In 2025, Scopism, supported by volunteers from the SIAM community, is leading a major refresh of the SIAM Body of Knowledge (BoK). In this blog, we share updates on progress so far. You can read the previous blog here.
Meet the Team
The SIAM BoK refresh project is led by our architects – Claire Agutter, Simon Dorst and Michelle Major-Goldsmith. The architects are supported by over 140 dedicated volunteers, who are generously sharing their knowledge and experiences. We’re grateful to all of them for their time and dedication and for helping us to evolve SIAM guidance.
Naming Conventions – from BoKs to BoK
The terminology around the SIAM bodies of knowledge (BoKs) has always been a little bit clunky, so we’re using this refresh to update the naming convention. Previously, we referred to multiple standalone documents: the Foundation BoK, the Professional BoK etc. as ‘BoK’s, but this isn’t ideal., There will now be one conceptual Scopism SIAM Body of Knowledge, which will contain multiple publications. The components of the new, unified, BoK will be:
- Core – SIAM Foundation and SIAM Professional – content based around principles and theory which will be relatively stable
- Compendiums – including the current work in progress and future Compendiums, small publications which target a particular topic or evolution of how SIAM is being applied. The BoK refresh includes multiple Compendiums, which will then be added to over time
- Expanded – including all of the whitepapers, case studies, community generated content that we have and continue to publish
SIAM Foundation Updates
The lead architect for the Foundation, Simon Dorst, says “The SIAM Foundation refresh is in its final stages. All current content has been reviewed and updated (and modified or augmented) where applicable. The approach has been ‘light touch’ where we only focussed on necessary updates and not necessarily style or phrasing. This will maintain the connection with the previous version and hopefully avoid the need for a refresh certification. The content is undergoing a final review before added to our end to end BoK.”
SIAM Professional Updates
Claire Agutter and Michelle Major-Goldsmith added “The core team for the Professional continues to meet regularly and we have done two updates to the content. Some points are still being debated, and we will be in touch with end to end reviewers in July for their input.”
Compendiums
Most of the Compendiums are progressing well and entering the review phase, with a few still in the final stages of content development. We welcome everyone’s input to help strengthen and shape these resources.
Looking ahead, we’re also preparing for Tranche 2 and the future of the Compendium series. This next phase will focus on the topics we weren’t able to include in the first iteration, including important areas that require more time, input, or deeper exploration. The Compendiums are designed to be an evolving body of knowledge. They’ll be created, updated, or retired over time based on changing needs and the value they offer to the SIAM community.
Thank you to our Lead Authors and all of our contributors
Everyone who has contributed to the BoK refresh will be acknowledged in the updated publications – we’re very grateful for everyone who is working so hard on this. In this blog, we’d particularly like to thank our Lead Authors for their enthusiasm and support. Thank you to Barry Corless, Latha Aiyer, Peter McKenzie, Chevonne Hobbs, Richard Oliver, Dolf van der Haven, Martin Malmquist, Matt Reprogle, Ben Palmer-Hughes, Karen Ferris, Suzanne Galletly, Simone Jo Moore, Markus Muller, Gavin Espin, Stacy Thomas, James Gander and Deepti Dewgun.
