Re-application of CEng after being rejected

Lee Knight said:

"position yourself to gain experience of a competency, wait <insert absolutely firm, not made-up number> of weeks before re-submitting”.

Unfortunately as David and Rebecca have said, it's impossible to give such advice...it's only about having the evidence of the competences, and maybe one applicant was within a hair's breadth of having it and another was a long way off.

I know the example I'm about to give could raise all sorts of other questions, but it's very real: it is possible to fail an application by not showing evidence of the 'E' competences. Now many of these don't need "experience" of any particular duration, they just need "understanding". Let's say, for example, that a CEng applicant gave no good evidence of E3 "Understand the principles of sustainable development and apply them in their work", and when asked about it at interview also showed no understanding. (Maybe because they hadn't been advised on this by a PRA! We're trained to bludgeon the E competences into applicants.) This doesn't require them to spend x weeks working on a sustainable development project, it just needs them to reflect and understand how their current work relates to it. Pretty much they could potentially reapply immediately.

While on the other hand a CEng applicant who is not actually taking any innovative or complex decisions (in the eyes of the assessors) could need months or years (or indeed forever) to gain the experience to show evidence of the A and B competences.

So I do appreciate the frustration, I've been asked this question many times when helping failed candidates, but there can't be a firm number of weeks. It's got to be by understanding the specific competence(s) missed, and how far by, and then resubmitting when the applicant judges that they've now been met. As Gerard suggests, it's best to work through the reasons for rejection with a PRA who (if there aren't grounds for appeal) can hopefully help the candidate identify the specific additional experience they need and potential ways of achieving this. The candidate can then judge how long it's likely that they'll take to achieve this. 

(Incidentally by my statement "only a few months later" I was telescoping "only a few months after they were notified that they had failed, they were ready to submit again, and then after the assessment period they were successful". Sorry if that wasn't clear, the durations of the assessments themselves are a whole different discussion!)

Thanks,

Andy