McLaughlin & Harvey

The shift Glenn describes is deceptively simple but genuinely transformative: reporting went from subjective to objective. Before, when someone said a project was on track, that was an opinion. Now the dashboards show the truth of where things actually stand, and the data either confirms or contradicts the claim immediately.

Subcontractors now input directly into Morta, providing real-time visibility into deliverables and asset data. This replaced the opaque process of waiting for spreadsheets to arrive by email and hoping the data was accurate. Report generation that previously required hours of collation is now automated through Power BI dashboards pulling directly from Morta. Version control problems and communication gaps from passing Excel files back and forth have been eliminated.

All processes are structured to align with ISO 19650, giving the company confidence when responding to client expectations for standards compliance. And using Morta alongside Solibri for asset data validation, the team can verify COBie compliance before handover, catching issues in the data rather than discovering them when it’s too late to fix them cleanly.

McLaughlin & Harvey has been building things since 1853. With £800M turnover, over 800 employees, and 41 active projects across offices in Belfast, Glasgow, London, Bristol, and Birmingham, they have 170 years of successful delivery behind them. But when Glenn McCaffrey arrived as Digital Construction Director five years ago, the company’s relationship with information was fundamentally broken.

The organisation didn’t see information as an asset. Data was treated as administrative overhead — something that happened alongside the real work, not something that shaped it. Every time information passed from one stage to another — design to procurement, procurement to construction, construction to operations — there was a significant quality drop-off. And that matters, because poor information directly impacts what Glenn calls the four pillars of project delivery: programme, cost, quality, and health and safety.

The challenges multiplied across three distinct types of project information, each with its own management demands: geometry (3D models), alphanumerical data (asset information, COBie data, specifications), and documents (drawings, reports, manuals). Teams relied on siloed, traditional methods. Each of the 41 projects operated independently with its own processes, templates, and conventions. There was no standardised approach, no way to compare performance across the portfolio, and no single view of how the business was doing.

Clients were increasingly demanding digital deliverables — COBie data, record issue models, ISO 19650-aligned information management plans — and the gap between what was expected and what McLaughlin & Harvey could consistently deliver was widening. The workforce had strong construction expertise, but the skills required for managing BIM models and structured asset data were underdeveloped, particularly among subcontractors and site teams.

Glenn’s philosophy was straightforward and deliberate: people first, then processes, then technology. The critical insight was that technology comes last. Rather than leading with tools and hoping teams would follow, McLaughlin & Harvey invested in helping people understand why information management matters and what good looks like before anyone was asked to use new software.

With that foundation in place, Morta became the platform to standardise and automate. The team developed standardised templates covering BIM execution plans, exchange information requirements, information standards, and production methods, then rolled them out across all projects so every team starts from the same baseline. Supply chain partners complete their Task Information Delivery Plans directly in Morta, which aggregate into the Master Information Delivery Plan. Design managers review and baseline the MIDP, creating a clear picture of all planned deliverables.

The Morta API connects to Viewpoint, enabling automated comparison of planned deliverables against actual CDE uploads. Planned versus actual status updates without anyone manually checking the CDE. Real-time Power BI dashboards pull data from both Morta and Viewpoint, visualising deliverables at three key stages: procurement, design, and handover. These replaced the subjective progress reports that previously depended on individual assessments.

For data validation, the team uses Solibri to run automated checks against 3D models, with results feeding into Morta for tracking and reporting. Bespoke asset registers in Morta allow subcontractors to input data directly rather than sending spreadsheets by email, and COBie compliance can be verified before handover — catching issues before formal submission rather than discovering them during client acceptance reviews.

Glenn McCaffrey started as a team of one. Over five years he built out a full digital construction function, bringing on Carpgiane Dos Santos as Digital Construction Manager and Geri Gardner as Information Manager. The growth of the team mirrored the gradual rollout of digital processes — there was always sufficient support for the projects adopting new ways of working.

Templates were introduced progressively, not as a big-bang rollout. Each new project adopted the standardised BIM execution plan, EIR, information standards, and TIDP/MIDP templates with hands-on support from the digital construction team during the transition. Getting the supply chain on board was a critical milestone — subcontractors were engaged through training sessions and collaboration charters that set out expectations for digital deliverables. By demonstrating less rework, faster feedback, and clear visibility into what was expected, the team gradually shifted behaviours from resistance to adoption.

Every process was designed with the on-site team in mind. Rather than creating workflows that looked good in a head office presentation but failed on site, the digital construction team worked directly with project leads to ensure that what they built was practical, intuitive, and delivered tangible time savings for the people actually using it.