Use this material to examine your own work. Confirm current requirements, forms and dates with IStructE before applying.
Complete ten forms, one for each Core Objective, once you have met the IPD requirements. On the individually managed route, your personal mentor signs them.
The word you use is the claim you make
The third point above is sharper than it looks. Knowledge, Experience and Ability are not synonyms in this process: they are the three minimum standards, and each objective is set at one of them.
Writing *"I have experience of…"* on an objective set at Ability is not modesty. It is a statement, in the Institution's own vocabulary, that you have not met the standard. Go through all ten forms with the standards for your grade beside you and check the verb in every claim.
That check matters more for Incorporated-Member and Chartered candidates than it first appears, because the standards are not identical between the grades. Use the ones for the grade you are applying for.
Structure for each claim
Reviewers are reading for how you achieved the standard. A claim that does this has four parts, and they fit in a paragraph:
- What you did: the specific work, on a named project.
- At what level: unsupervised, supervised, advising others.
- The judgement: what you decided, and what you rejected.
- Where it is evidenced: the cross-reference into the portfolio.
Two or three claims of that kind carry an objective far better than a page of generalities.
Signing, and what the mentor is signing
On the individually managed route the forms are signed by your personal mentor. That signature attests to your development against the objectives as they have observed it. It is not a guarantee of the outcome, and no mentor, employer or peer can confirm that an objective has been achieved: that determination is made by IStructE's reviewers and its panel.
You also sign a declaration that the evidence submitted in the portfolio of work is your own.
Failing, and what has to be resubmitted
If the interview does not go your way, the scope of what you rewrite depends on how much was not met. Where a small number of objectives are failed, the re-interview is on those objectives only, and there is a limited window to clear them before forms for all ten have to be resubmitted. The current thresholds and window are on the interview page.
Ten forms, common errors
Look for
- Write in the first person, about work you personally undertook
- Use the exact standard word for that objective: knowledge, experience or ability
- Give the project, the decision and the level of supervision
- Cross-reference each claim to a page in the portfolio
- Have your mentor read all ten together, looking for contradictions
Watch for
- Describe the objective back to the reviewers
- Explain why the subject is important
- Write 'we' where you mean 'I'
- Hedge with 'some' or 'limited'
- Reuse the same project across every form
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.