The AI Disruption Speaker Series: Hans-Georg Fill

Hans-Georg Fill is a full professor for business informatics, vice-president of the Department of Informatics, and co-coordinator of the Smart Living Lab at the University of Fribourg, Switzerland. Before, he held positions at the University of Vienna, Austria and the University of Bamberg, Germany and was a visiting scholar at Stanford University, Karlsruhe Institute of Technology, Germany and the École des Mines at St. Etienne, France. He has received his PhD and habilitation from the University of Vienna, Austria. He has more than 15 years of experience in conceptual modeling and enterprise modeling both in academia and industrial research projects. He is supporting editor in chief of the gold open access journal Enterprise Modeling and Information Systems Architectures – International Journal of Conceptual Modeling (EMISAJ). He is speaker of the SIG Modeling of Enterprise Information Systems (MobIS) and deputy speaker of the Cross-sectional Technical Committee on Modeling (QFAM) of the German Informatics Society (GI).

Abstract:
Generative artificial intelligence has recently emerged as a global phenomenon. It has the capacity to generate texts, images, software, video, and audio content through statements in natural language without the need for technical expertise. However, these advancements come with costs, including increased energy consumption, potential copyright issues, or costs related to potentially false information. Additionally, there is a concern that humans are becoming overwhelmed by the sheer volume of information they are now generating individually, while at the same time experiencing a loss of skills and competencies that are assumingly being absorbed by AI. The field of conceptual modeling has a long tradition in eliciting and structuring knowledge in many domains for supporting human communication, for processing information, and reasoning about it. It is therefore well-suited for dealing with some of the challenges of generative AI. This includes support for AI input, better understanding of AI output, as well as preventing the deskilling of human actors. In this talk we will therefore discuss the past, present, and future of conceptual modeling in times of generative artificial intelligence and its contributions to information systems development.

About the speaker series:
The CIRSS Speaker Series continues in Spring 2026 on the new theme of “The AI Disruption.” Our speakers will discuss how recent advances in AI have reshaped their research — what has been made easier and what has become more difficult — and reflect upon its broader disruptive impact on society.

We meet most Wednesdays, 9am-10am Central time, in Zoom.  Everyone is welcome to attend.  More information, including upcoming speaker schedule and links to recordings, is available on the series website.  For weekly updates on upcoming talks, subscribe to our CIRSS Seminars mailing list.  Our Spring 2026 series is led by Yuanxi Fu and Timothy McPhillips, and supported by the Center for Informatics Research in Science and Scholarship (CIRSS) and the School of Information Sciences at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.