Exam Content Outline · EMA Standard v3.0 · Draft

EME-III Expert

Draft — this examination is not yet open. The outline is published now so the standard is visible before the first sitting; it will be marked complete when the examination opens.

1. Purpose and how to read this document

This document states what the EME-III examination will assess and how. It is a complete draft: the examination is not yet open, and the outline will be marked complete when it is.

EME-III certifies executive-scope judgment: leading an engineering organisation, largely through systems and through other leaders. Every EMA-I and EMP-II indicator applies here — an Expert is expected to meet all three levels — and this outline adds only the indicators that exist at executive scope, tagged exec. Read the EMA-I and EMP-II outlines first.

The questions place the candidate as a director, vice-president or head of engineering. Their recurring material is the system: the structure that decides who owns what, the leadership pipeline, the operating cadence, the technical strategy and its bet-the-company decisions, the economics of the whole function, and the culture as the most consequential thing the executive runs. The information in these scenarios arrives late and filtered, the consequences are measured in years, and the goal is often the thing in question. More than two-thirds of the questions ask the candidate to analyse a situation and evaluate options rather than apply a known principle.

Preparation: everything below EME-III, then the Body of Knowledge units in this outline's weight order with attention to every judgment item tagged [exec], the How Judgment Scales table's executive column, and each unit's Tensions section, which at this level is where most questions live.

2. Exam specification

Questions

Time

120 min

Pass standard

80%

Per domain

18 of 90

Question formats

Single best answer. A situation and four options; exactly one is the most defensible action.
Extended scenario. A longer situation stem at organisational scale, then one or more questions with one best answer each. Most EME-III questions are extended scenarios.
Select all that apply. Two or more options are correct. Scored as one question, right only when the selection matches exactly.
True or false. A statement about practice to be judged true or false. Rare at this level.

Scoring

Every question is worth one point; no partial credit, no negative marking; unanswered scores zero. The pass standard is 80% of all questions in the sitting — 72 of 90. The clock is enforced by the examination server. A sitting draws eighteen questions from each of the five domains from the EME-III bank, in an order fixed for that sitting.

About the weights below

From 2026-10-27, every EME-III sitting started on or after that date draws its questions by the per-competency weights in this outline: each competency contributes the number of questions shown, and each domain keeps its 18 of 90. Sittings started before that date drew 18 questions per domain without a per-competency distribution.

3. The cumulative model

EME-III includes every indicator of EMA-I and EMP-II plus its own. Below, each indicator shows the level that added it; a certified Expert is held to all of them.

People Leadership — 18 questions

PL-1Delegation, ownership, and decision rights

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can delegate an outcome rather than a set of steps, stating the constraints and the level of authority that goes with it. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can match the scope of what they hand off to a person's demonstrated capability on that kind of work, with a deliberate stretch and a safety net. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise the moment they are about to take delegated work back, and choose support over rescue. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can delegate a whole team to a manager — its charter, its decisions, its outcomes — and stay accountable for the result without re-deciding it. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can make decision rights explicit across several teams so that a disputed decision has a known owner before the dispute. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can design the organisation's decision rights — which decisions are made at which level, and how that is made visible — so that most decisions never reach them. exec
I7A certified Expert can recognise when decisions are flowing upward because the design is wrong rather than because the people are weak. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

Every significant decision in a two-hundred-person organisation still lands on your desk.
A director asks you to decide something you have explicitly delegated to them.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-1.S2, PL-1.S5, PL-1.S7

PL-2Feedback and difficult conversations

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can give corrective feedback anchored in a specific situation and observable behaviour, and name its impact, without diagnosing intent. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can hold a difficult conversation early rather than waiting for a review cycle or hoping the problem resolves. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can invite and act on feedback about their own management from the people they lead. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can give a manager feedback about their leadership — a pattern across several moments — with the same specificity as feedback about a task. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can act on damning skip-level feedback about a manager by establishing the facts before confronting anyone. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can give a senior leader feedback about their performance and their effect on the organisation, and follow it with consequences. exec
I7A certified Expert can shape a feedback culture through what leadership visibly does with bad news. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A vice-president hits every number and leads through fear.
Bad news reaches you weeks late through three layers, every time.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-2.S2, PL-2.S5, PL-2.S7

PL-3Hiring and onboarding

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can run a structured interview against criteria defined before the process starts, and recognise the biases that unstructured evaluation invites. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can assess what a candidate can do rather than which tools they were permitted, and distinguish capability from fluency. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can design a first ninety days that gives a new hire explicit outcomes, a named guide, and early feedback. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can appoint a manager for sound reasons — demonstrated judgment about people, not seniority or retention — and support them through the first six months. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can calibrate the hiring bar across several teams so that the same capability earns the same decision regardless of interviewer. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can make a senior or executive appointment — including the choice between an unproven internal candidate and a proven external one — and own what the choice commits the organisation to. exec
I7A certified Expert can run a hiring system that stays calibrated across an organisation and through growth. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A newly hired senior leader from a very different culture is struggling and their team is losing people.
The organisation must double in a year and the hiring bar is already slipping.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-3.S2, PL-3.S5, PL-3.S7

PL-4Performance management

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can diagnose whether an engineer's underperformance is a matter of skill, will, or the conditions they were given, before choosing a response. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can set expectations explicitly enough that a later performance conversation refers to something the engineer already knew. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can follow a fair process to an honest consequence, including a formal one, without avoiding it or rushing it. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can manage a manager's performance, including the performance of their team, and distinguish a manager problem from a team problem. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can run calibration across teams so that ratings are consistent, and challenge a manager's case that lacks evidence or fair process. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can act on a leader's performance problem — including a loyal, long-tenured leader the organisation has outgrown — with fairness and without delay. exec
I7A certified Expert can design a performance system that is consistent across the organisation and that people trust to be fair. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A long-tenured director is no longer growing with the role and is loyal to you personally.
Ratings across the organisation are inflated and everyone knows it.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-4.S2, PL-4.S5, PL-4.S7

PL-5Career development and growth paths

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can run a one-on-one that belongs to the report — their growth, their concerns — rather than to the manager's status needs. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can respond to a promotion request with evidence, a named gap, and a path, rather than a yes to retain or a no without reasons. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can help an engineer weigh the senior individual-contributor track against management without steering them toward the manager's own path. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can create growth paths across teams — moves, stretch roles, the senior individual-contributor track — and see who is and is not getting them. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can develop a manager's career deliberately, including toward roles that compete with their own. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can design the career architecture — levels, the senior individual-contributor track, the leadership pipeline — and detect when it is producing the wrong people. exec
I7A certified Expert can read succession as a structural property and act on key-person risk before it materialises. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

You inherit an organisation where three people hold all the critical knowledge.
The leadership pipeline has produced no ready successor in two years.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-5.S2, PL-5.S5, PL-5.S7

PL-6Leading through leaders

6 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Professional can select managers on evidence of judgment about people and delivery, and decline to appoint the strongest engineer by default. org(from EMP-II)
I2A certified Professional can develop the managers who report to them through their own one-on-ones, coaching and honest feedback, rather than by sending them on a course. org(from EMP-II)
I3A certified Professional can hold a manager accountable for their team's outcomes and health without taking the team back from them. org(from EMP-II)
I4A certified Professional can set a span of control and a management structure that lets managers actually manage. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Expert can build a leadership team as a system — complementary strengths, clear scopes, shared accountability — rather than a set of individually strong leaders. exec
I6A certified Expert can develop leaders of leaders, and recognise the signals that a leader is ready for a larger scope before they ask. exec
I7A certified Expert can hold a senior leader accountable for an organisation's outcomes and health while acting through them, and know when to replace them. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A critical programme is in trouble and the responsible vice-president keeps reassuring you it is fine.
Your leadership team behaves as rivals for your attention rather than as a team.
You must decide between two leaders for a scope that will define the next three years.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: PL-6.S2, PL-6.S5, PL-6.S7

Domain hub: People Leadership

Delivery & Execution — 18 questions

DE-1Prioritisation under constraint

4 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can sequence a team's work by value and cost of delay rather than by who asked loudest or most recently. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can say no by surfacing the cost of yes — "we can do X, and Y slips" — and let the stakeholder choose. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can protect a team's focus against constant reprioritisation, and recognise when too much started work means nothing finishes. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can prioritise across several teams against a shared bottleneck, and make the resulting trade-offs visible to every team that loses. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can protect several teams' focus from department-level churn without becoming the only person who can say no. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can manage the organisation's portfolio — which bets it makes, which it declines, and when it stops one — and communicate the declined ones as clearly as the funded. exec
I7A certified Expert can hold a portfolio steady against executive-level churn while remaining genuinely open to a change in strategy. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The executive team adds a strategic initiative every quarter and removes none.
A programme two years in is not going to deliver and its sponsor is your peer.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: DE-1.S2, DE-1.S5, DE-1.S7

DE-2Estimation, planning, and honest commitments

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can distinguish an estimate from a commitment, and buffer the commitment deliberately rather than promising the estimate. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can re-plan openly when a commitment is at risk, giving stakeholders the choice between scope, date and quality rather than absorbing the gap with overtime. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can decline to give a date on the spot without an estimate, and say what it would take to give one. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can make a commitment that depends on several teams by aggregating uncertainty honestly rather than adding up best cases. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can detect status that has been shaded on its way up, and build reporting that surfaces trouble early. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can build an organisation-wide planning cadence whose commitments the business can rely on, without demanding a certainty the work cannot provide. exec
I7A certified Expert can ensure bad news about delivery reaches them in time to act, by design rather than by luck. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The board wants a committed date for a multi-year programme.
Status rolls up green through four layers and you no longer believe it.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: DE-2.S2, DE-2.S5, DE-2.S7

DE-3Reliability, incident response, and operational ownership

4 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can run an incident in progress in the right order — restore service, communicate, then find the cause — and resist debugging while users are down. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can lead a blameless postmortem that changes the system rather than naming the person. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can treat on-call load and service-level objectives as the team's operational ownership, not an interruption to real work. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can establish ownership for a service or a class of failure that falls between teams, before the next incident. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can design an on-call system across several teams that is sustainable, and read reliability trends across services rather than incident by incident. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can treat reliability as a strategic property — investment, risk appetite, what the business is implicitly assuming — and argue for it at the executive table. exec
I7A certified Expert can lead the organisation through a major failure — the incident, the communication, the learning, the accountability — in a way that leaves it stronger. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A stated value of "reliability first" collapsed when a launch coincided with an exhausted error budget.
A serious outage has reached customers and the press, and the board wants someone blamed.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: DE-3.S2, DE-3.S5, DE-3.S7

DE-4Managing scope, risk, and dependencies across workstreams

4 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can name a risk early, with its likelihood and impact, rather than hoping it does not materialise. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can manage a dependency on another team by negotiating a timeline and a fallback, before escalating and before building around it. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can trade scope before quality when a deadline is fixed, and say so. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can see and manage the dependencies between their teams, and the risks that fall between them because each team's view stops at its boundary. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can run a programme that spans several teams with a single view of scope and risk, without making every team wait on a central plan. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can see the systemic risks and dependencies an organisation does not see — the ones no team's view contains — and build the information flow that surfaces them. exec
I7A certified Expert can govern programmes that span the organisation without a central plan that every team waits on. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

Chronic delivery friction recurs at the boundaries between several of your organisations and process fixes have not helped.
A dependency on a single vendor, team or person has become an existential risk nobody owns.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: DE-4.S2, DE-4.S5, DE-4.S7

DE-5Designing how work flows

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can choose the lightest process that solves the team's actual problem, and change it when the problem changes. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can recognise when a drop in throughput is caused by interruptions and fragmentation rather than effort, and change the flow of work rather than push the people. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can introduce AI-assisted tooling to a team's workflow with an explicit view of what it changes about review, testing and ownership. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can decide which practices are standard across teams and which are each team's own — aligned autonomy — and explain the boundary. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can invest in developer experience and AI-assisted workflows at department scale, measured by what teams can now do rather than by adoption. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can design the organisation's operating system — cadence, standards, the developer platform — so that dozens of teams deliver without the executive in the room. exec
I7A certified Expert can decide the organisation's investment in developer experience and AI-assisted work as a strategic bet, measured by what the organisation can now do. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

Every organisation under you runs a different operating rhythm and the seams between them are where work dies.
A large investment in AI-assisted engineering must be justified to the board.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: DE-5.S2, DE-5.S5, DE-5.S7

Domain hub: Delivery & Execution

Strategy & Vision — 18 questions

SV-1Engineering strategy

5 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can translate a business goal into the team's work as outcomes — the change wanted in the world — rather than a feature list. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can ensure every engineer can say why their current work matters to the business. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can re-derive the team's plan when circumstances change, instead of defending the original list. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can write a department strategy with a connecting thesis — why these teams do these things — rather than assemble team wish lists. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can defend a strategy against churn and encroachment, and change it when the evidence says so rather than when the pressure does. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can author the engineering strategy — a written, arguable thesis connecting technical direction to the business's goals — and argue it at the executive table. exec
I7A certified Expert can keep a strategy alive as the world changes, distinguishing a change in the evidence from a change in the pressure. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The company is shifting from a single product to a platform strategy and engineering was built for the old one.
Your skip-levels reveal that engineers four levels down do not believe the company's direction.
Adopting AI across the products is now an existential priority and the organisation has little expertise.

Cognitive mix: apply 25% · analyse/evaluate 75%Traces to: SV-1.S2, SV-1.S5, SV-1.S7

SV-2Communicating and partnering across functions

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can explain a technical trade-off to a non-engineering stakeholder in the language of their outcome, without jargon and without condescension. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can partner with product and design as peers whose constraints are real, rather than as a queue of requests. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can deliver bad news about a delivery to a stakeholder early, with options, rather than late with excuses. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can partner with a product director and a design lead as peers, resolving disagreements about investment with evidence rather than escalation. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can represent engineering's trade-offs to executives so that they make an informed choice, and accept the choice when it goes the other way. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can communicate engineering's position, risks and trade-offs to the executive team and the board in their terms, and secure decisions rather than sympathy. exec
I7A certified Expert can build engineering's standing in the company through what it delivers and how it partners, so that it is consulted before decisions rather than informed after. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The board believes engineering is the reason the company is slow.
A peer executive has committed engineering to a date without asking.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: SV-2.S2, SV-2.S5, SV-2.S7

SV-3Roadmapping

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can hold a defined share of a team's capacity for platform and quality work and defend it with evidence of what its absence costs. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can present a team roadmap as bets with expected outcomes and confidence, not as a list of promised dates. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise when a roadmap is a wish list assembled bottom-up with no connecting thesis. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can balance product delivery against platform and quality investment across several teams, including work no single team would fund. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can present a department roadmap as bets and confidence levels to people who want dates. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can set multi-year investment across product, platform and quality, and defend the platform's runway against every quarter's urgency. exec
I7A certified Expert can decide when a roadmap should change and when it should hold, and explain the decision in terms the business accepts. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The platform's runway will run out in eighteen months and every quarter's plan defers the work.
A new chief executive wants the roadmap redone in a month.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: SV-3.S2, SV-3.S5, SV-3.S7

SV-4Engineering economics

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can frame a build-versus-buy decision around total cost, differentiation and reversibility rather than engineering preference. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can account for the cost of the team's delivery — people, vendors, infrastructure — well enough to argue for a change in it. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can evaluate an AI service or vendor as a third option beside build and buy, with its own cost and risk profile. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can plan and defend a department budget and headcount in terms of outcomes and cost of delivery. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can make a vendor, build or AI-service decision at department scale, including the exit cost and who owns the relationship. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can reason about the economics of the whole engineering function — cost of delivery, capital allocation, headcount as investment — and change them. exec
I7A certified Expert can make a make, buy or AI decision at organisational scale, including the infrastructure the products will increasingly depend on, with an explicit view of exit cost and strategic dependence. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

You face a make-or-buy decision for the AI infrastructure your products will rely on.
The board asks why engineering costs what it does and what would change if it cost less.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: SV-4.S2, SV-4.S5, SV-4.S7

SV-5Engineering metrics and measurement

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can choose delivery metrics that measure flow and stability rather than activity, and say what each one cannot show. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can recognise when a metric has become a target and is being gamed. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can decline to use a single productivity number for individuals, and explain why. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can choose metrics that compare or aggregate teams without inviting the gaming that comparison creates. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can measure the effect of AI assistance on delivery honestly, including where the numbers say it is not helping. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can choose the measures by which the business judges engineering, and refuse measures that would make the organisation worse to hit. exec
I7A certified Expert can report AI's effect on the organisation's delivery honestly to the board, including uncertainty and where the effect is negative. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The board wants a single number for engineering productivity.
A large AI investment must show a return and the honest answer is "not yet, and here is why".

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: SV-5.S2, SV-5.S5, SV-5.S7

SV-6Organisational design and leading change

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Professional can design team boundaries around ownership and cognitive load, and see a team boundary and a system boundary as one decision. org(from EMP-II)
I2A certified Professional can lead several teams through a reorganisation — communicating the why, naming what changes and what does not, and staying present through the transition. org(from EMP-II)
I3A certified Professional can recognise when a structural problem is being treated as a people problem, and the reverse. org(from EMP-II)
I4A certified Professional can settle a charter dispute between teams at the level that sets charters. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Expert can design the shape of the organisation — structure, ownership boundaries, the layers between them and the work — around the strategy, and know what each design makes easy and hard. exec
I6A certified Expert can lead an organisation through a major transition — a reorganisation, a merger, an acquisition — so that the change sticks and the cynicism does not. exec
I7A certified Expert can weigh reorganisation options by their effect on leaders' scopes, ownership clarity and coordination cost, not by who is asking. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

An acquisition brings in a redundant engineering organisation with its own stack and culture.
Repeated reorganisations have left a cynicism that change will not stick.
After a reorganisation you led, morale dropped and a narrative spread that leadership does not care.

Cognitive mix: apply 25% · analyse/evaluate 75%Traces to: SV-6.S2, SV-6.S5, SV-6.S7

Domain hub: Strategy & Vision

Technical Judgment — 18 questions

TJ-1Evaluating architectural decisions and their organisational consequences

4 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can improve a design decision through questions — what does this assume, what happens when it fails, who has to coordinate — without taking it over. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can spend deliberation on the irreversible decisions and let reversible ones move fast. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can see a system boundary and a team boundary as one decision. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can keep architecture coherent across autonomous teams by setting standards at the boundaries rather than reviewing every design. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can make a deliberate platform bet on behalf of several teams and own its organisational consequences. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can own the organisation's technical strategy — the bet-the-company architectural decisions — and evaluate them by their organisational consequences over years. exec
I7A certified Expert can keep technical strategy coherent across acquired teams and systems without forcing uniformity where it is not worth its cost. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A once-in-a-decade platform decision must be made with incomplete information and two credible camps.
Acquired systems and teams must be integrated with a strategy that predates them.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-1.S2, TJ-1.S5, TJ-1.S7

TJ-2Technical debt

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can make technical debt visible in terms stakeholders understand — what it costs per month, what it risks — rather than as an engineering complaint. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can distinguish debt worth repaying from debt worth carrying, and schedule repayment as ordinary work. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise a proposed rewrite as a bet and evaluate it as one. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can make systemic technical debt that no single team owns visible, and fund its repayment at department level. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can weigh a large repayment programme against feature delivery with an explicit model of what each delays. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can present technical debt as a strategic liability — the platform's runway, the business's exposure — and win investment against it at the executive table. exec
I7A certified Expert can decide when a large modernisation is a necessity and when it is an engineering preference dressed as one. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The core platform is a decade old and a modernisation would take two years of a third of the organisation.
The board asks what technical risk the company is carrying.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-2.S2, TJ-2.S5, TJ-2.S7

TJ-3Code review and quality standards

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can set a quality bar the team owns — tests, review, definition of done — and hold it under deadline pressure. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can shape a code-review culture that teaches rather than gatekeeps, and notice when review has become rubber-stamping. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can state what review must establish for AI-generated code, and who is accountable for it. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can set an organisation-level quality bar that autonomous teams meet in their own way, and see when it is being met on paper only. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can set standards for AI-generated code across teams — verification, ownership, disclosure — without prescribing each team's tools. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can set the organisation's quality posture and the systems that maintain it — including standards for AI-generated code — without owning any team's practice. exec
I7A certified Expert can recognise when a quality failure at organisational scale is a leadership failure rather than an engineering one. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A pattern of quality failures across the organisation is being explained team by team.
AI-generated code is now most of what ships and nobody can say what review establishes.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-3.S2, TJ-3.S5, TJ-3.S7

TJ-4Technical credibility and intervention

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can stay close enough to the team's technical work to judge it — reading designs, reviewing selectively, asking sharp questions — without becoming its bottleneck. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can decide when to intervene in a technical decision and when to let the team own it, and know which decisions are theirs. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can resist doing the engineering themselves when the team is struggling, and choose the intervention that leaves the team stronger. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can stay close enough to several teams' technical work to judge it — through design reviews, architecture forums and the artifacts themselves — without doing it or blocking it. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can decide when a technical decision in one of their teams is theirs to override, and intervene through the manager rather than around them. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can decide which technical concerns belong on an executive's personal agenda and track them without displacing the leaders who own them. exec
I7A certified Expert can stay technically credible at executive scope — able to judge a strategy, a risk, a claim — without pretending to a closeness to the code they no longer have. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

You must decide which technical risks to track personally in an organisation of five hundred.
A leader presents a technical claim you suspect is wrong and you are no longer close enough to be sure.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-4.S2, TJ-4.S5, TJ-4.S7

TJ-5AI-assisted engineering

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can introduce AI assistance to a team with explicit expectations for verification, ownership and disclosure. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can recognise the risks AI assistance introduces — unverified code, leaked data, eroded understanding — and put proportionate controls in place. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can distinguish where AI assistance genuinely helps the team from where it is being used to look fast. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can govern AI-assisted engineering across teams — what is permitted, what must be verified, what data may be used — proportionately to the risk. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can build the capability to use AI assistance well across a department, and recognise where it is eroding understanding rather than adding leverage. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can set the organisation's strategy for AI-assisted engineering — investment, governance, capability, risk — and say what changes about the work and the workforce. exec
I7A certified Expert can evaluate an emerging AI capability that could be transformative and is unproven, and decide how much of the organisation to bet on it. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

An emerging AI capability could transform the product but is unproven and resource-intensive.
The board expects AI to reduce engineering headcount and wants a plan.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-5.S2, TJ-5.S5, TJ-5.S7

TJ-6Security, privacy, and compliance as engineering responsibilities

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can treat a security vulnerability, a privacy obligation or a compliance requirement as the team's own work, prioritised by risk rather than deferred to a function. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can respond to a security finding proportionately — triage by exploitability and exposure — rather than freezing or ignoring it. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise a privacy or access-control problem in an everyday decision before it becomes an incident. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can assign ownership for a class of security, privacy or compliance gap that spans teams and see the fix through. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can weigh a compliance requirement against delivery honestly, distinguishing what is mandatory from what is merely requested. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can own security, privacy and compliance as organisational risk — investment, accountability, what the business is exposed to — at executive level. exec
I7A certified Expert can lead the organisation through a mandate that requires re-architecting systems across it, sequencing the work by risk rather than by who shouts. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A new security and compliance mandate requires re-architecting systems across the whole organisation.
A serious class of vulnerability spans many services and fixing it properly will take a year.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: TJ-6.S2, TJ-6.S5, TJ-6.S7

Domain hub: Technical Judgment

Culture & Coaching — 18 questions

CC-1Psychological safety and productive conflict

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can respond to an admitted mistake, a naive question or a challenge to their idea with curiosity rather than punishment. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can pair psychological safety with high standards, and recognise that "going easy" is not safety. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can invite open disagreement about ideas and then expect commitment once the decision is made. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can build psychological safety in the managers they lead and see when a manager's team has gone quiet. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can resolve conflict between teams by making the underlying disagreement explicit rather than by separating the people. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can build trust in leadership across an organisation, knowing it is created in visible moments, spent by inconsistency, and repaid only by behaviour over time. exec
I7A certified Expert can make it safe to bring bad news to the top, and can tell when it has stopped being safe. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

Your skip-levels reveal a version of the organisation your leaders never describe.
After a decision went badly, nobody will tell you what they thought at the time.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: CC-1.S2, CC-1.S5, CC-1.S7

CC-2Coaching versus directing

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can develop an engineer's judgment through questions rather than supplying the answer, and know when directing is the right exception. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can recognise when they are rescuing rather than coaching, and what the team learns from each. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can coach a senior engineer who is strong technically but does not mentor, document or lift others. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can coach the coaches — develop a manager's judgment through questions — and resist solving their team's problems for them. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can recognise a manager who is too hands-off or too hands-on and coach them toward the right distance. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can develop the judgment of senior leaders through questions and exposure rather than instruction, and build a leadership culture that coaches. exec
I7A certified Expert can recognise when the organisation has learned to wait for the executive's answer, and change what the executive does. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

Your leaders bring you decisions fully formed and wait for approval.
A senior leader is technically excellent and develops nobody.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: CC-2.S2, CC-2.S5, CC-2.S7

CC-3Inclusive practices and equitable opportunity distribution

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can notice who on the team gets the stretch work, the visibility and the benefit of the doubt, and correct the pattern. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can run team rituals — meetings, reviews, on-call, recognition — so that they do not systematically favour the loudest, the most present or the most similar to the manager. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise glue work and ensure it is valued and distributed rather than left to whoever will not refuse it. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can read promotion, opportunity and attrition patterns across teams and act on an inequity the numbers reveal. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can hold managers accountable for equitable practice on their teams without making it a compliance exercise. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can read the organisation's opportunity structure from its data — promotion, attrition, pay, who leads what — and change the structure, not only the outcomes. exec
I7A certified Expert can hold the leadership team accountable for equity as a business responsibility rather than a programme. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The organisation's senior leadership is homogeneous and the pipeline below it is not.
An inequity in pay across the organisation has surfaced and correcting it is expensive.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: CC-3.S2, CC-3.S5, CC-3.S7

CC-4Motivation, recognition, and sustainable pace

3 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can recognise burnout and disengagement early from changes in behaviour, and respond to the person before the output. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can protect a sustainable pace, and treat a run of heroics as a system failure rather than a badge. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise people specifically and in the way that person values, including on a distributed team where effort is not visible. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can sustain motivation and pace across several teams, including distributed ones, through what they reward and what they refuse to normalise. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can recognise department-wide burnout as a system property and change the system. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can shape the organisation's relationship to pace — what leadership rewards, what it survives, what it refuses — including across distributed and hybrid teams. exec
I7A certified Expert can sustain motivation through a long period of difficulty by telling the truth about it. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The company has been in a hard year and the organisation is running on fumes.
A return-to-office decision is about to be made for reasons that have nothing to do with the work.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: CC-4.S2, CC-4.S5, CC-4.S7

CC-5Values, integrity, and ethical judgment under pressure

4 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can make the costly right call — on quality, on honesty, on a person — when pressure points the other way, and know that the team is watching. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can act on a values breach by a high performer rather than let results buy an exemption. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can recognise when they are being asked to shade the truth about status and decline. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can hold managers to the organisation's values, including when the manager who breaches them delivers. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can decline to shade status, ratings or commitments upward, and absorb the cost of declining rather than passing it down. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can act on the organisation's values when it is expensive at company level — a launch, a customer, a leader — and knows that this is the moment the culture is actually set. exec
I7A certified Expert can exercise ethical judgment where the law, the policy and the pressure of the moment do not settle the question. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

A stated value collapsed under a launch deadline and the organisation noticed.
A customer is asking for something that is legal and wrong.

Cognitive mix: apply 25% · analyse/evaluate 75%Traces to: CC-5.S2, CC-5.S5, CC-5.S7

CC-6Self-management

2 questions

Proficiency indicators

I1A certified Associate can manage their own time and calendar so that the team's needs, not the inbox, determine where the hours go. team(from EMA-I)
I2A certified Associate can recognise their own overload and burnout, set boundaries, and ask for help before it reaches the team. team(from EMA-I)
I3A certified Associate can separate their own anxiety about a situation from the decision it needs. team(from EMA-I)
I4A certified Professional can manage their own effectiveness as the layer between teams and executives — time, attention, the temptation to be in every room — deliberately. org(from EMP-II)
I5A certified Professional can recognise when their own overload is degrading their judgment about people, and change their load before it changes their decisions. org(from EMP-II)
I6A certified Expert can sustain their own judgment and resilience under executive-scale consequence and visibility, and build the support that makes it possible. exec
I7A certified Expert can recognise when their own state is shaping the organisation's, and act on themselves first. exec

Scenario contexts at this level

The organisation has become anxious and you notice it started with you.
You have not taken a real break in two years and have begun to make decisions to end conversations.

Cognitive mix: apply 30% · analyse/evaluate 70%Traces to: CC-6.S2, CC-6.S5, CC-6.S7

Domain hub: Culture & Coaching

5. What this exam does not assess

Recall of models, frameworks, definitions or bibliography.
Tools, languages, vendors or specific technologies.
Employment law, corporate governance, securities regulation, human-resources policy or the practices of any specific company or jurisdiction.
Financial modelling beyond the reasoning an engineering executive needs to argue an investment; the examination does not assess accounting.

6. Change log

v3.0 · 2026-09-23. First published Exam Content Outline for EME-III, as a complete draft ahead of the examination opening. Aligns to the EMA Competency Framework v3.0. Inherits every EMA-I and EMP-II indicator and adds executive-scope indicators.