"This is an exciting time to be a structural engineer!" This sentiment has been echoed repeatedly from many practitioners during the variety of confer-ences, meetings, and seminars that I have attended recently.

Building information modeling (BIM), sustainability, security, design-build, risk management, hazard mitigation, performance-based design, and especially leadership are among the current hot topics that keep the dialogue buzz-ing among structural engineering professionals. Each issue has been debated individually and many of them have been analyzed together. However, I contend that ultimately all of these issues will permeate into the customary practice of structural engineering through what has been coined "inte-grated design."

During the 2006 Structural Engineers Building Con-ference and Expo, presenters and Conference Chairman Charles H. Thornton, Ph.D., P.E., advocated many new tools and ideologies, as well as emphasized the imminent project delivery paradigm shift enabled by BIM.

Some of the new tools presented were actually well-established resources developed by the National Institute of Building Sciences (NIBS). NIBS is a non-profit, non-governmental institute that serves as an independent, authoritative source of advice on issues of building and sci-ence technology. One of the institute’s efforts is the Whole Building Design Guide. This resource, according to www. wbdg.org, is an online gateway to up-to-date information on integrated "whole building" design techniques and tech-nologies. The National BIM Standard project and HAZUS software—a GIS-based tool for estimating hurricane, flood, and earthquake damage and economic loss—are two other powerful resources available to the entire AEC profession. If you know little or nothing about these projects, I encourage you to learn more at www.nibs.org.

One design ideology presented at the conference was performance-based design. Although the theory is not necessarily new, speaker Stephen K. Harris, S.E., educated the audience on the benefits of performance-based design, as well as explored next-generation procedures being de-veloped by the Applied Technology Council (ATC). Read "The ATC-58 Project: Development of next-generation, performance-based, seismic design guidelines" on page 28 to learn about the project.

Another philosophy of practice being re-examined is how structural engineers mitigate risk within their businesses.The chairman of the Council of American Structural Engineer’s Risk Manage-ment Program (RMP), Nils V. (Val) Ericson, P.E., moderated a two-part ses-sion to educate structural engineers on proactive management techniques for dealing with the risks inherent to the building industry.

BIM remains a focal point of nearly every discussion in the AEC profession, and this conference was no exception. Speaker Joseph G. Burns, P.E., S.E., AIA, kicked off the en-tire conference with an inspiring call-to-action for structural engineers to leverage virtual modeling to become the next-generation of project leaders. Not only is this new process the key to adding value to the owner, but it enables design success related to sustainability, security, design-build, risk management, hazard mitigation, and performance-based design. As speaker James G. Jacobi, P.E., remarked, "BIM is not about technology, but about the future."

While many economists are forecasting a slowdown in residential construction, non-residential and transportation markets remain strong (see "Forecast for the future: An in-dustry outlook for 2007," on page 20). The upshot is that most firms are going to remain busy in 2007. However, as you dive into the new year, consider the factors—in addi-tion to market forces—that are going to drive your busi-ness. Whether you call it BIM or virtual building, project delivery methods are evolving from traditional, disparate, paper-based processes to new, integrated, data-centric ap-proaches. How and when you make the transition is up to you. However, as Burns urged during the conference, "It doesn’t matter how you start, just start!"

With so much happening, it is indeed an exciting time to practice structural engineering.
It is an exciting time at Structural Engineer, as well. As you can see, the magazine has been redesigned to offer a fresh and modern look to complement our award-winning editorial. And although the format has been updated, the magazine’s content and our approach remain steadfast.