Estimated reading time: 3 minutes
In the age of artificial intelligence, inspectors are finding new allies in AI language models to help craft detailed, accurate reports.
However, AI’s lack of firsthand sensory experience presents a unique challenge. To bridge this gap and ensure AI-assisted reports capture the full scope of an inspection, here are 10 crucial inputs every inspector should provide when collaborating with AI.
Detailed visual description:
AI hasn’t seen what you’ve seen.
By providing a thorough, objective description of colors, textures, sizes, and spatial relationships in your prompt, you’re lending your eyes to the AI, allowing it to “see” through your detailed account.
Contextual information:
AI lacks a broader understanding of the inspection site’s history or environment, and the prompt should include your location data, state, and city.
Sharing location details, climate zones, microclimate data from surrounding conditions, and relevant background information helps the AI place your observations in the proper context, leading to more informed and relevant report content.
Sensory details beyond sight:
AI can’t smell, hear, or touch.
Describing relevant sounds, smells, or tactile sensations provides a multi-dimensional understanding of the inspection site that AI couldn’t otherwise access, enriching the report with crucial non-visual data.
Environmental conditions:
Factors like temperature, humidity, and lighting can significantly impact inspection findings.
AI needs this information to understand how environmental conditions might influence your observations or affect the inspected items over time. This is especially true when considering lighting.
Comparison to standards:
AI won’t know your code jurisdiction and its rules unless you specify.
While AI can be programmed with broad industry standards, your professional judgment in comparing observations to these standards is invaluable. It is one of the key components of developing your voice as you craft your report. This input helps the AI frame your findings within the appropriate regulatory or quality context.
Severity assessment:
You’ll need to rate the observation; remember, AI wasn’t present.
Your experience-based judgment on the severity of issues is crucial. AI can help articulate this assessment, but your input is needed to convey the urgency or importance of each observation.
Potential causes:
Remember: You are the professional, not the AI.
Your insights into possible causes of defects or issues are based on years of experience that AI simply doesn’t have. Sharing these thoughts allows the AI to incorporate expert analysis into the report, adding depth to the observations.
Progression indicators:
Signs of how long an issue has been present or how it might develop are critical for prioritizing repairs or maintenance.
AI needs your observations on these indicators to accurately convey the timeline and potential future impacts of issues.
Interrelationships between observations:
The hip bone is connected to the thigh bone.
Understanding how different observations might be connected requires a holistic view that AI currently lacks. Your input on these relationships helps the AI create a more comprehensive and insightful report. As you craft your query, consider giving AI your opinion about the connections.
Limitations of the inspection:
I’ve listed limitations last and believe it is probably THE MOST IMPORTANT aspect of performing a visual inspection. It is paramount to describe or report what you don’t see and why you don’t see it.
Being transparent about what couldn’t be inspected is as important as reporting what was observed. AI needs this information to accurately represent the scope and limitations of the inspection, ensuring the report is comprehensive and honest.
By providing these key inputs, inspectors can effectively collaborate with AI to produce reports that combine human expertise with AI’s language processing capabilities.
Learn how to use AI to craft observations, refine your report comments, and develop your own voice.
This partnership ensures that inspection reports remain accurate, detailed, and valuable in the age of artificial intelligence.
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