The construction industry has no other alternative than catching up with digital trends disruption this segment. Big data, the innovative tech has a lot to offer the building environment. Big data is already affecting every area of business activity including real estate, construction and the built environment. Surveying in the construction landscape can benefit from big data with its various capabilities to disrupt this segment. Surveyors need to keep abreast of developments in big data field and they need to embrace new skill sets if the relevance of the profession is to be maintained and strengthened in the future.  

The surveying landscape in the construction industry

Building survey is the starting point for initial planning proposals, for the diagnosis and documentation of building damages, for the creation of objectives catalogues, for the detailed design of renovation and conversion measures and for ensuring fulfilment of building legislation, particularly by change of use and refitting. The importance of surveying determines the viability of the project. Construction and building, big data already exists in all the plans and records of anything that was ever built.. The variety of inputs in big data allows better levels of certainty about status reports and forecasts. The analytics can provide helpful indications of levels of risk before a threshold is exceeded and an alert generated. They also offer insights that traditional systems simply cannot.

The potential disruptive impact of big data and digital technologies on traditional surveying practice

Surveyors’ implication in intelligent building

Surveyors need to keep abreast of modern building management, which is changing intelligent buildings sector with potential of generating large quantities of digital data from sensors and other diverse sources. Today computer servers are the controlling elements in heating ventilation, air conditioning, lighting and metering systems.

Data driven decision-making leads to higher asset utilisation, reduced capital and operational cost structure for surveyors. As one of the globally recognised professions in constructing, managing and valuing real estate, understanding this new operating environment is vital to surveyors who are providing informed advice to commissioners, occupiers, investors and lenders. The rapid developments in building design, management and maintenance are drawn together through the BIM enabled procurement process, creates the opportunity for surveyors to provide enhanced client services.

Surveyors’ implications in new smart cities

Smart Cities prioritise different aspects of smart enabling systems and are largely emerge as real estate enterprises. The success of a smart city relies on the ability of meeting the objectives
set out at the initial start. Surveyors have an important role in rendering a smart city successful. Surveyors using big data innovations can provide added value knowledge in projects. The role of the surveyor in these new environments is to understand each city’s uniqueness and its market implications. In the city, data comes from many sources. Big data technologies, used successfully, allow the city government to capture, store, analyse and act on big data for the good of citizens and other stakeholders. The focus is not on the individual buildings that make up the city, but on people, infrastructure, and environment.

The adoption of smart technologies to deliver buildings and infrastructure will have a transforming effect on the construction sector, which will favour surveying professionals who have developed this expertise.