Top 12 Structural Engineer Skills to Put on Your Resume

In the competitive field of structural engineering, a resume that reads crisp and credible can tip the scales. Blend sharp technical depth with grounded problem-solving and clear communication. Show your command of tools, but don’t forget the judgment that holds a design together when loads shift and constraints bite.

Structural Engineer Skills

1. AutoCAD
2. Revit
3. SAP2000
4. STAAD.Pro
5. ETABS
6. Rhino
7. Tekla Structures
8. Mathcad
9. Ansys
10. Civil 3D
11. MicroStation
12. BIM (Building Information Modeling)

1. AutoCAD

AutoCAD is a CAD platform structural engineers use to produce precise 2D drawings and lightweight 3D models, driving details, plans, and coordination sheets that contractors can actually build from.

Why It's Important

It delivers speed, accuracy, and standardization for drawings and details, supports collaboration through xrefs and sheet sets, and slots neatly into broader BIM-centric workflows when needed.

How to Improve AutoCAD Skills

1. Customize relentlessly: Tool palettes, ribbons, workspaces, and profiles tuned to structural tasks cut clicks and errors.

2. Standardize: Deploy templates, title blocks, plot styles, and layers with CAD standards and QA checklists baked in.

3. Exploit smart content: Dynamic blocks, fields, and attributed blocks reduce rework and keep data consistent.

4. Master external references: Xrefs, overlays, and clipping for clean discipline coordination and lean files.

5. Automate: Scripts, LISP, and Action Recorder for repetitive tasks; consider parametric constraints for families of details.

6. Keyboard fluency: Shortcuts, aliases, and command options accelerate everything.

7. Mind the handoff: Use DWG standards, purge, audit, and eTransmit so partners receive lean, reliable packages.

8. Use the right tool for detailing: AutoCAD Structural Detailing is discontinued; many teams now pair AutoCAD with Revit or Advance Steel, or shift detailing to dedicated platforms like Tekla depending on project needs.

Stack these habits and AutoCAD becomes less of a drafting board and more of a precision instrument.

How to Display AutoCAD Skills on Your Resume

2. Revit

Revit is a BIM authoring tool for modeling, documenting, and coordinating structural systems in 3D, with an analytical backbone that ties geometry to engineering intent.

Why It's Important

One coordinated model drives drawings, schedules, and changes. Collaboration improves. Clash risk drops. Structural analysis can be integrated sooner, and design iterations move quicker.

How to Improve Revit Skills

1. Own the fundamentals: Families, parameters, templates, view templates, filters, and worksets—get these right and everything else behaves.

2. Analytical model discipline: Align physical and analytical models, define releases and boundary conditions, and validate connectivity before exporting to analysis.

3. Rebar and connections: Learn rebar constraints, shape codes, assemblies, and shop-drawing workflows; coordinate with steel connection tools where applicable.

4. Dynamo: Automate repetitive modeling, QC checks, and data wrangling with visual scripting.

5. Interoperability: Clean IFC exports, link models from other trades, and manage shared coordinates without drift.

6. Cloud collaboration: Use modern CDE tools (e.g., BIM Collaborate Pro within the Autodesk Construction Cloud) for versioning, issues, and structured reviews.

7. Performance hygiene: Purge, compact, audit, and keep families lean to avoid sluggish models.

Precision in setup yields calm, predictable projects when the crunch hits.

How to Display Revit Skills on Your Resume

3. SAP2000

SAP2000 is a general-purpose structural analysis and design platform suited for buildings, bridges, tanks, towers, and odd-shaped structures that don’t like being pigeonholed.

Why It's Important

It blends powerful solvers with approachable modeling, broad code support, and design post-processors—solid for quick studies or deep dives.

How to Improve SAP2000 Skills

1. Model with intent: Element types, releases, offsets, diaphragm definitions, and mass sources should reflect real behavior, not just geometry.

2. Load logic: Define clean load patterns, cases, and combos aligned to governing codes; include P-Delta and second-order effects where relevant.

3. Meshing discipline: Appropriate mesh density, transitions, and aspect ratios; refine only where stress gradients demand it.

4. Advanced analysis: Try nonlinear hinges, staged construction, time history, and response spectrum where the project warrants it.

5. Verify: Sanity-check results with hand calcs and alternative models; build small benchmarks to validate assumptions.

6. Automate: Use the API or spreadsheets to generate repetitive geometry and load patterns, and to extract results in a structured way.

7. Stay current: Review release notes and example models; maintain a personal library of templates you trust.

Good inputs and a skeptical mindset beat button-clicking every time.

How to Display SAP2000 Skills on Your Resume

4. STAAD.Pro

STAAD.Pro handles analysis and design for buildings, industrial structures, towers, and more, with wide-ranging code design modules and scripting options.

Why It's Important

It offers breadth—steel, concrete, timber, aluminum design—alongside workflows that integrate with detailing and documentation ecosystems.

How to Improve STAAD.Pro Skills

1. Start clean: Set units, parameters, and design codes before modeling; keep the input file readable and commented.

2. Right elements, right supports: Model connectivity, member offsets, plate thickness, and boundary conditions that mirror reality.

3. Load paths: Build load cases and envelopes logically; embrace load groups for seismic/wind combinations.

4. Post-processing finesse: Filter, sort, and extract governing forces and code checks; validate members with independent checks.

5. Macros and scripts: Use the editor and macros for repetitive geometry, load assignment, and reporting.

6. Interoperability: Move data to and from modeling/drafting tools cleanly to reduce rework.

7. Quality gates: Peer review inputs, combos, and member design parameters before sign-off.

Clarity in the input file often predicts clarity in the results.

How to Display STAAD.Pro Skills on Your Resume

5. ETABS

ETABS streamlines analysis and design of buildings—especially multi-story systems—with story-based modeling, powerful lateral load tools, and tight code-check integration.

Why It's Important

For buildings, it moves fast from concept to code checks, handling diaphragms, redundancy, and drift with purpose-built features.

How to Improve ETABS Skills

1. Story-first mindset: Define story data, diaphragms (rigid vs. semi-rigid), and mass sources deliberately.

2. Lateral systems: Model frames, shear walls, and coupling beams with appropriate releases and cracked section modifiers where required.

3. Load patterns that matter: Wind, seismic, accidental torsion, and notional loads; generate combos per the governing code and review them carefully.

4. Second-order effects: Run P-Delta and stability indices when drift pushes limits.

5. Mesh consciously: Wall and slab meshes should respect openings and transfer paths, not just grid spacing.

6. API and automation: Script repetitive model creation and results extraction for consistency.

7. Validate: Calibrate with simpler models or alternative software; capture lessons learned in a checklist.

Let the model reflect behavior, not wishful thinking—then the numbers tell a trustworthy story.

How to Display ETABS Skills on Your Resume

6. Rhino

Rhino (Rhinoceros) is a NURBS-based modeler that excels at complex geometry. Structural engineers use it to prototype intricate forms, rationalize surfaces, and translate architectural expression into buildable systems.

Why It's Important

It bridges architectural ambition and engineering pragmatism—fast iteration, precise control, and broad interoperability.

How to Improve Rhino Skills

1. Geometry fundamentals: Curves, continuity, surface topology, tolerances—clean inputs produce clean outputs.

2. Grasshopper: Parametric definitions drive rapid options, rule-based assemblies, and robust change management.

3. Structural plugins: Tools like Karamba3D can bring early-stage structural feedback into the modeling loop.

4. Interoperability: Establish reliable pathways to Revit, ETABS, or SAP2000; test units, orientation, and naming conventions.

5. Rhino.Inside workflows: Drive Revit from Grasshopper for smart, data-rich geometry handoffs.

6. Model hygiene: Blocks, layers, named views, and saved states keep complex studies manageable.

When geometry, data, and structure travel together, coordination pain drops.

How to Display Rhino Skills on Your Resume

7. Tekla Structures

Tekla Structures is a detailed 3D environment for constructible models across steel, concrete, and mixed systems—from concept through fabrication and erection.

Why It's Important

It turns design intent into shop-ready information with precise connections, rebar, embeds, and coordinated drawings that fabricators trust.

How to Improve Tekla Structures Skills

1. Start with the standards: Templates, object-level settings, numbering, and drawing styles aligned to your firm and fabricator preferences.

2. Custom components: Build parametric details and connections that speed consistent, error-free modeling.

3. Rebar mastery: Use rebar sets, couplers, and pour management; drive bar marks and lists directly from the model.

4. Model management: Organizer, phases, and categories for clean tracking; run clash checks early and often.

5. Collaboration: Share models, lock scopes, and use change management to avoid conflicts.

6. Automation: Explore the Open API and Grasshopper–Tekla Live Link for repetitive tasks and rule-based modeling.

The payoff is fewer RFIs and shop drawings that sail through approval.

How to Display Tekla Structures Skills on Your Resume

8. Mathcad

Mathcad is an engineering calculation environment that blends math notation, units awareness, plots, and documentation into readable, auditable worksheets.

Why It's Important

It turns scattered spreadsheets and scribbles into a single source of truth—traceable calculations that teams can review and reuse with confidence.

How to Improve Mathcad Skills

1. Units-first approach: Keep units turned on, convert explicitly, and let the software catch mismatches.

2. Templates and standards: Headers, revision blocks, assumptions, safety factors, and references—codify them in a template.

3. Reusable functions: Build a library for beams, columns, footings, lateral checks, and load combos; version it and document inputs/outputs.

4. Symbolic vs. numeric: Use symbolic math for general solutions, numeric solvers for specifics; plot results to sanity-check behavior.

5. Data links: Exchange with spreadsheets, text files, or databases to avoid hand entry.

6. Peer review ready: Annotate assumptions, cite code clauses, and lock critical sections to prevent accidental edits.

Readable, unit-safe worksheets reduce design risk and speed reviews.

How to Display Mathcad Skills on Your Resume

9. Ansys

Ansys is a simulation suite used for structural FEA—linear and nonlinear—covering materials, contacts, dynamics, thermal coupling, and more.

Why It's Important

It predicts real behavior under messy conditions—contact, plasticity, buckling—so you can tune designs before steel is cut or concrete is poured.

How to Improve Ansys Skills

1. Problem framing: Choose the right analysis type and boundary conditions; simplify where appropriate but keep the physics honest.

2. Meshing craft: Start coarse, refine where gradients spike; mind aspect ratios and transitions; use contact sizing thoughtfully.

3. Materials and contacts: Calibrate material models and contact behavior (friction, stiffness, damping) to match reality.

4. Nonlinear discipline: Control load steps, convergence, and stabilization; monitor energy balance, not just final numbers.

5. Validation: Benchmark against closed-form solutions or submodels; run sensitivity studies.

6. Automation: Parameterize geometry, loads, and results extraction; script recurring studies to avoid manual drift.

7. Reporting: Build consistent result plots and metrics that decision-makers can read in minutes.

Good FEA is as much about engineering judgment as it is about elements and nodes.

How to Display Ansys Skills on Your Resume

10. Civil 3D

Civil 3D supports BIM for infrastructure—surfaces, corridors, grading, and networks. For structural engineers, it anchors site interfaces: grades, pads, utilities, and roadway tie-ins that dictate loads and levels.

Why It's Important

It connects the structure to the site, ensuring elevations, drainage, and access are coordinated, documented, and constructible.

How to Improve Civil 3D Skills

1. Styles and templates: Standardize surfaces, labels, and sheet sets; use data shortcuts for multi-discipline coordination.

2. Surface fidelity: Clean survey data, breaklines, and boundaries; sample intelligently for accurate volumes and pad design.

3. Grading strategies: Feature lines and gradings that respect slopes, drainage, and structural tolerances.

4. Corridor awareness: Understand how roadway geometry impacts structure interfaces—abutments, MSE walls, utilities.

5. Interoperability: Exchange alignments, surfaces, and coordinates cleanly with Revit and analysis tools.

6. Automation: Use subassemblies and scripting to repeat standard details; keep models tidy to avoid bloat.

When the dirt work is right, the structure breathes easier.

How to Display Civil 3D Skills on Your Resume

11. MicroStation

MicroStation is a CAD platform used for 2D/3D design and documentation across infrastructure—bridges, plants, transit, buildings—with hefty referencing and standards tools.

Why It's Important

It excels at precise drafting, robust referencing, and large-project standards—key for multi-discipline deliverables.

How to Improve MicroStation Skills

1. Workspace discipline: Seed files, level libraries, line styles, and annotations standardized for your projects.

2. 3D and parametrics: Solid modeling, constraints, and item types to embed data in geometry.

3. References done right: Nesting depth, display rules, and clip volumes for crisp coordination.

4. Cells and catalogs: Create reusable, annotated details and symbols; control scales with annotation settings.

5. Automation: VBA and macros for repetitive edits, batch printing, and quality checks.

6. QA habits: Audit, compress, and standards-check files before issue.

With a tight workspace and smart cells, production accelerates without chaos.

How to Display MicroStation Skills on Your Resume

12. BIM (Building Information Modeling)

BIM is the process of creating and managing information-rich models across the project lifecycle—design, analysis, coordination, construction, and operations.

Why It's Important

Shared models reduce clashes, sharpen quantities, accelerate decisions, and keep teams aligned when changes land late.

How to Improve BIM (Building Information Modeling) Skills

1. Standards and LOD: Define naming, parameters, and Level of Development early; keep it enforceable, not aspirational.

2. Common Data Environment: Use a structured CDE for versions, permissions, issues, and review workflows.

3. Open formats: Exchange with IFC and maintain mapping rules; test round-trips routinely.

4. Model checking: Automate rule-based QA for naming, parameters, and clashes; track issues with accountability.

5. 4D/5D integration: Link models to schedules and quantities for plan realism and cost clarity.

6. Analysis early and often: Push structural analysis from the BIM model when feasible; close the loop with results-driven design tweaks.

7. People and process: Train teams, assign model ownership, and run regular coordination reviews with clear exit criteria.

BIM is less about fancy models and more about predictable delivery.

How to Display BIM (Building Information Modeling) Skills on Your Resume