CPENG CIVIL ENGINEER · AUCKLAND
Most of what your team does by hand — 224c chasing, council submissions, as-built compilation, job costing — could run in the background. I find those bottlenecks and fix them.
Built for
THE PROBLEM
Chasing 224c sign-offs across Watercare, AT, council, and utility provider inboxes for every subdivision.
Re-typing the same site data into Watercare, council, and utility portals.
Compiling consent packs and RFI responses from scratch when 80% of the content already exists.
Quoting from a blank page when your firm has done 200 similar jobs.
You know there's a better way. You just haven't had a CPEng who actually codes show you how.
HOW IT WORKS
I spend a day inside your business. I map your workflows, find the bottlenecks, and identify what can be automated — and what shouldn't be. You get a clear report, not a sales pitch.
I build the automation. Not a pitch deck about what AI could do — working systems connected to your actual tools. SharePoint, Xero, email, whatever you use. It works on Monday morning, not in a demo.
I train your team on the tool — short sessions, real workflows, not slideware. Adoption gets measured. What isn't landing gets tuned. Once it's in your team's daily hands and the wins are socialised, we move to handover.
I'm not your IT department. I set the tool up in Azure on your account, then hand off to your IT service provider — they handle day-to-day monitoring, auth, DNS, and tenant integration the way they already do for your other systems. My monthly retainer covers what they don't: new tools, feature work, and ongoing support when your processes change. You get build expertise from me and ops continuity from your existing provider, without paying me to maintain something they do better.
SPECIALIST ENGAGEMENTS
Half-day Claude workshops for engineering, planning, and surveying firms.
Ten workflow modules built for NZ consultancies — not adapted from generic AI training. Context engineering, document summaries, Microsoft 365 connectors, Co-Work folder cleanup, Claude Projects, council research, data analysis, consent lodgement packs, hearing decks. Morning whole-team session, afternoon discipline breakouts. Run on-site in Auckland or remote.
Board paper, IT brief, and governance framework for AI deployment.
I write the director-level case for AI in your firm. Privacy Act 2020 compliance, Engineering New Zealand alignment, PI insurance scoping, hosting architecture (Azure App Service, Streamlit, Entra SSO), priority tool roadmap, PIA programme, rollout phasing. The same pack I wrote for my own firm — adapted to yours.
WHO I AM
I'm Dietrich Truchsess — Chartered Professional Engineer (CPEng), APEC Engineer, IntPEng. Fifteen years across New Zealand land development, three-waters, and capital infrastructure delivery.
I've worked the Engineer to the Contract seat on $15M+ subdivision builds, design-led multi-lot residential subdivisions, served as an Auckland Council Inspector for Special Housing Areas, and authored Producer Statements for E1, G12, and G13.
Somewhere in there I started building automation — because nobody on staff was going to. The platform I built connects to SharePoint, Azure AD, Microsoft Graph, NIWA, 12d Synergy, and WorkflowMax. Six production tools — stormwater calc agents, a 224c certification tracker, project health monitor — live in Auckland engineering today.
Now I do the same for other firms. That's Automaton AI.
Curious where your firm sits? Take the 7-minute AI Readiness Assessment →
FROM MANUAL TO AUTOMATED
Eight parallel utility approvals, all converging on one certificate. Left: how it runs manually — every job slightly different, work scattered across Outlook, SharePoint, sticky notes. Right: how it runs once I organise it. Each track has a specific AI tool doing the heavy lifting.
The 8 streams + how I automate them
Potable Water
co-work + watercare-pack skill
Wastewater
co-work + wastewater-pack skill
Stormwater
calculation agent + cctv-pack
Roads
roads-submission skill + automation orchestration
Traffic Resolution
trr-pack + outlook automation
Telecom
chorus-pack + automation orchestration
Power & Gas
vector-pack + automation orchestration
Building Consent
ccc-pack + 224c tracker
Want the details on how each stream gets automated? Keep scrolling.
HOW EACH STREAM GETS AUTOMATED
Each utility stream gets its own combination of Co-Work, custom Claude Code skills, and automation orchestration. Same pattern across all eight — only the specifics change.
Manual today
Watercare connection applications, City Care quotes and invoices, on-site connection coordination, asset registration, sign-off documentation.
How I automate it
Co-Work folder watcher + custom Claude Code skill watercare-pack — assembles the full Watercare submission from your job folder, populates required fields, generates the cover letter.
Result
4 hours of admin → 15 minutes of review.
Manual today
Council drawing approvals, Watercare final inspections, as-built collation, submission paperwork.
How I automate it
wastewater-pack skill — pulls drawings from 12d Synergy, validates against current standards, packages the council submission with cover letter.
Result
As-built compilation in minutes, not hours.
Manual today
Standards-based calcs (TP108, GD01), CCTV reports, draft and final as-builts, council inspection coordination.
How I automate it
Calculation Agent (already shipped) + stormwater-pack — runs the deterministic Python maths, attaches CCTV evidence, produces the council submission.
Result
End-to-end stormwater pack automated.
Manual today
As-builts (draft and final), Council and AT inspections, RAMM sheets, street lighting design, Survey LT plans.
How I automate it
roads-submission skill — assembles the full Council + AT submission from the project folder, flags missing inputs against the lodgement checklist.
Result
Submission pack ready in 20 minutes, fully traceable.
Manual today
TRR drafting, road name approvals, AT and Local Board sign-off chasing, status reporting back to the project team.
How I automate it
trr-pack skill writes the report against your template + Outlook automation tracks approval status without inbox archaeology.
Result
TRR drafted in hours, approval status always visible.
Manual today
EPA, CHORUS application, design coordination, trenching and pipe-laying tracking, final sign-off.
How I automate it
chorus-pack skill + Claude Code automation orchestration routing CHORUS application status into the 224c Tracker dashboard.
Result
Status visible alongside every other utility on one screen.
Manual today
VECTOR or Northpower application, design coordination, hook-up tracking, final sign-off.
How I automate it
vector-pack skill + same automation orchestration + 224c Tracker integration pattern as telecom.
Result
Both utility tracks managed from one place.
Manual today
Building consent application, intermediate inspections during construction, CCC pack assembly, surveyor's certificate for siting/set-out.
How I automate it
ccc-pack skill + 224c Tracker checkpoint — CCC submission auto-prepared the moment prerequisites complete.
Result
CCC ready to lodge the moment the project clears its dependencies.
WHAT I'VE BUILT
These are the tools I've built — or am building — inside my own firm. The same pattern carries across to yours.
Stormwater, wastewater, floor levels, detention tanks, pipe sizing — standards-based outputs in minutes, returned to 12d Synergy.
Director view of budgeted vs actual hours, invoiced vs cost, across every live job.
s.224c, EACC, CoA and Gantt certification workflows. Visibility from lodgement to issue.
Role-specific staff packs and checklists. Engineer, surveyor, planner, admin — each gets the right brief on day one.
NZ standards retrieval — AUP, Watercare COP, AT Design Manual, TP108, GD01, NZBC. Effective-date filtering, source citation on every answer.
Flags NZS 3910 notice obligations, deadlines, and the consequence of silence. Reviewed by a professional before reliance.
KNOWLEDGE BASE
The same guides I've handed to engineers, planners and surveyors who wanted to start working with Claude. Read in the browser or download. Use them, share them, tell me what's missing.
The four-layer prompt, document summaries, connectors, Projects — the whole-team starter pack.
Read guideWhat an agent actually is, how it differs from a chatbot, where they belong inside a consultancy.
Read guideSetup, context curation, custom commands, MCP servers, hooks, the SDK. Claude as a development partner — not just a chat window.
Read guideQUESTIONS I HEAR A LOT
I spend a day inside your business — usually on-site, sometimes hybrid. Before I arrive, your team takes a short AI Readiness Assessment so I know where each person is starting from and what your firm's biggest gaps are. On the day, I shadow the workflows that hurt: quoting, reporting, council submissions, data entry, compliance tracking. At the end you get a written report with a prioritised list of what's automatable, what isn't, and what I'd build first. Most internal tools land in the 3-day to 2-week range depending on complexity. Fixed fee for the audit. No sales pitch attached.
Question I haven't answered? Email me directly — I read everything.
WHAT I BUILD WITH
LET'S TALK
No pitch deck. No upsell. Just a conversation about where your business is losing time and what we can do about it.