Careers

Building controls are central to the efficient running of a building. They can help minimise energy use, reducing building-related greenhouse gas emissions. Controls also ensure that buildings are safe to work in, comfortable and provide good working environments for occupants.

The building controls industry offers a wide variety of career options ranging across electrical, electronic, mechanical, hydraulic, pneumatic, computer hardware and software as well as communications knowledge and skills. Graduates and school-leavers have a number of career paths to choose from, such as product design, application and systems engineering, after-sales service and maintenance through to sales and project engineering onto marketing and general management.

The Building Controls Industry Association represents the largest companies in the building controls sector, many of which are household names operating at the leading edge of technology and offering rewarding careers in all aspects of control and building management technology.

Career Insight

What is a building controls engineer?
A building controls engineer is responsible for designing and maintaining the control system within a building, ensuring that the heating and ventilation systems keep the environmental conditions required by the occupants, while minimising the energy and financial costs of the building.

Building controls engineers are able to read and understand electrical and mechanical drawings supplied by the design team, and are then able to discuss the implementation of a control system with the building owner or customer. From there, they oversee the installation of the building control system and configure them to meet the requirements of the design team. An engineer will work with many trades on a construction site and will gain a working knowledge of each during his or her career. In addition, a building controls engineer will be confident in the inspection and faultfinding of existing building control systems and able to identify enhancements and improvements to the existing system.

There are a variety of job roles and opportunities for careers in the building controls industry, including:

• Service engineer
• Project manager
• Project engineer
• Graphic designer
• Strategy designer (software control strategy)
• Commissioning engineer.

Service Engineer
Once a building control system has been installed, a service engineer will be responsible for ensuring it continues to operate at maximum efficiency at all times, while exploring opportunities for further energy savings – very important at a time when energy costs for businesses are rising rapidly.

Project Manager
A project manager is responsible for the smooth running of building controls projects. This includes working closely with clients and other contractors to ensure the project is delivered on time and in accordance with the specification. The project manager plans and coordinates all aspect of the building controls installation, managing the day-to-day activity of project engineers.

Project engineer
A project engineer reports to the project manager and will carry out the design and commissioning of the building controls project. He will review the specification and develop the controls design to meet the requirements. He will also check equipment selection and ensure orders are delivered in a timely way.

Graphic designer
A graphic designer is responsible for producing the PC display graphics for customers to maintain control of their building management system. Accurately interpreting the layout of physical plant through graphics will give the user a useful overview of the system.

Strategy design engineer
A strategy design engineer interprets the client’s requirements for operating the heating, ventilating and air conditioning systems in their building. The strategy design engineer will then create a building controls strategy using specially designed software tools.

Commissioning engineer
A commissioning engineer will ensure that all equipment connected to a building controls system responds correctly to the control signals, they will also work with other trades to check correct operation of items of plant.

* This copy was supplied courtesy of Trend Control Systems, a member of the BCIA