15 common CDR report mistakes made by applicants for Engineers Australia skill assessment

Suppose you are an engineer trying to settle down in Australia with the hope of promising a career in engineering. In that particular case, you have to be aware of Engineers Australia. To move there and work as an engineer, you must pass Engineer Australia’s Skills Assessment Test.

Preparing a standard CDR Report is the most crucial step of Australian Skilled Migration for engineers. The Competency Demonstration Report, or CDR as it is more commonly known, is a technical document demonstrating that you are an engineer with knowledge and skills that meet Australian standards. 

Engineers Australia requires engineers to undergo skill assessment tests before working in Australia. Many CDR reports are rejected yearly due to a variety of minor errors. Nevertheless, minor errors led to unfavorable assessment conclusions; in a few cases, candidates got barred for a year.

Through this blog, you can learn 15 common CDR Report mistakes made by applicants make for Engineers Australia skill assessment.

Common CDR report mistakes made by applicants for Engineers Australia skill assessment

Engineers Australia ensures applicants stick to all the instructions given in Migration Skills Assessment Booklet for comprehensive understanding while preparing the CDR Report. 

So, the applicants should write their standard or ideal CDR writing, keeping in mind all the regulations and recommendations provided by EA.

Below given are the most common mistakes made by applicants while doing CDR Report writing.

1. Plagiarism and errors

i. Plagiarism

Plagiarizing content encompasses your direct invitation to rejection and increases the chance of getting scrutinized by EA. Hundreds of online sources are available, but that doesn’t mean you must depend on those CDR samples for telecommunication.

Use your creativity and write the report extracting the basic ideas from those numerous online sources that indirectly help you broaden your knowledge horizon and awareness.

Authorities of the Skills Assessment Test are highly skilled and professional at their jobs and maintain specific criteria to evaluate your application. So, they quickly find out whether your report is original and distinctive.

ii. Grammatical errors and spelling

Make sure that your CDR Report is grammatically correct. Certain professionals must have written this report that you are providing.

So, you must ensure that the information has no grammatical errors, spelling, punctuation, or sentence flow. Before submitting, you must double-check its spelling, punctuation, and formatting in career episodes.

EA immediately scrutinized the documents if they found any error in the information. Through this examination, you will gain insight into the basic format of a report for competency assessment.

iii. Formatting

There shouldn’t be improper formatting in the CDR Report. Instead of using the material in bullet points, describe all the information in paragraphs to be readily understandable. Follow the guides provided and can take the help of professionals if needed so that there will be no minor formatting issues.

2. Information problem

i. Insufficient information

Not giving the details is no less than an unforgivable mistake. You have to choose a decent project to include in your CDR Report as a part of your educational certification. It would help if you mentioned the selected projects, summary statements, and problem statements.

ii. Inaccurate information

Inaccurate pieces of information: Couldn’t describe ideas adequately; how you use them; challenges that those ways brought. The project development mentions all the positive points, like in the design.  

Mentioning false content such as counterfeit projects, experiences, credentials, or other phony information to enhance your chances of passing skill assessment tests is one of the main mistakes engineers make.

So avoid such mistakes as this violation of the rules of EA that may directly lead to the rejection of the report, and Engineers Australia can take decisive actions against you.

3. Excessive technical details

CDR Report utilized tedious descriptions of the technical details in every project’s design phase. Also, mentioning unnecessary details and instead forgot to show your inventiveness.

We must consider technical portions when developing career episodes, as a career episode is also a technical record. The Migration Skills Assessment Booklet says career episodes should not be too technical. We shouldn’t focus on various technical portions like photographs, charts, infographics, complex calculations, or tables. Instead of being extensive and complex, this report must be to the point and brief.

4. Missing problem statement

Either Poor demonstration of the problem statement or missing it is also an unforgivable mistake that most applicants make.

5. Writing Career Episode about Group Activity

CDR comprises three distinct career episodes, and the report must include all these sections. You must highlight and detail a separate project you managed while earning your engineering degree in each episode of the CDR.

Write your report in the first person, prioritizing what you accomplished rather than what your team accomplished. It monitors what you did on that particular project, how you completed it, how you collaborated with others, and many more.

Career episodes must not be overly technical as well. Career episodes must avoid technical elements as much as possible. In this part, you should mention your project or difficulty, strategy, and results. EA wants to access your problem-solving capacity, and practical skills as your university degrees show your theoretical knowledge.

6. Word Limit

EA gives specific guidance on how many words you can use while writing each career episode in Migration Skill Assessment Booklet. According to the booklet, each episode must have between 1000-2500 words in career episodes.

Hence, you are not allowed to include unnecessary information but must address it within a limited word count that meets all the Engineer’s Australia requirements.

7. Division of one project into two career episodes

In the case of preparing career episodes, most of the applicants make the error of splitting the same project into two pieces and including each portion in the career episode. According to the MSA Booklet, you must complete one project in each career episode.

For example:

An Electrical engineer created his career episode based on the work completed during his engineering course in the seventh and eighth semesters. The central theme of this project was to Design and Installation of an LV distribution System with LUX Level Calculations for Lighting.

When he was in the seventh semester, he completed his first project. The project included formulating a research question, developing a specific strategy, designing a selecting method, and writing a research proposal. As a result, he talked about this project in his first Career Episode.

In the Eighth semester, he completed the second project. The project goals included a literature review, data collection, designing and installing LV distribution System with LUX Level Calculations for Lighting, and preparing a final report.

Even though these two projects had separate grades and got completed for different goals during her academic career, EA considers them to be the elements of the same project because he completed both tasks.

8. Use of a foreign language than English

Submission of the CDR writing in Australian English is mandatory. So, you have to translate all portions of documents into the English language. Describing your Career Episodes in other languages can decrease your chances.

9. Improper selection of projects

Poor selection or complete negligence in choosing the right and appropriate project showcases your knowledge and skills. Australia analyses your report with an eagle eye to ensure you’ve enough skills or capability to work as an engineer in Australia and add more professional knowledge to its workforce to take its economy to the next level.

It would help if you didn’t mention those projects whose skills and ideas you can’t completely describe. But, you have to note the project chosen based on your educational qualifications, the affiliated company, and your role to let them conceptualize it so they can know its importance.

You must show your indubitable sincerity for every responsibility you take and give security mechanisms of the project as well.

The report must include duration, locations, project purpose, and company profile. With this material contained in the news, it should also get presented in chronological order.

Visit:  How to prepare a CDR report for engineers migrating to Australia? ✈️✈️

10. Poor demonstration of the summary statement

Forget to write about all the capabilities you earned by working. You have to briefly mention this summary statement, showing your database management techniques and showcasing a sky-high level of your innovation.

A summary statement is one of the critical components of CDR. It is the beginning page of the report, which shows how well you accumulate facts and draw conclusions. This portion summarises all three career experiences in only one sentence.

11. Absence of problem statement

The missing problem statement is the primary reason for getting rejected by EA. It would help if you mentioned problem statements and measures you took to solve them in your career episode report.

Many applicants forget to mention the problem statement, so you should know this.

12. Writing about only your experiences.

Sometimes, reports get rejected due to a lack of good experiences. In case you did a project in the team when you were achieving an engineering degree, you should write your CDR Report from the perspective of “what I did” rather than “what we did.”

13. Lack of imaginative design

Designing is the most critical part of CDR assessment. Whenever you incorporate technical design efforts in your CDR Report, you increase the likelihood of being selected by EA.

In the same way, poor or lack of innovative design may decrease the chance of favorable appraisal of your CDR Report. So, describe your technological skills, experiences, and creative engineering concerning your design efforts, and show your creativity as much as possible.

14. Tedious CPD (Continuing Professional Development)

Recently, Engineers Australia commissioned this report that shows an engineer’s growth and development process after finishing an Undergraduate engineering degree.

This Continuing Professional Development includes various training, workshops, events, research, attending conferences, Internships, and anything got studied. Most of the applications get rejected just because of this particular reason.

In this portion, you must include all the essential information, such as title, location, date, and length of the training or workshops.

15. Incorrect design: format; structure

Following the information provided in Engineers Australia, you must prepare your CDR Report. We must be careful in reviewing the report in case of technical design and presentation to avoid errors related to format, technological innovation, and structure.

For example, the summary statement should not exceed 100 words, and the Continuing Professional Development (CPD) list should be formatted.

Documents necessary for a CDR report

You need many essential documents for writing a CDR Report, which Documents must include.

• Information about you, such as your birth certificate and passport biodata.
• A current copy of your resume with details about your employment and education.
• Evidence of English language proficiency
• Certificates of education and enrollment, academic transcripts, or other documents
• A letter of work (s)
• Three Career Episodes
• The Executive Summary
• Continuing Professional Education (CPD)

To know in detail, follow this blog: Competency Demonstration Report (CDR): Everything you need to know – MigrationSkillsAustralia.

Conclusion

The Competency Demonstration Report can serve as your entry ticket to obtaining skilled migration to Australia. For all engineers working in other countries around the world, this opens up the possibility of establishing a prosperous career in Australia.

Sometimes, Negligence and overconfidence make minor mistakes in preparing a CDR Report. Remember, many Engineers are applying for Australian immigration, which shows indescribably tough competition, even far beyond your imagination.

Don’t be frightened. Above are the 15 Common CDR Report mistakes made by applicants for Engineers Australia skill assessment which you can avoid. Also, you must follow some valuable tips, advice, and guidelines to prepare the best CDR Report and also you can follow CDR Samples as well.

We at MigrationSkillsAustralia help you with every skills assessment you need. Depending on the guidelines and procedures provided by Engineers Australia, CDR Report is prepared to make you able to qualify as a skilled engineer in Australia.

The specialty of our company is the best quality services for skills assessment applications and updated knowledge of Australian Migration of Professionals to help you in the best way possible. You are requested to try our service once.

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