Hi All,

I’m looking for some advice.

Lately I’ve been contemplating an application for CEng.

I’m currently IEng registered with the UK Engineering council and have an accredited partial CEng BEng(Hons) in Electrical Engineering. I work for a well known organisation in the nuclear industry, designing safety critical reactor protection equipment. I’ve worked for other organisations developing power electronic systems and providing technical support on products for customers.

I feel I am at a cross roads in my career. I have undertaken a PGDip in business administration with the view to working towards completing an MBA. I have been looking at some managerial roles which ask for CEng in the application (the reason I’m contemplating CEng) although I must admit to me I feel that CEng should be reserved for the engineers who make the critical sign off decisions which if I’m honest I don’t think I have such experience to do this yet. As an IEng I have enough understanding and knowledge to know when a design is a little bit suspect perhaps, although I might not have the full technical understanding to resolve the issue.

CEng, as I understand it is for engineers who innovate products and have subsequent technical knowledge to solve problems and develop new analytical techniques.
What I would like to know is what counts as innovative, is it a new product based on an existing model. So for example is an iPhone5 (or whatever we are on nowadays) innovative or was it the mobile phone device which was the innovation?

I am a Senior Electrical & Instrumentation designer which sounds a nice title, but when I analyse myself critically to me I think it means nothing more than a ‘glorified draughtsperson’ whom creates models, drawings and formal bills of materials based on an engineers instructions. Would I be correct it thinking this type of role would not be ideal if one was looking to pursue CEng?

Furthermore, when it comes to underpinning knowledge and understanding for competence A, I notice that there is a caveat for people whom do not have the routine undergrad degree and MEng/Msc whereby a person can provide evidence of appropriate further learning to Masters level. How does this work? Is a PGDip in business admin relevant in this context? Is knowledge of range of software such as AutoCAD / Inventor appropriate further learning?

Also for some competencies, can one use previous examples, which were used in the IEng report? So if I had an example of where I promoted quality throughout the organisation in a previous role in my Ieng report to demonstrate some aspects of competence C could this be re-used? Or does one have to start from scratch with entirely new examples to satisfy for CEng?

Apologies for the long thread I just thought it might be wise to get some answers on these questions before proceeding with the application if I have not yet reached the competency level and/or perhaps CEng might not be what I’m looking for.
Cheers, K