Building and civil
engineering technicians
Building and civil engineering technicians perform a variety of technical support functions to assist civil and building engineers.
- Employees (UK)
- 10k
- Median annual pay
- £36,912
- Exposure score ?
- 1.2/10 Minimal 7.3/10 High strict reading, with tools is 7.3/10 with-tools reading, strict is 1.2/10
- Wage exposure
- £44m £269m
Higher exposure than 62% of the 379 UK occupations we scored.
What this score means.
Most of this role's work is still hard for AI: physical presence, practised skill, judgement in context and direct care, the things that do not turn into text.
If you are in this role
Nothing here is under pressure today, but the frontier moves. Learn enough to direct AI at the paperwork around the job. People in hands-on roles who can do that become unusually useful inside their organisations.
Most of the routine work in this role can already be done by a capable model. The role does not disappear, but its shape changes, and one person can credibly cover the work of several.
If you are in this role
Stop spending time on what a model can do well. Your value is judgement, relationships and the parts of the work that need you in the room. Redesign the workflow around that before someone else does it for you.
Where the work usually starts.
These are the most important tasks a language model can already handle directly. In a typical engagement the first wins come from building workflows around them, so they stop eating the team's time.
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Calculate latitudes, longitudes, angles, areas, or other information for mapmaking, using survey field notes or reference tables.
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Complete detailed source and method notes describing the location of routine or complex land parcels.
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Perform calculations to determine earth curvature corrections, atmospheric impacts on measurements, traverse closures or adjustments, azimuths, level runs, or placement of markers.
These are the most important tasks AI can already handle when paired with the right tools and context. The first wins usually come from building workflows around them. That is the difference between a model that could do the job and one that actually does it inside your business.
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Check all layers of maps to ensure accuracy, identifying and marking errors and making corrections.
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Design or develop information databases that include geographic or topographic data.
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Monitor mapping work or the updating of maps to ensure accuracy, inclusion of new or changed information, or compliance with rules and regulations.
Every role has three or four places like these. Finding them takes an hour. Turning them into a workflow your team actually uses takes a few days.
Every task in the role.
Every O*NET task for this occupation, split by what AI can do unaided and what still needs a person. Importance is O*NET's 1 to 5 rating of how central each task is.
Tasks via O*NET "Surveying and Mapping Technicians" (17-3031.00).
What AI can already do
3 of 30 tasks, unaided
Calculate latitudes, longitudes, angles, areas, or other information for mapmaking, using survey field notes or reference tables.
Complete detailed source and method notes describing the location of routine or complex land parcels.
Perform calculations to determine earth curvature corrections, atmospheric impacts on measurements, traverse closures or adjustments, azimuths, level runs, or placement of markers.
What still needs a person
27 of 30 tasks
Position and hold the vertical rods, or targets, that theodolite operators use for sighting to measure angles, distances, and elevations.
Check all layers of maps to ensure accuracy, identifying and marking errors and making corrections.
Design or develop information databases that include geographic or topographic data.
Monitor mapping work or the updating of maps to ensure accuracy, inclusion of new or changed information, or compliance with rules and regulations.
Produce or update overlay maps to show information boundaries, water locations, or topographic features on various base maps or at different scales.
Determine scales, line sizes, or colors to be used for hard copies of computerized maps, using plotters.
Compile information necessary to stake projects for construction, using engineering plans.
Identify and compile database information to create requested maps.
Operate and manage land-information computer systems, performing tasks such as storing data, making inquiries, and producing plots and reports.
Compare survey computations with applicable standards to determine adequacy of data.
Analyze aerial photographs to detect and interpret significant military, industrial, resource, or topographical data.
Answer questions and provide information to the public or to staff members regarding assessment maps, surveys, boundaries, easements, property ownership, roads, zoning, or similar matters.
Research and combine existing property information to describe property boundaries in relation to adjacent properties, taking into account parcel splits, combinations, or land boundary adjustments.
Compare topographical features or contour lines with images from aerial photographs, old maps, or other reference materials to verify the accuracy of their identification.
Trace contours or topographic details to generate maps that denote specific land or property locations or geographic attributes.
Provide assistance in the development of methods and procedures for conducting field surveys.
Trim, align, and join prints to form photographic mosaics, maintaining scaled distances between reference points.
Adjust and operate surveying instruments such as prisms, theodolites, electronic distance measuring equipment, or electronic data collectors.
Collect information needed to carry out new surveys, using source maps, previous survey data, photographs, computer records, or other relevant information.
Conduct surveys to ascertain the locations of natural features and man-made structures on the Earth's surface, underground, and underwater, using electronic distance-measuring equipment, such as GPS, and other surveying instruments.
Enter Global Positioning System (GPS) data, legal deeds, field notes, or land survey reports into geographic information system (GIS) workstations so that information can be transformed into graphic land descriptions, such as maps and drawings.
Prepare cost estimates for mapping projects.
Prepare topographic or contour maps of land surveyed, including site features and other relevant information, such as charts, drawings, and survey notes.
Record survey measurements or descriptive data, using notes, drawings, sketches, or inked tracings.
Search for section corners, property irons, or survey points.
Set out and recover stakes, marks, or other monumentation.
Supervise or coordinate activities of workers engaged in surveying, plotting data, drafting maps, or producing blueprints, photostats, or photographs.
Tasks via O*NET "Surveying and Mapping Technicians" (17-3031.00).
What AI can already do
27 of 30 tasks, with tools
Check all layers of maps to ensure accuracy, identifying and marking errors and making corrections.
Design or develop information databases that include geographic or topographic data.
Monitor mapping work or the updating of maps to ensure accuracy, inclusion of new or changed information, or compliance with rules and regulations.
Produce or update overlay maps to show information boundaries, water locations, or topographic features on various base maps or at different scales.
Determine scales, line sizes, or colors to be used for hard copies of computerized maps, using plotters.
Compile information necessary to stake projects for construction, using engineering plans.
Identify and compile database information to create requested maps.
Operate and manage land-information computer systems, performing tasks such as storing data, making inquiries, and producing plots and reports.
Compare survey computations with applicable standards to determine adequacy of data.
Analyze aerial photographs to detect and interpret significant military, industrial, resource, or topographical data.
Answer questions and provide information to the public or to staff members regarding assessment maps, surveys, boundaries, easements, property ownership, roads, zoning, or similar matters.
Research and combine existing property information to describe property boundaries in relation to adjacent properties, taking into account parcel splits, combinations, or land boundary adjustments.
Calculate latitudes, longitudes, angles, areas, or other information for mapmaking, using survey field notes or reference tables.
Compare topographical features or contour lines with images from aerial photographs, old maps, or other reference materials to verify the accuracy of their identification.
Trace contours or topographic details to generate maps that denote specific land or property locations or geographic attributes.
Provide assistance in the development of methods and procedures for conducting field surveys.
Trim, align, and join prints to form photographic mosaics, maintaining scaled distances between reference points.
Complete detailed source and method notes describing the location of routine or complex land parcels.
Perform calculations to determine earth curvature corrections, atmospheric impacts on measurements, traverse closures or adjustments, azimuths, level runs, or placement of markers.
Collect information needed to carry out new surveys, using source maps, previous survey data, photographs, computer records, or other relevant information.
Conduct surveys to ascertain the locations of natural features and man-made structures on the Earth's surface, underground, and underwater, using electronic distance-measuring equipment, such as GPS, and other surveying instruments.
Enter Global Positioning System (GPS) data, legal deeds, field notes, or land survey reports into geographic information system (GIS) workstations so that information can be transformed into graphic land descriptions, such as maps and drawings.
Prepare cost estimates for mapping projects.
Prepare topographic or contour maps of land surveyed, including site features and other relevant information, such as charts, drawings, and survey notes.
Record survey measurements or descriptive data, using notes, drawings, sketches, or inked tracings.
Search for section corners, property irons, or survey points.
Supervise or coordinate activities of workers engaged in surveying, plotting data, drafting maps, or producing blueprints, photostats, or photographs.
What still needs a person
3 of 30 tasks
Position and hold the vertical rods, or targets, that theodolite operators use for sighting to measure angles, distances, and elevations.
Adjust and operate surveying instruments such as prisms, theodolites, electronic distance measuring equipment, or electronic data collectors.
Set out and recover stakes, marks, or other monumentation.
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Related occupations.
Other roles in Associate professional occupations, and roles close by exposure.
What it means for your sector.
This role's score comes from Eloundou et al's 2023 task labels, weighted by O*NET importance within each O*NET-SOC code, then bridged to UK SOC 2020 through ISCO-08 (the ONS coding index) and US SOC 2010 (the BLS crosswalk). Employment and median pay come from ONS ASHE Table 14.7a, 2025 provisional, which covers employees only.
Back to the mapMethodologySources (PDF)Built 29 April 2026
Pictures
- "Census pantograph and 1930s keypunches" by U.S. Census Bureau employees, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
- "Shepard Barclay, St. Louis lawyer, in his office" by Missouri Historical Society via DPLA, no known copyright restrictions, via Wikimedia Commons
- "Accountant's Office LCCN2016824374" by National Photo Company Collection, public domain, via Wikimedia Commons
- "Employment service in Oulu in the spring 1931" by Finnish Heritage Agency (Museovirasto), CC BY 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons