PE Required for "No PE sign off required" Projects

[prost]

I have been seeing more and more career advertisements by companies specifying "PE required" or "PE desirable" for what appear to be projects that, as far as I know, have not required a professional engineer (PE) signatures in the past. Say I am a mechanical engineer--generally a PE signature is required when there are building plans for things mechanical engineers design such as heating, ventilation, and air conditioning systems. Lately I have been noticing career ads which appear to be at companies that always have been exempt, such as manufacturing companies, and the jobs do not appear to be building maintenance or construction related (for instance, a motorcycle parts maker might specify a mechanical engineer with PE is desired). What's going on? Are there new regulatory requirements for PE sign off at manufacturing companies in certain industries? Is this somehow tied to ISO 9XXX certifications?

 

[dig1]

I'm seeing this as well, including at the old company I worked for. They were an OEM with most of their projects outside of North America. When I asked about why this was required (the position was not even a design position but a product management position) the long answer could be shorted to "it looks good".

It was their way to show their customers, companies that did the actual equipment fabrication, outside consulting engineers, etc that the person responsible for the management of the product had a certain technical level.

When I obtained my PE while working there, I got a "nice job" but nothing else. I had to use a vacation day to take the exam.

Now they are paying for review classes, giving the day off w/o vacation being charged, etc. This is actually a refreshing change because they are also paying for the continuing education.

Even if the PE requirement isn't kept for these positions in the future, I hope that they keep up with the continuing ed. This is actually more valuable than the license because they look for good courses that apply to the work being done and are willing to pay the expense to get someone there.

 

[prost]

dig1:
two points, one on topic, one off
1) It still seems odd to me because 99.99999% (yes, I am sure that is the correct percentage! LOL) of customers in non construction industries have no idea even what a PE is. If that is so, seems like an unnecessary expense of manpower and resources to both get the PE and do continuing ed on company time. It's anti competitive, since it costs you money if you are the company and your customers don't know the difference. As much as I agree personally with the desirability of pushing your engineers to all have PEs, I can't see the advantage of it for the company if their customers don't care or don't know. You said the one company said 'looks good'; I assume that they were educating their customers as to why having a PE work on the project was advantageous?

2) Continuing ed is a whole 'nuther' thread, I think. I live in the St. Louis area; if you have a PE, but you don't work in the construction industry in St. Louis, your choices for relevant and constructive, if you will, continuing ed courses are between 'slim' and 'none', and 'slim' has left town long ago. I get all my continuing ed units from doing stuff I always have done: writing papers, going to conferences. I am fortunate so far in that respect. However, if I didn't have the conferences, I would consider the other, realistic choices (that is, affordable--who can afford out of own pocket to pay $1500 plus lodging and per diem and time lost at work to go to an ASME course?) to be worse than useless because my time would be better spent at work (but of course I don't get cont. ed. credit for that!).

 

[dig1]

prost,

Many of my former company's customers are Europeans or have heavy European influence in thier projects. The fact of having initials after names brings credibility in many cases to the people in that industry. It also brought credibility when dealing with the fabrication shops, many of them who sub-contract the detailed design to a PE. Many of the direct contacts of this company's clients were engineers or technical people, which is fortunate. They might not really know what a PE is but understand it is a credential and that is what they care about. Just having the initials on my business card helped on a project in Chile where one of the customer's employees was Canadian and knew what PE meant. What was anticipated to be a project delay was not because they trusted what I said. Right, wrong, or indifferent it saved tens of thousands of dollars in delays and re-work. It goes back to the old saying about perception.

I live in upstate NY so the options for continuing ed are even worse than in St. Louis. I have taken ASME course and the value really is not in the course itself. I have always found the value is the contacts that I have kept up with afterward. In a way, it is similar to this board. The company understood that and reasonable requests were granted. Obviously, we put this in our budget for the year and defended how/why/etc the course would contribute to the bottom line.

Also, there was little lost work. We had laptops and were expected to keep up with our work while we were gone. If not, there would be several hundered unread e-mails in just a few days plus cost delays for unanswered questions.

I'm not saying I understand the shift, except that I have noticed it too.

 

[prost]

dig1,
great insight! It never even occurred to me that there was some value in the networking at these type of CE (continuing ed) courses such as ASTM, ASME, UCLA, etc. put on.

However, no budget here for CE, I am on my own, which severely restricts viable options. Still, the right course might be worth emptying my own checkbook.

 

[JStephen]

FYI, a couple of classes I have taken for the continuing ed were very general- AutoCAD (never had used it), Visual Basic for example- keep an open mind.

 

[PhilBW]

I work for a small manufacturing company. The premiums for the company's product liability insurance are lower if at least some of the company's engineers are PE's. I interviewed with another company who was looking for a PE to hire because their insurance carrier was insisting on it. An insurance company doesn't offer lower premiums for a certain criteria (i.e. PE's on staff) unless thay have data showing their payout will be less if a compnay meets that criteria. In other words, the insurance companies are convinced they will pay less in product liabiltiy claims if there are PE's involved in the design of a company's products.

That goes to show that there are other benefits to hiring PE's besides just the legal requirement of stamping drawings.

 

[prost]

Thanks for everyone's inputs. The recent reqts make more sense when looked at it with benefit of others' experience.
It all boils down to the lawyers and liabilities, doesn't it?

 

[GregLocock]

and yet, companies that self-insure don't bother with PEs.

Funny old world, innit?

Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[Ashereng]

I believe Exxon/Mobil is self-insured.

They very certainly bother with PEs.

"Do not worry about your problems with mathematics, I assure you mine are far greater."
Albert Einstein
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[GregLocock]

http://www.hal-pc.org/~gtaylor/ExxonLloyds.html

Stretches my definition of self-insurance.

Cheers

Greg Locock

Please see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[prost]

Ashereng: which specialties in Exxon/Mobil are registered engineers? Just construction related, or are there others?

 

[JStephen]

I'm sure part of the issue is simply supply and demand.

When I was in college, three of the older ME professors just had master's degrees. But at the time, a new hire couldn't hardly get on at the university with a PhD. And looking back at some family history here, I find my grandmother listed as a schoolteacher in the public schools- when she had an 8th grade education (1920).

So if there's scads of PE's looking for work, that's liable to get a requirement. And if not, it won't. Ditto with advanced degrees, experience in the field, etc.

 

[Ashereng]

prost,

I think what you are asking is "Which jobs in Exxon/Mobil are limited to PE's". Than answer is none that I know of.

That is not what I mean.

There are many PE's in Exxon/Mobil doing lots of different jobs, and Exxon/Mobil value the fact that they are PE's.



"Do not worry about your problems with mathematics, I assure you mine are far greater."
Albert Einstein
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[prost]

Great to seem Exxon/Mobil values professional registration, even for jobs in which prof. registration is not needed. Most companies don't, because engineers stupidly allowed the registration law to be written with so many exemptions that a PE outside of construction industry is next to meaningless. That appears to be changing.

My question wasn't which jobs are limited to PEs, my question was "which jobs demand PEs?" If your company does a lot of construction, naturally your company will have PEs if they do not want to outsource design/build.

 

[rbulsara]

A few points:

1. PE stamp is required for design documents of a work that requires permit of building department or government regulatory angecies. So it is a statutory requirement and a good one at that.

2. Many employers see, and duly so, PE license as an extra qualification.

3. Whether or not you have a PE or not, if you are involved in a construction project and someone sues you are on the hook. Even that invlovement was delvering pizzas to the site.

4. If you are a Owner's rep (say at Exxon) who makes the decisions as to what you want in your office building or a plant construciton projects, it is good to have a PE license.

 

[Ashereng]

As a general statement:

- Civil usually require a PE
- Mechanical Structure Steel usually require a PE
- Electrical Power Distribution usually require a PE

You mean something like this Prost?

"Do not worry about your problems with mathematics, I assure you mine are far greater."
Albert Einstein
Have you read FAQ731-376 to make the best use of Eng-Tips Forums?

 

[prost]

sure, Ashereng, that's what I was assuming you meant by which specialties in your company had PEs--they appear to be construction jobs, building buildings, power plants, towers. Nothing wrong with that of course, but it surely explains the PEs, which are needed to sign off on construction design documents.