Make basic assessments and engineering judgements to justify and sign off product variations

Design & specify | DS015

This activity is about making engineering judgements to justify and sign off product variations, where relatively minor changes to a tested product or system are required and those changes are not critical to the fire performance of the product or construction being assessed. This includes signoff of documentation about the performance of products determined beyond existing DIAP and EXAP rules based on product performance.

Culture & behaviour

Core abilities

Culture & behaviour
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Effective working behaviours

You must:

  • Work within limits of own capability and know when to seek advice from others
  • Manage own time effectively
  • Work effectively individually and as part of a team
  • Communicate effectively
  • Undertake personal development activities to maintain currency of competence
Culture & behaviour
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Design & specification behaviours

You must:

  • Challenge unsafe behaviours and activities, and report where necessary
  • Work in accordance with quality requirements and challenge where they are not being met
  • Act ethically to ensure safe outcomes
Culture & behaviour
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Leadership behaviours for design and specification

You must:

  • Demonstrate effective leadership
Currency of competence
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Experience making basic assessments and engineering judgements

You must have:

  • 1 instance of making basic assessment and engineering judgement to sign off product variation
Core abilities
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Core passive fire knowledge

You must:

  • Know the importance of passive fire protection in safeguarding buildings and people
    • To include: compartmentation; how PFP impedes fire to protect structures and people.
  • Know suitable vocabulary to discuss passive fire protection products
Core abilities
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Selection of construction products

You must:

  • Know how legislation and official guidance relates to the specification of passive fire protection products, and the consequences of non-compliance
  • Understand that buildings work as systems and know the importance of this when selecting construction products
  • Understand the organisation's construction products hierarchy and how to obtain advice and raise concerns as appropriate within it
  • Understand your responsibility to follow organisational rules about construction products
  • Be aware of the Code for Construction Product Information (CCPI) and how it is utilised
  • Know how conformity marking can be used to support product specification
    • To include: Use of the Declaration of Performance to compare products for the same scope of application; Knowing that not all products can be conformity marked
  • Understand how third party certification can support product specification
  • Understand how test reports can support product specification
Core abilities
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Impact of product variation in design and specification

You must:

  • Understand the potential impact of product variation on construction system conformance or compliance
  • Understand when product variation may be required
    • Where suitable products cannot be specified based on direct field of application and certificated product performance
  • Know organisational processes to escalate product variation queries
Specific abilities
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Clarifying requirements for basic product variation

You must:

  • Know what constitutes a basic assessment which does not affect fire safety, with regards to product variation
    • Guidance can be found in the PFPF guide to Undertaking Technical Assessments of Fire Performance of Construction Products Based on Fire Test Evidence
  • Understand the importance of only making judgements within your specialist area
  • Know the level of complexity of assessment that you are competent to undertake
  • Know processes for escalating queries outside your area of expertise or level of competence

You must be able to:

  • Clarify requirements for the product variation requested
  • Redirect any queries outside your specialist area
  • Escalate requests outside of your level of competence
Specific abilities
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Use of data sources for product variation

You must:

  • Understand the difference between primary and secondary data on fire performance of construction products
  • Understand the importance of primary data in decision making
    • Including: Why engineering judgements should not be made based on secondary data alone
  • Understand organisational rules on levels of information needed to select construction products to create solutions
    • Including product characteristics, performance requirements and dependencies
Specific abilities
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Make basic product variation decisions

You must:

  • Know sources of supporting information for basic assessments, and the relevance of that information to decision making
    • To include information on: Performance and product characteristics, rules of application, test information, product interfaces and interactions, risks, durability, service life, access & maintenance, warranties and guarantees

You must be able to:

  • Source, review and interpret relevant supporting data to inform basic assessments
    • To include information on: Performance and product characteristics, rules of application, test information, product interfaces and interactions, risks, durability, service life, access & maintenance, warranties and guarantees
  • Make basic assessments and judgements about suitable product variations
  • Prepare reports on product variation, including justification for recommendations made
  • Follow organisational processes for report signoff and distribution

Currency of competence

Specific abilities

Culture & behaviour

Core abilities

Currency of competence

Specific abilities

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