In this guide
Use this material to examine your own work. Confirm current requirements, forms and dates with IStructE before applying.
Professional evidence explains what you did, the responsibility you held and how that work demonstrates a specific Core Objective.
Explaining your contribution
IStructE's guidance asks you to explain how you achieved the standard. A drawing or project image needs enough context to establish your part in the work. For each item, make clear:
- What you contributed personally.
- Whether you worked under supervision, independently or in a position to advise others.
- Which objective the evidence supports and where the report form refers to it.
Use your 300-page allowance for material that helps establish these points.
Matching evidence to the required level
Knowledge, Experience and Ability describe different levels of competence:
- Knowledge: understanding the subject and its principles. Evidence might include a CPD record, commentary or explanation of the limits of your competence.
- Experience: having done the work independently or under supervision. Evidence might include calculations, a design or correspondence showing your contribution.
- Ability: having worked unsupervised and being competent to advise others. Explain the decisions you made, work you checked or approach you set for others.
Check that evidence for an Ability objective demonstrates that level, especially where most of the portfolio shows supervised work.
Annotating evidence
A short annotation can identify your contribution to a shared drawing. For example: *"I sized these transfer beams; the 900 depth was driven by the services zone shown, which I agreed with the M&E lead"*. It explains the action, constraint and coordination behind the result.
The same job, evidenced two ways
Fictional example: a four-storey office refurbishment, consultant
Includes the general arrangement drawing for the second floor and the structural calculations package for the scheme, with a caption reading "Office refurbishment, 2024. Steel frame with composite slabs."
Includes two sheets from the same calculations, annotated: which member the candidate sized, the deflection limit chosen and why, the transfer condition they identified when the client moved a wall, and a note of the check they asked their supervisor to review and why. The general arrangement is included once, marked to show the four gridlines the candidate was responsible for.
The second version is shorter and evidences more. It shows personal contribution, a judgement made, an awareness of what needed checking by someone else, and a clear link to the objectives on analysis and sizing. The first version could have been submitted by any of nine people on that job.
Selecting what goes in
Look for
- Choose evidence for what it proves about you, not for how impressive the project was
- Spread it across several projects, as the guidance expects
- Annotate every item with your part in it and the judgement you made
- Include work at the level the objective asks for: advising others, where the standard is Ability
- Include evidence of things that went wrong and what you did about them; reviewers read this well
Watch for
- Include a full project report because it is thorough
- Repeat the same design or drawing type to fill space
- Submit anything you did not produce yourself
- Leave a reviewer to infer your contribution from a title block
- Assume a well-known project speaks for itself
Questions to ask yourself
- If my name were removed, could a reviewer still tell what I did?
If not, the item is evidence about the project, not about you, and it is your competence being assessed.
- Which objective does this sit under, and at which standard?
Evidence that is not filed against an objective is not doing work; the portfolio is sub-divided by objective for exactly this reason.
- Does this show a judgement, or only an output?
Outputs show that work happened. Judgements show the level of responsibility you carried, which is what separates the three standards.
- Would I be comfortable being questioned on every number on this page?
Reviewers question primarily on the content of your portfolio. Anything you cannot discuss in detail is a liability.
Official sources
Selected publisher pages were rechecked in September 2026. Other source records were last checked in July 2026. Open the latest official document before relying on a requirement.