To ensure that your project is successful, it is crucial to employ engineers with Professional Engineer's license or relevant certification for the State in which they operate in. Because you don't want your project to collapse, the engineers who design the various structures should have a certain level of competence.
Every State has licensing and certification department or board that administers the licensing process and grants the licenses. An engineer that works on your project should stamp the drawings for the project with his or her seal which comes with the license. Although not all engineers in a firm need to be licensed, the one who supervises your project should be licensed. Good civil engineering firms have most of their engineers licensed.
Types of Engineering Licenses
Generally, engineering licenses are granted into two parts. The first one is offered after taking Engineer in Training (EIT) test and covers the fundamentals of engineering theory. The second one is offered after taking the Professional Engineer examination and after 4 years of experience of working under a licensed engineer. It covers real world and more practical engineering.
Industry Exclusion
There are some engineering firms that may operate without any licensed engineers. This is possible when they offer their services to other businesses---and not the public. This is usually categorized under what is commonly reefed to as industry exclusion and states that engineers that work for industry do not have to be licensed. Generally, such engineering companies often engage in mechanical design works and acts as an extension of an organization's in-house engineering department. Established civil engineering firms, for instance, can also bring in other outside firms whenever they are short on staff, especially on a new project---this is where they bring in such firms with unlicensed engineers. This also happens when the firm doesn't want to hire new staff and then lay them off when they are through with a project.