Building Information Modeling for Construction Project Management: A Literature Review

Over the last decades, Building Information Modeling (BIM) has increased its relevance to construction project management to improve the construction projects’ outputs and the integration between stakeholders. BIM is undoubtedly a tool used worldwide and has become practically a standard in construction project management. However, despite the relevance of BIM for construction project management, no literature review has been conducted to unravel this relation. This study introduces a comprehensive understanding of the nexus between BIM and construction project management and its evolution. A screening process resulted in 166 peer-reviewed papers retrieved from the Web of Science database. Findings demonstrated that the incorporation of BIM in the construction project management literature still being incipient starting in 2010. Overall, this research agenda has been strengthened especially since 2017 driven by China and three traditional developed English-speaking countries (the USA, England, and Australia). The implementation of BIM within the construction project management literature is evolving from traditional drivers of monitoring/control such as schedule to more complex and multidimensional topics such as sustainability, lean construction, and optimization. The network representation revealed five clusters, each related to one or more subject groups defined in the project management body of knowledge. Overall, the most representative subject groups supported by the BIM implementation in construction project management were integration, time, and cost. Interestingly, the most representative process group is implementing/executing revealing the role of BIM as an enhancer of the development of the project’s activities, contrasting with the traditional project management literature focused mostly on the planning process group.