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Technicians and associate professionals · code 3522

Telecommunications engineering technicians

AI can spot the fault on the network. Climbing the mast to fix it is still a technician.

All five tasks are mostly out of AI's reach, from research support and supervising maintenance to cost estimates and reading blueprints.

What they actually do (and what else they get called)

Telecommunications engineering technicians perform technical tasks connected with telecommunications engineering research, as well as with the design, manufacture, assembly, construction, operation, maintenance and repair of telecommunications systems. Tasks include - (a) providing technical assistance connected with research and the development of telecommunications equipment, or testing prototypes; (b) studying technical material such as blueprints and sketches to determine the method of work to be adopted; (c) preparing detailed estimates of quantities and costs of materials and labour required for the manufacture and installation of telecommunications equipment, according to the specifications given; (d) providing technical supervision of the manufacture, utilization, maintenance and repair of telecommunications systems to ensure satisfactory performance and compliance with specifications and regulations; (e) applying technical knowledge of telecommunications engineering principles and practices in order to identify and solve problems arising in the course of their work. Examples of the occupations classified here: - Engineering technician (telecommunications) Some related occupations classified elsewhere: - Engineering technician (electronics) - 3114 - Computer hardware installer - 7422 - Telecommunications equipment repairer - 7422 - Telephone installer - 7422

  • telecommunications engineering technician

Job titles from the EU's ESCO list. Search for any of them on the jobs page and you'll end up here.

55 / 100

Changing significantly

AI could do a real share of the everyday tasks. The job is changing shape, not vanishing.

Not the odds you keep your job. It's how much of the everyday work still needs a person, out of 100.

← Robot's turf Human's turf →

The ILO's official verdict: Minimal Exposure

357 of 427 for holding up against AI

Why this score?

The ILO rated each of this job's 5 tasks for how much of it AI could do. They average 45.3 out of 100, so it holds up at 100 − 45.3 = 54.7.

That's the whole sum. No black box, no secret sauce: you can check it against the ILO's study. ILO group “Minimal Exposure”: A few tasks are affected, but the heart of the job isn't.

This job rates 49.1 out of 100 for how hands-on it is. The score above only looks at AI tools, not robots, but for work this far from the physical that matters less.

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Man v Bot · compare

Who holds up better?

Telecommunications engineering technicians 55

v

Go on, try your partner's job. Or your sibling's. We won't tell.

Man v Bot

Where the bot helps, and where the human wins

Bot

What AI takes

The routine stuff. You may not miss it.

  • Cost and materials estimates.
  • Fault diagnosis.
  • Technical documentation.

Man

What people still do better

Judgement, trust and skilled hands. Hard to download.

  • Installing and repairing equipment.
  • Testing prototypes.
  • Supervising work on site.

Both

What's arriving

New work that only exists because the AI does.

  • 5G and full-fibre rollout.
  • Network automation.
  • Satellite internet.

Written by a human, from the ILO's task ratings below. Yes, we see the irony. Read it as one person's take.

Meet your two rivals

They're not the same machine. AI software can only reach the parts of a job done on a screen or in words. A chatbot can't climb a ladder. A robot might, one day, if it doesn't fall off.

The AI

Lives in a screen. Never had to fix a boiler.

Threat level: Medium

46 could do without you

It could take over some of the work, and help with more. It could help with 69 of 100.

The robot

The wildcard. Has hands, still working out stairs.

How much it matters here: Some

49 how hands-on

A fair part of this job is hands-on, so robots would be needed for that part, not just software.

So could a robot do the physical part?

Less than half of this job is hands-on. Robots still matter, but for a smaller part of the work, so we don't sort it any further.

Robots hate fiddly work in awkward spaces. On that measure, this job scores 35 out of 100. The higher it is, the longer the robot waits.

49 How
hands-on
35 How fiddly
and cramped

Kind of hands-on work Less than half hands-on

The small print

They aren't a robot score, and nothing on this page is. Nobody measures how far robots have got well enough to put a number on it. These are the closest thing we have: how hands-on the job is, and how much fiddly, cramped work it takes, which is what Frey and Osborne found hardest for machines.

From O*NET, matched to one US job .

finger skill 44.6 · hand skill 42.9 · cramped spaces 17.5 · averaged · rule: hands-on under 50

estimated O*NET 31.0 BLS occupational crosswalk chain ISCO-08 to 2010 SOC (Aug 2012, rev. Jun 2015); 2010 to 2018 SOC (Nov 2017); O*NET-SOC 2019 taxonomy data 0.8-observed-use measures chosen by Frey & Osborne (2017) · the grouping is a sorting, not a measurement

The job, task by task

Every job is really a bundle of tasks. Here's this one unpacked, with how much of each AI could do, out of 100. The score is the average, and averages can hide a lot.

AI's favourite task here scores 48, against an average of 45. The bigger the gap, the more lopsided the job: some of it wide open to AI, some of it barely touched.

  1. 48

    Providing technical assistance connected with research and the development of telecommunications equipment, or testing prototypes

    Low
  2. 48

    Providing technical supervision of the manufacture, utilization, maintenance and repair of telecommunications systems to ensure satisfactory performance and compliance with specifications and regulations

    Low
  3. 47

    Applying technical knowledge of telecommunications engineering principles and practices in order to identify and solve problems arising in the course of their work.

    Low
  4. 46

    Preparing detailed estimates of quantities and costs of materials and labour required for the manufacture and installation of telecommunications equipment, according to the specifications given

    Low
  5. 39

    Studying technical material such as blue prints and sketches to determine the method of work to be adopted

    Low

5 tasks · the High to Very Low labels are the ILO's

from the source Working Paper 140, Generative AI and Jobs 2025 index data 0.8-observed-use

Sidekick or replacement?

A tool that makes you faster is a very different thing from one that does the task while you watch. Jobs and Skills Australia measured the two separately, which is handy.

AI helps you
69
AI does it for you
46

Sidekick wins, by 23 points.

How good a match is this?

One Australian job matches, but only partly: not everyone in it does this job. Treat the numbers as a rough guide.

estimated Our Gen AI Transition (Gen AI Capacity Study) September 2025 detailed data release data 0.8-observed-use matched to Australian jobs 3132

Meanwhile, in real life…

Everything else here is about what AI could do. This is what people actually did. When they asked Claude for help with this kind of work, did they hand the whole task over, or roll their sleeves up and work through it together?

Tiny sample alert This job makes up 0.01% of all the conversations: a tiny slice. People using AI for a job isn't the same as AI being able to do it.

Out of every 100 conversations

47
53

worked through it together handed it over

The small print

Anthropic publishes this about its own product, and it doesn't feed into any score here. These are people who use Claude, not workers in general, so little use here doesn't mean AI can't reach the job.

These two add up to 100. The bars elsewhere on the page don't, because each is scored on its own, so we don't put them side by side.

observed use Anthropic Economic Index release 2026-06-26, period beginning 2026-05-01 data 0.8-observed-use 2026-05-01 · Anthropic, about its own product

So, should telecoms technicians be worried?

Short answer: not worried, but paying attention. The job is changing.

Not much. Research support, supervision, problem-solving, estimates and reading plans all rate Low. AI monitoring helps find faults; installing and repairing stay hands-on.

Worth remembering: we score tasks, not jobs. When AI takes on a task, the job usually reshuffles around it rather than vanishing.

Where this job could lead

None of the new jobs we've written up start from here yet. Could be you're the first. See the jobs AI is creating →

How are the neighbours doing?

There are 82 jobs in the “Technicians and associate professionals” family, averaging 66. This one is below the family average.

Pit this against any other job →