Construction
In a building-services contractor, the most expensive knowledge is the kind that retires with the fitter
The AI Business Center Foundation (AIBC) is a think tank and advisory partner that helps the boards of construction, industrial and technical-services companies adopt artificial intelligence so that it delivers measurable results and builds competitive advantage. In building-services contractors we start with estimates and service knowledge.
The labour shortage is no longer only a problem on site. It has become a problem for the office and the service team
Building-services contractors, whether electrical, HVAC or plumbing and drainage, have two bottlenecks besides the installation work itself: preparing estimates from the design documentation, and service, where the experience of particular people is decisive. Both depend on the knowledge of a few individuals, and those individuals carry the heaviest workload in the company.
How cost and risk arise
- an engineer who spends days on quantity take-offs and schedules instead of on projects the company could win,
- an error in an estimate that only comes to light on site,
- knowledge of typical faults and exceptions that an experienced fitter has and a new employee does not,
- the history of a customer’s installation scattered across email, phone calls and paper records.
The first step
One of two processes: preparing an estimate from the documentation, or handling a service request. We measure the time taken to prepare an estimate or the time from request to diagnosis, describe how the company works and choose a process translator who will maintain the description.
What the Foundation does
- 30-day readiness assessment, scaled to the size of the company.
- Semantic transformation, that is, organising a company’s names, processes and data so that people, language models and board reports understand them the same way: a description of the estimating method and a service knowledge base.
- GenAI competence: programmes for the technical office, site managers and the service team, built on the company’s own documents.
- Grants and funding: funds for workforce development and the digitalisation of small and medium-sized companies.
Frequently asked questions
Can AI prepare an estimate for an installation from the design documentation?
It can speed up part of the work: finding items in the documentation, compiling materials, comparing against previous estimates. The precondition is a described method of estimating in the company and verification by an engineer. Without that, the model will repeat errors faster than a person.
How can the know-how of experienced fitters be retained?
Through a process translator in the service department who, together with the fitters, describes typical faults, exceptions and solutions in a form that a new employee and a model can understand. Such a knowledge base works regardless of which tool the company chooses.
Can a small building-services contractor fund a competence programme?
Often, yes, from programmes that support workforce development. The conditions change every year, so we check them for each specific project.
Let’s start with an assessment
Let’s talk about estimates or service: let us choose the process that places the heaviest load on the most experienced people in the company.