The Nastiest Trends in BIM Hiring
- By Tarek Ghazzaoui, Eng. (Senior BIM Manager)
- on
The Nastiest Trends in BIM Hiring
- By Tarek Ghazzaoui, Eng. (Senior BIM Manager)
- on
Building Information Modeling (BIM) has become essential in North America’s architecture, engineering, and construction industry, but the way firms hire and manage BIM professionals is increasingly problematic. Many roles are undervalued and underpaid, with staff often carrying responsibilities far beyond their job descriptions. Inflated titles may promise seniority but rarely come with real authority, and job postings are frequently filled with buzzwords and hype that misrepresent the work involved. These trends, fueled by a lack of oversight and the rise of AI-driven hiring, undermine both professionals and the industry, highlighting the need for more transparent and fair practices.
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The nasty trends
Building Information Modeling (BIM) in North America has grown into a central pillar of the architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC) sector. It’s no longer just a specialized toolset; it’s a standard approach shaping how buildings and infrastructure are designed, constructed, and managed.
Unfortunately, based on my experience as a consultant, I notice how employers undercut employees working in BIM in a number of subtle and not-so-subtle ways, in what has become a nasty trend in BIM hiring. While BIM is an increasingly essential role in architecture, engineering, and construction (AEC), some employers exploit gaps in understanding, lack of regulation, or industry immaturity to undervalue BIM professionals.
Let’s explore together 5 nasty trends in BIM hiring.
Nasty trend #1: Undervalued BIM roles
As already mentioned, BIM plays a central role in the design, construction and operation of building projects. While project managers, architects, engineers and designers get all the credit and the visibility, a large pillar of project success relies on successful BIM management. Unfortunately, BIM leads, managers, coordinators and other professionals don’t get the recognition they deserve most of the time, and their role is considered a “nice-to-have” sometimes, instead of an essential one.
This becomes detrimental to the success of projects when inexperienced (not to say bad) BIM professionals are in charge, or when there are no BIM professionals assigned at all. BIM professionals not only set up and operate the framework that all design and construction teams use on projects, but they promote cross-collaboration between stakeholders, prevent costly construction errors and delays, ensure quality control and help communicate design effectively using BIM tools.
Far too often, those working in the shadows that are directly and indirectly responsible for successful project delivery are not recognized or value enough.
Nasty trend #2: Underpaid BIM wages
This is one of the most ridiculous emerging trends in my opinion: underpaying BIM roles in AEC firms. The problem is on both sides of the isle, on the employers’ and the candidates’ side.
On the employers’ side, most firms do not value BIM roles enough to allocate fair or competitive compensation based on the actual responsibilities. This stems usually from a lack of experience and understanding what BIM professionals do, and a lack of recognition for the internal need for such dedicated roles. Also, many firms engage in such practices, which creates a false comparative market to new prospects that are wondering what the salary scale is for BIM roles.
On the employees’ side, candidates sometimes accept very low paying jobs to pay their bills, which does overall harm to the industry by lowering the pay scale for BIM roles. Also, a part of the issue here is that some architectural and engineering professionals who don’t have much experience in BIM are awarded such positions following their involvement in projects, but the nature of their work becomes much more significant and strategic than the technical work they did.
This is directly tied to the next point, which is hiring BIM professionals, paying them low wages and expecting them to do everything internally.
Nasty trend #3: Over-extended BIM responsibilities
Over-extended responsibilities in general, and more specifically in BIM, is one of the biggest sources of stress, burnout, and disengagement. It is natural for BIM professionals to often wear multiple hats, in some cases sporadically beyond what their job title suggests. However, this becomes very problematic in two specific instances: either when a firm or department doesn’t have a BIM team, or when there’s a layoff or firing that doesn’t get replenished fast.
In the first case, one of the trends I have seen in the past is when firms hire a “do-it-all” candidate; they expect the BIM Manager or similar role to do everything in the organization, including setting up and managing Common Data Environments, BIM Execution Plans, training, project support, content libraries, consultant coordination, and the list goes on. While this may seem interesting to some candidates, they quickly realize within a few weeks or months that they’re doing way more than they are compensated for, and they either get poached or they seek other better paying jobs.
In the second case, firms expect the existing team of BIM professionals to “absorb the blow” of laying off or firing one of their colleagues, and to re-distribute their responsibilities among the team. While this may seem basic at the surface, it can be quite significant in terms of added responsibilities to the existing team or new hires.
Nasty trend #4: Hollow BIM titles
This is one of my favorite trends – NOT. Hollow BIM titles mean the titles sound senior or highly specialized (i.e. BIM Manager, VDC Lead, BIM Director), but the actual role is stripped of real authority, decision-making power, or strategic impact. Essentially, the title is inflated on paper but hollow in practice. In my opinion, although having good titles and compensation is good for your Linkedin profile and your pocket, hollow BIM titles do more harm than good on the long run.
Most often, not having real authority or decision-making power can lead to frustration, stalled career development, question of self-worth and deteriorated mental health. It all depends on the candidate; some are able to put on a poker face and play their “hollow” part on a daily basis, while others need to rank high on Maslow’s hierarchy of needs and reach self-actualization.
In all cases, firms need to assign roles to candidates that reflect the actual authority, responsibilities and experience.
Nasty trend #5: BIM buzzword vibe-hiring
Vibe-hiring is an AI-driven or inspired hiring practice where human resources professionals engage in the use of AI to create job postings, assess and filter candidates and decide who to hire in BIM. Add to that some BIM buzzwords, and you end up with the perfect recipe for BS!
Some examples of vibe-hiring with BIM buzzwords include:
- Job postings packed with terms like BIM Ninja, Digital Twin Guru, VDC Rockstar, Revit Jedi
- Emphasis on innovation, industry leadership, world-class or cutting-edge
- Titles that sound advanced (i.e. VDC Lead) with job responsibilities of an entry-level BIM professional
- Requirements for industry standards like ISO 19650, OpenBIM, LOD, etc. as if the firm is engaged in all of them
- Requirements for software skills like Revit, Navisworks, Dynamo, AutoCAD, etc. as if the firm expects proficiency in all on day one
- Requirements for the use of AI tools and the integration of AI in processes
The funny thing is, although these BIM roles have lengthy requirements and expectations, sometimes candidates realize that those same firms don’t even have the basics in place, such as BIM training, BIM Execution plans, or a corporate BIM library. Talk about heads in the clouds – Go figure!
Final thoughts
Well, in a nutshell, this sucks! There is no oversight body for BIM hiring practices of AEC firms, so it’s a free for all in the industry. Although there are some respectable firms that do their best at avoiding these nasty trends, based on my experience, there are a lot of firms that still engage in them, to their detriment, to the detriment of the candidates, and that of the industry as a whole.
Furthermore, I believe that AI will amplify these nasty trends even further, as it will blur the line much more between what’s real and what’s not, both for firms and candidates. In the past, it was easier to detect if a firm was legitimate about BIM based on its job postings; likewise, firms could detect if a candidate was also legitimate about their BIM experience based on their resume. But with AI, it’s becoming much more challenging to know what’s AI generated and what’s real.
That said, I would love to hear from recruiters and HR professionals what their thoughts are on this topic – so please reach out if you are one!
Thank you for taking the time to read my blog article and I’ll see you again soon.
Tarek Ghazzaoui, Eng.
Senior BIM Manager
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