Professional Conduct.
The day-to-day conduct expected of PCI-certified professionals.
Overview
Holding the PCL-AI is a commitment. Certified professionals are expected to work with integrity and objectivity, protect confidential information, and stay accountable for their conclusions — including those assisted by AI.
At a glance
Core obligations
- Act with integrity, objectivity and honesty
- Report performance, risk and forecasts truthfully
- Protect confidential project and personal information
- Work within competence and seek help when needed
- Use AI responsibly, with human accountability
Conduct and AI
PCI applies this consistently and records what it does, so the process can be checked and improved. The detail is governed by the related policies linked below and is published as the institute matures.
Common questions
Who must follow this?
All PCI-certified professionals, alongside the code of ethics.
How does it treat AI?
Professionals must not present unverified AI output as fact and must apply human oversight.
What if conduct falls short?
Concerns are examined under the investigation procedure, with fair process.
Why this matters
Clear policies matter because they are how fairness is made real. A certification body that treats everyone consistently — on eligibility, conduct, security, impartiality and appeals — is one whose decisions can be trusted, and whose credential therefore means the same thing for everyone who holds it. These pages set out those commitments plainly.
PCI states its position honestly, including where processes are still being established. The aim is not legal cover for its own sake but genuine, transparent governance — the substance that lets a credential, and the body behind it, earn and keep professional trust.
- Substance over marketing
- Fair, transparent process
- Honesty about our status
- Responsible, governed use of AI
Founding-stage document · Version 1.0 — effective date to be confirmed · Reviewed under PCI governance. PCI makes no claims of accreditation or recognition beyond what is true today.
Conduct lives in the numbers you publish
For a project controls professional, conduct is not an abstract virtue — it is embedded in every forecast, report and register you sign. The policy's core expectations map directly onto daily work:
Report what the data shows
Forecasts and variance analyses reflect the evidence, not what a client, sponsor or manager would prefer to hear. Shading a number to keep the peace is a conduct issue, not a style choice.
Disclose assumptions and limits
Every analysis rests on assumptions. Stating them — and saying what your conclusion cannot support — is what separates professional judgement from confident guessing.
Protect confidential information
Cost data, commercial positions and project performance information are used only for their intended purpose, and never traded for personal advantage.
Stay within competence
Take on work you are competent to do, and say so plainly when a task needs expertise you do not have. Overreach harms projects quietly and reputations loudly.
Owning AI-assisted conclusions
PCI's founding principle — AI proposes, the professional disposes — becomes a personal obligation under this policy. Using AI to draft analysis, test scenarios or check work is legitimate and often good practice; presenting unverified AI output as your professional conclusion is not. The certified professional is expected to understand the inputs the tool worked from, verify the outputs against independent evidence or their own reasoning, and remain fully answerable for whatever carries their name. "The model said so" is never a defence, because accountability cannot be delegated to software. Where AI use is material to a conclusion, being transparent about it is part of honest reporting. The human oversight policy and the AI ethics standard set out this expectation in full.
When conduct is questioned
Concerns about a certified professional's conduct can be raised by anyone through the ethics reporting route, and are handled under a process built for fairness on both sides: the professional is told what is alleged, given a genuine opportunity to respond, and judged by people with no conflict of interest. Outcomes are proportionate to the breach — from guidance, through conditions, to suspension or withdrawal of certification in serious cases — and adverse decisions carry a right of appeal. The point of enforcement is not punishment for its own sake; it is that employers and the public can rely on the credential precisely because its standards are policed, visibly and fairly.
Keep going
The standard, in working situations
The conduct standard is easiest to see in moments of pressure: reporting a forecast you know is optimistic because it is wanted; being asked to sign analysis you did not perform; noticing an AI-assisted output is wrong but convenient. In each, the professional obligation is the same — accuracy over comfort, attribution over convenience, and escalation over silence.
Credential-holders are accountable for work carried out under their name, including work AI helped produce: AI proposes, the professional disposes. Concerns about conduct go through the ethics report.