________________________________________________________________________________________________ Main
Interview consistent carbon information, then analysis is increasingly possible. More iterations can be designed and assessed for viable and sustainable structural solutions.”
Data-driven decision making
Indeed, data on existing assets can help to shape planning considerations for new assets, by calculating whole life costs and overall value. Data can help to inform and guide future projects.“ Some companies are already using AI to help them understand their own knowledge base, enabling them, for example, to bid for work based on their experience. While bid writing may be lowhanging fruit, there’ s greater opportunity in terms of eradicating the routine processes carried out by designers and engineers, which can free them up to focus on the more creative aspects of a project. I don’ t think human discernment will ever be replaced but rather there will be an expert operator overseeing the implementation of AI, so that people can stop doing laborious, routine work and embrace their creativity.
“ Across AEC, we cannot ignore the fact that some are still to be persuaded to make the move from paper or to a model-based approach, which is particularly true onsite where paper drawings and forms are held in high regard in comparison to the, much quicker and easier, use of equivalents in mobile solutions. This challenge remains with the readiness of industry professionals, trades and at the client level. It will take some time before we have confidence that AI is generating correct, accurate answers. Ultimately, we are building things that people drive on, and live, work, and play in, and we don’ t want those things to ever fail.”
In 2026, Marek will have the honor of serving as President of the Chartered Institution of Civil Engineering Surveyors( CICES). The current President, Alison Watson, is dedicated to encouraging young people to join the industry and Marek intends to follow suit.“ Alison really wants more young people to enter our industry because we do build amazing things. If you want to address the sustainability and environmental challenges facing the world, the best place to be is working in our industry. I’ m excited about seeing how technology can enable the next generation of practitioners to do things more effectively. Technology has the potential to provide the options and outcomes so that humans can choose the best scheme to meet the desired outcome. Rather than choosing the cheapest option, outcome-driven decision making will be the determining factor. This will also play into stakeholder engagement. By leveraging the animation and visualization capabilities of digital tools, stakeholders will be able to better understand how a prospective project will perform.
“ I really want our industry to become a place where young people want to work because the sector has been able to leverage the most advanced technologies to deliver the most beneficial solutions. I want to be a change agent and to promote our industry more positively. In cities around the world, people are walking around and looking at beautiful buildings. As humans, we love the built environment as much as the natural environment but don’ t tend to celebrate it enough. If we can educate a little bit more about what’ s possible and why doing things differently will help us achieve greater quality, then that can only be a good thing,” Marek concludes.“ We need to achieve effective whole-life analysis of assets to ensure optimization of the built environment, and having structured, robust data is critical to achieving this goal in the long term.” ■
www. construction. autodesk. com
construction-today. com 15