ISO 19650 compliance – Solid Framework or Industry Dogma?

ISO 19650 compliance has become the cornerstone of information management in construction and asset management projects. It provides a consistent framework for naming, sharing and approving data, helping project teams and asset owners work together more effectively. For many organisations, it has brought much-needed structure and discipline to an industry that has historically struggled with fragmented processes.

But while ISO 19650 is undoubtedly a solid framework to support the adoption of BIM Level 3, its application can sometimes feel rigid. Too much flexibility risks undermining consistency yet following the standard too dogmatically can create inefficiencies where other well established standards may exist. The real challenge is finding the right balance between the new and existing, achieving compliance without losing sight of practical business needs.

When ISO 19650 Meets Existing Standards

Whilst the ISO 19650 standard has been a revelation to much of the construction industry, its arrival has not always been welcomed with open arms. In highly regulated industries such as nuclear, defence, oil and gas and rail, unique operational requirements have often been codified for decades, long before ISO 19650 existed. These sectors built their own information standards to meet specific regulatory and safety obligations, meaning a “lift and shift” to ISO 19650 is rarely straightforward.

One of the greatest strengths of ISO 19650 is that it provides a familiar framework for organising, labelling and describing information. If followed, information becomes predictable and easy to decipher, regardless of which organisation generated it. However, for industries with long-established standards, the pressure to realign can create serious challenges. In fact, it can sometimes be easier for organisations with no existing standards to adopt ISO 19650 wholesale than for those with deeply embedded legacy structures.

The result is often a complex compromise: a mix of legacy rules, partial ISO adoption, and plans for full adoption in the future. This “in-between” stage risks creating a third, hybrid way of working that actually increases workloads, rather than simplifying them. Instead of clarity, organisations may find themselves trying to reconcile three parallel standards; the old, the mixed, and the new.

Andy Holt ~ Consultant and REBIM® founder writes:

Industry standards exist for a reason: they create consistency, trust and interoperability across projects and organisations. ISO 19650, for example, defines how information should be managed throughout the lifecycle of a built asset, from initial design through construction and into operation. By using a shared framework for naming and tagging information, approving and exchanging information, project teams reduce misunderstandings. This avoids costly mistakes that come from working with fragmented or outdated data.

For asset owners, complementary standards such as ISO 55001 ensure that asset information supports long-term performance, safety and compliance. In highly regulated industries such as defence, nuclear, manufacturing, rail, infrastructure and housing, this alignment is essential to demonstrate governance and satisfy external regulators.

Without such frameworks, each organisation would manage data in its own way, creating duplication, inefficiencies and a lack of transparency. The is evident in industries such as nuclear and oil and gas where organisational specific standards require specialist knowledge and experience which is not easily transferable between different organisations. Standards like ISO 19650 provide a solid baseline that is consistent across all organisations, industries and projects. This ensures that information can flow smoothly between clients, consultants, contractors and operators.

However, while this consistency is invaluable, standards cannot anticipate every operational need of every organisation. This is where the tension arises; the difference between treating ISO 19650 as a framework to guide good practice and applying it as absolute that restricts flexibility.

On many BIM projects, information managers and consultants push for strict adherence to ISO 19650. While this ensures alignment with recognised best practice, it often leaves little room for an organisation’s unique requirements:

• Operational data may need to be structured differently to support internal systems.
• Workflows required for compliance don’t always match the day-to-day realities of site teams or asset managers who may use established processes (sometimes know as standard operating procedures (SOPs).
• Information exchange standards sometimes fail to capture additional business-critical data and require workarounds including custom data fields outside of the standard, resulting in multiple messy project by project specific data models.

This rigidity can frustrate users and lead to inefficiencies, as teams end up working around the system rather than with it. The challenge is to comply with ISO-19650 without being dogmatic, enabling compliance without compromising business needs.

The solution is not to abandon standards but to create an information management environment that can deliver both:

• Compliance with ISO 19650 and ISO 55001: ensuring naming conventions, workflows, approvals, and handover deliverables meet the required standards.
• Flexibility for the organisation: configuring data models, workflows, and reporting so they reflect how the organisation actually operates. See Sellafield SMF Case study where Sellafield use their own internal “systemisation coding structure” which is based on the CFIHOS standard.

With this approach, project teams and asset owners can remain compliant while also gaining meaningful insights and operational efficiencies. In other words, the platform should help you achieve ISO-19650 compliance, while adding value to day-to-day operations.

A configurable Common Data Environment (CDE) provides the flexibility to:

• Define configurable workflows for processes such as inspections, maintenance, or issue resolution. Custom workflows in a tool like REBIM can adhere to ISO 19650 whilst also catering for additional organisational specific standards.
• Enforce evidence capture (photos, video, documents) alongside standard BIM requirements. Useful automation to comply with safety and regulatory requirements.
• Tailor reports and dashboards to both internal KPIs and external standards.
• Ensure that outputs meet ISO 19650 for project delivery while also serving internal asset management and operational needs beyond the current delivery project.

By combining compliance with flexibility, organisations can achieve the best of both worlds: standards alignment and operational relevance.

Full compliance with ISO 19650 is a worthwhile goal. The benefits of standardisation outweigh any fully bespoke standard in many ways. The standard itself is also flexible enough to cater for most custom data requirements, so focusing on adoption will pay off, even in industries where legacy internal standards still exist.

Uniform standards such as ISO 19650 make data predictable and easier to translate into other formats and systems. Organisations can invest in information management architectures built around a stable framework, confident that the data will remain predictable and consistent and usable regardless of its origin. This predictability makes it easy to process automatically, reducing operational costs and also makes it easier to specify requirements in contracts and tenders, since the industry increasingly expects to see ISO 19650 referenced.

But when can we expect complete uniformity? The UK has been working towards this goal for some time. While the current situation is not perfect, real progress has been made. Like most standards, it is a matter of continuous improvement rather than instant transformation.

REBIM® has been designed with this balance in mind. Our configurable workflow engine and flexible data model allow clients to:

• Align with ISO 19650 and ISO 55001 for project delivery and asset management.
• Adapt configurable workflows to existing business processes and comply with new standards such as ISO 19650 instead of forcing change.
• Output data in standardised formats for regulators and clients, while generating operational reports for internal teams.

With REBIM®, you can achieve ISO 19650 compliance and still meet your organisation’s unique needs.

Standards matter, but so do the operational realities of running projects, assets, and organisations. By adopting a flexible, configurable platform, you can ensure compliance while empowering teams to work in the way that suits them best.

The answer isn’t to choose between compliance and practicality. It’s to combine the two.

See how REBIM® can help your organisation comply with ISO-19650 and still meet your organisation’s unique needs.

Book a demo to experience how REBIM®, the security minded construction management tool can help your team deliver.