AI Fundamentals for Building Services Professionals

Artificial intelligence is rapidly becoming part of everyday professional life, yet most of us have never been shown how these tools actually work, where they excel, and where they get things wrong. This hands-on afternoon workshop which gives CIBSE members a practical, jargon-free grounding in AI - and the confidence to apply it to their own work, it’s an interactive sessions, combining short teaching blocks with guided exercises on your own laptop, so you leave having done it rather than just heard about it.

Session 1 - The Basics

• How AI Actually Works
• What large language models are (and aren't),
• Why the same question can produce different answers from different tools
• The genuine strengths of AI - drafting, summarising, analysing documents, working through technical standards
• The limitations and risks every professional should understand before relying on it.

Session 2 - Effective Prompting

• Why the quality of the output depends entirely on the quality of the input and context
• Practical prompting techniques and how to adapt them to real workflows such as; report writing, reviewing specifications, interrogating guidance documents, client communications and technical problem-solving
• Hands-on exercises tailored to the roles in the room.

Who should attend

• Consultants, contractors and client-side professionals at any level. No prior AI knowledge required — just bring a laptop and curiosity.

This is a hybrid event with both in person and online tickets available.

CIBSE Event Behavioural Policy

CIBSE wants all attendees to feel welcome and included at our events. We ask attendees to keep in mind that they are within a professional environment when at CIBSE events and they are expected to always demonstrate professional behaviour modelling high standards of ethical conduct, honesty and integrity to protect the reputation and standing of CIBSE. CIBSE will not tolerate or allow any discriminatory or disrespectful behaviours by any person during CIBSE events, including bullying, harassment or sexist, racist, or exclusionary comments or jokes at our events. Where alcohol is provided, attendees are expected to know their limits and drink responsibly. The provision of alcohol should not be taken as an endorsement by CIBSE for attendees to drink excessively nor for any resulting improper conduct or activity.

By registering for this event, you agree to abide by the CIBSE Event Behavioural Policy 13.09.24.pdf

CIBSE Privacy Notice

The Chartered Institution of Building Services Engineers ('CIBSE') is committed to protecting your privacy, and takes its responsibilities regarding the security of members' and customers' information very seriously. For the purpose of registering you for this event and providing you with further information in relation to this event we will process your personal data within our customer database. On the basis of legitimate interest we may use your data to inform you of similar events in the future and to promote services, activities and commercial objectives that are designed to support the science, art and practice of building services engineering . For more information about how we process any personal information that we collect about you, how you can instruct us if you prefer to limit the use of that information and procedures that we have in place to safeguard your privacy please view our privacy notice.