NCEES Ethics and Practice 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A PE co-signs a report with a non-licensed senior engineer who performed all the technical analyses. Who bears professional responsibility for the report?
- The non-licensed engineer who performed the work
- The PE who signed and sealed the report (Correct answer)
- Both share equal legal and professional responsibility
- The firm that employed both individuals
Correct answer: The PE who signed and sealed the report
The PE who signs and seals a report accepts full professional responsibility for its content, regardless of who performed the underlying analysis.
Question 2: An engineer advertises her services by comparing her firm's quality favorably to a named competitor in a way she cannot substantiate. This action is:
- Acceptable competitive marketing in a free market
- Unethical because engineers must not make false or misleading statements about competitors (Correct answer)
- Legal as long as no lawsuit is filed by the competitor
- Required to win contracts in a competitive market
Correct answer: Unethical because engineers must not make false or misleading statements about competitors
Making unsubstantiated derogatory or misleading comparisons about competitors violates professional ethics codes requiring honesty and objectivity in public statements.
Question 3: A PE is asked to sign off on a structural analysis report that used assumptions she considers overly optimistic but technically within code limits. She should:
- Refuse to sign since any questionable assumption is unacceptable
- Sign after documenting her concerns and ensuring the assumptions are defensible (Correct answer)
- Sign without comment to avoid delays
- Have a junior engineer sign the report instead
Correct answer: Sign after documenting her concerns and ensuring the assumptions are defensible
A PE may sign reports containing debatable but defensible engineering judgments, provided she documents her evaluation and is satisfied the assumptions meet applicable standards.
Question 4: Which of the following best characterizes the NCEES Model Law's approach to the 'industrial exemption' in engineering practice?
- It broadly exempts all private company employees from licensure requirements
- It allows employees to practice engineering for their employer without a PE license in some contexts, subject to state-specific rules (Correct answer)
- It eliminates all licensing requirements for manufacturing engineers nationwide
- It only applies to federal government employees
Correct answer: It allows employees to practice engineering for their employer without a PE license in some contexts, subject to state-specific rules
The industrial exemption permits unlicensed engineers to practice within certain private-sector settings, but the scope varies by state and is subject to important limitations.
Question 5: A former employee publishes confidential design data from her previous employer without authorization. Under engineering ethics, this constitutes:
- Acceptable whistleblowing if the data reveals safety concerns
- A breach of the professional duty of confidentiality (Correct answer)
- Permissible once the employment relationship ends
- Protected speech under the First Amendment
Correct answer: A breach of the professional duty of confidentiality
The professional duty of confidentiality extends beyond the employment relationship; unauthorized disclosure of proprietary information is an ethical violation.
Question 6: An engineer reviewing a colleague's PE renewal application notices that the colleague falsely claimed professional development hours. The reviewing engineer should:
- Overlook it as a minor administrative matter
- Report the falsification to the state licensing board (Correct answer)
- Confront the colleague personally and drop the matter if they apologize
- Note it privately but take no formal action
Correct answer: Report the falsification to the state licensing board
Falsifying professional development records is fraud; engineers have an ethical obligation to report known misconduct by fellow professionals to the appropriate board.
Question 7: A PE is hired as a project manager for a large infrastructure project. She is not the engineer of record but signs off on contractor payment applications. Her primary ethical obligation regarding those payment approvals is to:
- Approve payments quickly to maintain contractor relationships
- Certify only that work billed has been satisfactorily completed to the best of her knowledge (Correct answer)
- Defer all payment decisions to the owner
- Approve payments based solely on the contractor's submissions without independent verification
Correct answer: Certify only that work billed has been satisfactorily completed to the best of her knowledge
When a PE certifies payment applications, she is professionally attesting that the work billed has been completed satisfactorily; she must perform adequate verification before signing.
NCEES Ethics and Practice 5
A PE co-signs a report with a non-licensed senior engineer who performed all the technical analyses.
Who bears professional responsibility for the report?