The number of newly registered incorporated engineers continues to decline. The strategy of the Engineering Council is clearly not aligned to supporting the engineering technologist professional. Given the governments commitment to technical education the IET should create their own professional register to provide a relevant standard. It is obvious the current UKSPEC standard lacks credibility in terms of the IEng grade
And herein lies a central problem - the key distinction between I.Eng/Technologists and C.Eng, is that word innovation.
For me, the key difference was management. Having read the horribly woolly and wordy UKSPEC more times than I ever wish to, the one thing that prevented me from applying for CEng wasn't innovation, but management. There's a requirement for CEng that you must have managed things (projects and/or people). The requirement for IEng is a lot vaguer - assisting in management (for instance by preparing status reports) is sufficient.
Fundamentally, the difference between engineering and many other professions is the lack of a clear education and structured training path. Engineering is just something that people drift into after they leave college or university. After a few years, they may decide to aply for professional registration. If they can be bothered with all the time and effort of going through the registration process, and paying all the fees. This is to apply for registration in the job that they are already doing.
And herein lies a central problem - the key distinction between I.Eng/Technologists and C.Eng, is that word innovation.
For me, the key difference was management. Having read the horribly woolly and wordy UKSPEC more times than I ever wish to, the one thing that prevented me from applying for CEng wasn't innovation, but management. There's a requirement for CEng that you must have managed things (projects and/or people). The requirement for IEng is a lot vaguer - assisting in management (for instance by preparing status reports) is sufficient.
Fundamentally, the difference between engineering and many other professions is the lack of a clear education and structured training path. Engineering is just something that people drift into after they leave college or university. After a few years, they may decide to aply for professional registration. If they can be bothered with all the time and effort of going through the registration process, and paying all the fees. This is to apply for registration in the job that they are already doing.
