Use this material to examine your own work. Confirm current requirements, forms and dates with ICE before applying.
You take the invigilated written Communication Task after your interview. It assesses part of the Interpersonal Skills and Communication attribute under strict closed-book rules.
The CEng scenario themes and response formats
ICE does not publish the questions in advance, but it does publish the themes and the formats. Scenarios are based on: Presidential themes; decarbonisation; sustainable communities; climate impacts; infrastructure and resource resilience; transport and connectivity; asset management; water and sanitation; energy supply; the productivity challenge; digital and data; emerging technologies and innovation; security of assets; the future of engineering and ethics; education and skills; and diversity and inclusion.
You can expect two of the following response formats, one for each scenario:
- A piece for a journalist, for inclusion in an industry supplement.
- A summary note to inform civil or infrastructure engineering students at your local university undertaking coursework.
- A letter to a local resident group explaining how the issues will affect them.
- A blog for people with a technical background but without specialist knowledge in civil or infrastructure engineering.
- A piece for students in your local secondary school explaining the main issues.
- A briefing note to your local government representative outlining the main points.
ICE also says you should be familiar with the two most recent Presidential addresses, and notes that themes from an inaugural address typically appear in questions after about six months.
What the format changes
The format is not decoration. It decides the register, the structure and what you leave out, and getting it wrong costs you on both "knowledge and relevance" and "clarity and presentation".
A letter to residents is not a shorter version of an industry article. It answers "what does this mean for me", it does not assume any technical vocabulary, and it says what will happen and when. A briefing note to a government representative is structured for someone who will read the first paragraph and skim the rest, so the recommendation goes at the top. A piece for secondary school students needs one idea, made concrete, without condescension.
Adapt the structure and language to the audience. Allow time to answer their question as well as explaining the technical content.
A way to spend the time
- 01
Read both, choose fast
Five to ten minutes at most. Choose the one where you have something to say, not the one that sounds more impressive. You cannot change your mind at forty minutes.
- 02
Identify the audience before the content
Write down who is reading it and what they want from it. Everything else follows from that, and it takes ninety seconds.
- 03
Plan on paper
Three to five headings and the one-line point of each. ICE lets you upload your plan as a supporting document if you wish. Writing without a plan is where structure marks are lost.
- 04
Write in the format asked for
A letter has a salutation. A briefing note has a recommendation near the top. A blog can have subheadings. Use the conventions of the document you were asked to produce.
- 05
Leave ten to fifteen minutes to check
Grammar and syntax are one of three marking criteria. Read it once for sense and once for errors: the two passes catch different things.
- 06
Save as PDF and upload
You have 15 minutes after the end. Do it immediately rather than re-reading; access is revoked when the window closes.
Your two sides of A4
They are optional, and they are the only thing you may bring. What is useful on them:
- Structures for each response format: the shape of a briefing note, of a letter, of an article.
- A handful of facts you are confident are right: figures you would be comfortable being questioned on.
- Prompts for the competing considerations in the main themes: cost, carbon, disruption, equity, resilience.
- The two most recent Presidential themes.
What is not useful: pre-written paragraphs. You cannot copy and paste from your reference material, and an attempt to transcribe a memorised passage reads exactly like what it is.
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.