AI for Professional Engineers: Safe, Checked, Competent

What's inside

1. Level 1: What AI Can and Cannot Do for an EngineerFree
   Learn what today's AI assistants are good and bad at in engineering work, using dated survey evidence and published guidance on how the profession is using them.
2. Level 2: Approved Tools and Your Firm's AI PolicyFree
   Learn to choose an approved AI tool under your employer's policy by comparing enterprise and consumer versions of ChatGPT, Gemini, Claude and Microsoft 365 Copilot on data handling, training use and retention, as stated on their current help pages.
3. Level 3: Confidentiality, UK GDPR and What Never to Paste
   Learn what must never go into an AI tool (personal data, client-confidential, commercially sensitive and security-sensitive information) and how to anonymise and redact inputs so you stay within UK GDPR and your contracts.
4. Level 4: Researching and Summarising Standards
   Learn a workflow for using AI to find, explain and summarise standards and codes, with every clause, number and edition checked against the published standard.
5. Level 5: Catching Made-Up Facts, Errors and Bias
   Learn to spot invented references, wrong values, outdated information and biased framing in AI output, and use a repeatable verification routine before relying on any claim.
6. Level 6: Checking Calculations and AI Arithmetic
   Learn why AI arithmetic and engineering calculations need independent checking, and how to use AI to review a calculation without trusting its numbers.
7. Level 7: Design Review Prompts and Challenge Questions
   Learn to use AI as a structured 'devil's advocate' in design reviews, producing challenge questions and checklists that a competent engineer then judges.
8. Level 8: Failure-Mode Thinking and FMEA Support
   Learn to use AI to broaden failure-mode brainstorming and draft FMEA tables, while severity, occurrence and detection ratings stay human judgements grounded in data.
9. Level 9: Technical Reports and Method Statements
   Learn to use AI to structure, draft and edit technical reports and method statements while keeping technical content, safety steps and conclusions owned and verified by the engineer.
10. Level 10: Writing and Reviewing Specifications
    Learn to use AI to draft and check specification clauses for clarity, ambiguity and consistency, without bringing in unchecked requirements or standard references.
11. Level 11: Analysing Test Data with AI
    Learn to use AI to plan and run analyses of test and monitoring data through code you can inspect, and to check the statistics and conclusions it suggests.
12. Level 12: Small Scripts, Spreadsheets and Searches
    Learn to build and test small calculation scripts and spreadsheets with AI help, and to use AI in outline for literature and patent searching, with sources checked in proper databases.
13. Level 13: Codes of Conduct and Competence with AI
    Learn how the Engineering Council and the ICE, IMechE and IET codes of conduct apply to AI use, especially working within your competence and taking responsibility for your work.
14. Level 14: Health and Safety Law and Building Safety Duties
    Learn in outline how health and safety law and Building Safety Act 2022 duties apply when AI contributes to design, risk assessment or safety-critical documents.
15. Level 15: Intellectual Property and Export Control
    Learn the main intellectual property and export control risks of AI use, including who owns outputs, third-party content and the controlled technical data that must not leave approved systems.
16. Level 16: Disclosure, Honesty and Keeping an AI Record
    Learn when and how to disclose AI use to clients, employers and checkers, and how to keep a simple, auditable record of what the AI did and what you verified.
17. Level 17: Using AI to Deepen Your Own Expertise
    Learn to use AI as a tutor and sparring partner that builds your engineering judgement rather than replacing it, with every claim checked against authoritative sources.
18. Level 18: Talking About AI and How the Role May Change
    Learn to discuss AI use constructively with managers, colleagues and juniors, and to weigh honestly, with dated evidence and stated uncertainty, how engineering roles may change.
19. Level 19: Your Personal 30-Day AI Plan
    Learn to build a realistic 30-day plan to bring safe, checked AI use into your own work, with chosen tasks, controls, CPD evidence and review points.
20. Level 20: Final Challenge: Prompt to Signed-Off Work Exam
    Bring the whole course together by taking one real engineering task from a safe, policy-compliant prompt through independent checking to recorded, disclosed and signed-off work.

Access

The first 2 levels are free with a free account. Every level, the podcast edition and the AI tutor come with All Access at £4.99/month or any Creator plan — see pricing.

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