap alternative or a few alternatives.
Chad Holbrook [00:26:42] Right. Yeah. Yeah. You know, in in you know, we’ve we’ve started looking at other things, too, because I’ve got somebody on my team who’s really passionate about robotics. And so, you know, she’s she’s always had me like she wants to go build a robot so that she can do some of these things, kind of similar what spot is doing. So, you know, we’re investigating some of that stuff. But again, you know, our company is a little bit slower to kind of move in that direction slightly. You know, it’s it’s it’s it’s striking that balance. Right. We want to stay on the cutting edge, but not necessarily the bleeding edge, you know.
Gareth McGlynn [00:27:14] Exactly. I said it’s all about the balance and there is a balance. There depends on what you do, what industry you work on and the profit margin you’re getting.
Gareth McGlynn [00:27:23] So, Chad. Yeah, so, I mean, Dimi, the future is being the BDC. We talk talk recently about the detail that’s going to depend BDC. Is it a case or how do you see the future and BDC?
Gareth McGlynn [00:27:36] Is it a case that the architects, engineers and the Jeezy’s are going to work off the same model, being able to look at the washers, the nuts, the bolts, the handles on doors? Is that the future five, 10 years time?
Chad Holbrook [00:27:50] I think that’s the euphoria where we want to get to, right. You know, we have some architects who use Revit very well, use it to to put in a great deal of information.
Chad Holbrook [00:28:01] And we have others who still give us AutoCAD drawings or even worse yet, just PDX. So, you know, we’re actually getting ready to kick off some conversations with an architect. We have a very good relationship with. And then on the other side of things, a framer that we have very good relationship with and try to figure out and have the conversation like, hey, Mr. Architect, if you put this information in here, here’s what I can do to pull that data out and give the owner a better quantity, a better price and all that kind of stuff. And then on the other end, you know, that information can then be transition to the framer. And it saves him X number of dollars and time. And so then, you know, as the updated, then we can update, you know, that whole ecosystem, that whole stream of data back and forth. So, yeah, I think that that’s the euphoria where we want to get there, have the architects be able to put in that information now. There is a point where too much information is too much information. You know, I think that, you know, in a wall, for example, we’d want like drywall and insulation and framing and that kind of stuff, we could get down to the point where we could say, hey, you know, we have a formula that says this is how many screws go in this many square feet of drywall and that kind of stuff. But I don’t know that our estimate is when I want to spend that kind of time doing that kind of stuff. But to your point, yes, I think I think the more information that we’re starting to get from our architects is paying dividends on our end, at least being able to give the owners a better price and a better schedule, frankly. You know, we can we can plan our, you know, our construction process a little bit better if we had, you know, that kind of information.
Gareth McGlynn [00:29:39] Yeah. I mean, the one thing I always hear from BIM/VDC guys is gals is the whole collaboration communication thing. I mean, it’s it’s pretty evident that the way we talk with the three legged stool, the client, the architect and the GC, it’s pretty evident that the more communication that we have, the better buildings that we can build and the safer the world is because of that.
Gareth McGlynn [00:30:01] But the architect, if there’s no real reason other than Table eight to put that detail in for the general contractor, I’m just trying to put myself in their shoes. Why should they do it? Because at the end of the day, this is where I see it changing a little bit. The architects generally decide what the GC is and the owner. So I see a shift. Then I see it that the general contractor is going to start picking the architect.
Chad Holbrook [00:30:27] Yeah. And then, you know, work. Frankly, we’re in situations where that is a reality, where an owner says, hey, tell us tell us what this thing looks like if we go down the traditional path right where we pick everybody and then go tell us what it looks like if you pick, you know, these people. But the collaboration piece is huge. You know, I think. It works. We’re slow to get there.
Chad Holbrook [00:30:54] And I think a lot of the reason that the information doesn’t you know, all that data that you’re talking about doesn’t get into the architect’s model is because they probably they don’t know at that point in time necessarily when we’re trying to put together budgets and schedules and stuff. They don’t necessarily know what the finish might be here or, you know, exactly how thick that wall might be. They have a general idea. But, you know, some of that data is just not ready yet. But the collaboration that we’re trying to, you know, get going is the hey, if we talk to you and tell you how we’re going to use this information. Can you put this stuff in there and, you know, we’ve had great success with that. A lot of architects will be like, yeah, we can do that, you know, because we don’t ask for the world. Right. We just ask for stuff that will help us get over the hump. And because when we get the models, we have to pick it apart. We have to say, OK, our roofs really modeled is roofs, our floors really models, floors, because sometimes we get the opposite. And then, you know, we just spin out that data to our estimates and say, yeah, you’ve got X number of roofs. And then I’m like, well, that seems like double arm. And then you go back and you start looking at, oh, OK, well, they model the floor as a roof or a roof as a floor. But so having those conversations in upper, you know, in the front of of the process, I think pays huge dividends at the end.
Chad Holbrook [00:32:13] And you know what we do as BDC and boom guys and women is that we you know, we try to bridge that gap. We try to create a process and a workflow. And it kind of goes back to that coordination, right when we go into coordination. You know, we approach it as a team environment. We’re not we’re not in the room demanding this, demanding that, you know, we asked our trades and our subs actually have a say in our Bembe coordination plan, our execution plan. So coordination is big and collaboration is a big part of what we do for sure.
Gareth McGlynn [00:32:43] Yeah, because then another hot topic and buzzword is machine learning. I mean, what, what, what extent, where and when will we see machine learning within the building? These models are helping us out with these models. Obviously, the data is a key to all this. When do you think we will have enough data for the machine learning to when they come to the fore?
Chad Holbrook [00:33:05] No, it I think that’s going to.
Chad Holbrook [00:33:07] And I don’t have a good estimation and probably be a while, to be honest.
Chad Holbrook [00:33:13] I don’t I don’t think, you know, when you go to a you and they show you the machine learning for for fabrication and manufacturing night, that’s a little bit different beast.
Chad Holbrook [00:33:23] You know, when an owner when an owner wants a building a certain way or makes a design change, they know they want it that way. I don’t know that machine learning is quite where it needs to be just yet for our industry. I could be wrong, you know, but it’s ever changing. Every day there’s something new that comes out. There’s a new process that’s in place. So it’s just we just have to keep an eye on it.
Gareth McGlynn [00:33:46] Good, good. And that that that sort of stuff, it’s coming.
Gareth McGlynn [00:33:50] But as you say, it may be further down the line. So then in five years, what’s it gonna look like?
Chad Holbrook [00:33:56] That’s another very good question. But, you know, I think we’re just gonna have to continue to learn and keep a pulse on what’s going on and figure out what that, you know, figure out what works within our process. Right. We’ll make sure that the processes are in place and then find a tool that fits that. And not just, you know, we have to continue to not be distracted by the shiny new object out there and just just focus on, you know, what improves our processes, what makes a better product and a smoother process for our owners.
Chad Holbrook [00:34:30] I feel like I’m dodging the question, but I know being you know, five years ago when you would have asked me this, I would have known that we would’ve been doing the things we’re doing now.
Gareth McGlynn [00:34:39] Because, I mean, it seems like drones spot the dog laser scan and 3D printing. I mean, it’s all it’s all pretty exciting and good. But as you say, what is that? What are the shiny things in the toys and what are the real functional things that are helping us build better bobbles for lower costs? Mitigating risks. What what do you think are that the real value add when it comes to a client?
Chad Holbrook [00:35:06] So, you know, for us, you know, we try to mitigate our risk and try to mitigate that through the use of drones and through laser scanners, document in our processes with 360 degree cameras. And a lot of people, you know, have got experience in this field might be listen to this and go on while we’ve been doing that for years. And that that’s true. You know, our company is like, you know, and I think you ask anybody, we’re a little bit behind, you know, the big boys. But you know that that’s where we are. We, you know, we try to get things in place that help mitigate our risk. You know, whether it’s, you know, VR, you know, we’re looking at VR right now for some of our safety so that we can help train our guys before they go out on a job site about, you know, hey, what do you look for? How do you know? How do you look for damaged equipment? How do you look for, you know, what size land you need in case you fall off this edge, you know, those kinds of things. So, you know, we’re that’s exciting. Yeah. I think a lot of what we’re doing is trying to help mitigate our risk and improve our processes at the same time.
Gareth McGlynn [00:36:06] I love it. I mean, that that to me is real. Real. The art is unbelievable. I mean, if you can show you the walk and give a client a headset and say this is what your focus is going to be like, this is how it’s going to be built or even even better, a safety director, V.P. and say, listen, this is how we’re going to build it. Have a look at it. Walk through it. Do you see any major red flags that we can? And of. We can put a stop to it. I’m interested to see how that goes. Yes.
Chad Holbrook [00:36:36] And that’s one of the things I really feel like we can make tremendous progress in is safety with the help of the CDC in inexactly, what you mentioned. I want to be able to create a 3D model or get a 3D model from an architect if it’s available. Put our safety guy in there and let him do a virtual walk of the building. Go away. We need a handrail over there. You know, we need to store our, you know, flammable stuff over there or, you know, it looks like we need, you know, a guardrail upon the third floor when we’re working here. You know, those are those are the types of things where I think that the VR can really come in useful. You know, we go back to what what we’ve been using for four years. We put the client in there and say, hey, this is what your lobby is gonna look like of your hotel. You know that that has value. Don’t get me wrong. But I think that that we I think we’re trying to make that transition to moving into the safety side of things and try to try to train our people so that we that we preplan safe environments for our people.
Gareth McGlynn [00:37:39] Right. So, Chad, I mean, this this is all well and good. And so is it stressful stuff? What is the what does the getaway for you? What do you do to relax?
Chad Holbrook [00:37:49] Well, you know, I have three kids that are actively involved in sports. My daughter’s a softball player. My boys play hockey. So we’re you know, we’re constantly on the road for something sitting in a ball field, sitting in an ice rink, you know, freezer, Fanny’s off. But me personally, you know, I go out and I do woodworking. I you know, I take things, I build things or restore furniture or whatever it might be, create art. I mean, that that to me is my my relaxing time. My neighbor saw me out on July 4th, you know, working on something from my mother in law. He’s like, you’re not supposed be working today. I’m like, hey, man, this this isn’t work to me. This is me relaxing, you know, doing this than sitting in front of a TV watching something. So, yeah, that’s that’s me.
Gareth McGlynn [00:38:36] We’ve all got our five therapeutic ideas. Good luck. Thank you very much. One last thing before we go, because we talked a little bit about this affair at the very beginning. It’s a whole working from home at night. Obviously, you’re still working from home due to Colvert High. Have you find work from home? And what sort of future do you see for them? BBC estimating preconstruction.
Chad Holbrook [00:39:00] Yeah. So, you know, at first it was a little challenging because, you know, I got quarantine the same day my kids got quarantined. So my wife and I found ourselves taking some grades over again while we were trying to do work. But it’s it’s a challenge. Don’t get me wrong. But I think that this is quickly proven that you do have the capabilities and, you know, you can still remain productive from working from home. So I think, you know, the construction industry has has historically been, you know, the old school mentality, like, you know, nine to five, you know, and this and that. So but I do think that this has opened up the doors for some flexibility in that. I don’t say I can’t see that we would work 100 percent from home if things were normal or go back to normal. But I think this does open the door for some flexibility when it comes to that. And I think you’re going to see more and more of that in the future. You know, even even when we come out on the other side of this thing.
Gareth McGlynn [00:39:58] Yeah, yeah. No, I totally agree. So I think they’ll be meeting the medal. I mean, prior to this, we were just we were all working in the office for ridiculous amount of hours, depending on projects, obviously. But to go from that to working from home completely. Obviously, we can’t really judge it. Koven Because like you, I’ve got I’ve got small children for a.. And trying to work in the house with. I just can’t do it. I just could not do it. There’s no way that I can turn to my four year old when I’m working and she wants to play and I’m going no after work. I just gotta get involved. I’m a sucker for it and I just enjoy my kids too much. But there is going to be flexibility. There’s going to be good things come out of it. But I get it all the time. Candidates ringing me up. Listen, I work from home now for three months. I love it. I get more productive. I can see that. I said we’d do it for four, 24 months, maybe a little bit longer. It’s you need to be interacting with people. You need to communicate with people. You need to be able to pick people’s brains right away. But there will be flexibility in that. So hopefully, hopefully we see that over the next couple of years coming like that.
Chad Holbrook [00:41:06] And I’m also finding it difficult to disconnect. Right. You know, I’m I’m starting work earlier and I’m typically end up working a little later. So I’m finding that difficult to disconnect. Whereas when I was in the office, you know, I get my car and I head home and I was off the clock. You know, I might take a phone call or two in the car, but but when I got home, you know, for the most part, I wasn’t working. And then now I’m just finding out a little bit more. More difficult to put that delineation between work and family, you know, on the person.
Gareth McGlynn [00:41:36] Yeah, and there’s no doubt about it. They have to be separate to enjoy, to enjoy each of them as to its maximum. You’ve got to you’ve got to separate them. I totally agree with you. Absolutely. Good. Monch, listen. Fascinating chaps. Thank you very much for this is gonna be part of our and BBC series. That’s this is the fifth one. So we’ve had some brilliant leaders of which you were one of them. So I want to thank you very much from from the guys here preconstruction podcast.
Chad Holbrook [00:42:02] Yeah. Thank you so much. I appreciate you having me on.
Gareth McGlynn [00:42:18] I hope you enjoyed our chat with Chad. He did get me very excited about the future of construction. And as you heard, he is a huge advocate for BIM/VDC. So if you are a graduate or even someone is thinking about a career in BIM/VDC, he’s always happy to take some questions. Feel free to reach out to him through LinkedIn. As always, please share. And like this episode on your preferred social media platform. Thanks for listening. And stay tuned for more exciting guests.
