Reminder: who CGE and CTI are
Before comparing the questionnaires, a quick reminder. The CGE is the private association that federates 250+ grandes écoles (management and engineering) and publishes its national placement survey every year. It's an indicator of prestige and of comparison between schools. The CTI is the Commission des Titres d'Ingénieur, an independent authority that accredits schools to award the engineering degree. Its mission is official, and its survey feeds the accreditation file every 3 or 6 years.
An engineering school is typically subject to both. For a detailed breakdown of the obligations, read our CGE vs CTI guide.
Difference 1 — Explicit engineer job status (CTI only)
The CTI requires schools to explicitly identify the "engineer job" nature of the position held: design engineer, production engineer, R&D engineer, consulting engineer, and so on. The CGE accepts a fuzzier typology (executive, senior technician, other).
The practical consequence: on the CTI form, add a dedicated question such as "What is the exact title of your position, and is it considered by your employer to be an engineer job?". This information typically does not appear on the CGE form — or appears there in a less demanding form. Based on our field observations, roughly 15-20% of alumni from engineering schools hold positions outside "strict engineer jobs" (sales, consulting, finance) — this is data the CTI explicitly wants reported.
Difference 2 — Detailed international mobility (CTI)
The CTI attaches strong importance to the international mobility of graduates, both in the final-year internship and in the first job. The CTI questionnaire typically asks for the exact country, the duration, and the nature (expatriation, assignment, international remote work).
The CGE collects the data but with less granularity (often just "France / international"). To stay consistent with the expectations of the CTI file, you therefore need a specific question block of 3 to 5 sub-questions on the international experience, conditioned on the status "alumnus employed abroad" or "French alumnus on an international assignment".
Difference 3 — Training satisfaction (CTI insists, CGE optional)
The CTI requires training satisfaction indicators in the accreditation file: fit between training and job, satisfaction with the technical skills acquired, satisfaction with the educational path. These questions appear in every serious CTI questionnaire.
The CGE leaves these questions optional and many schools don't ask them in their CGE survey to avoid making it heavier. If you merge the questionnaires without having included these satisfaction questions, you show up before the CTI with an incomplete file — or you have to run a parallel satisfaction survey (which many do, wrongly, duplicating the effort).
Difference 4 — Employment status and contract type (different codings)
Both frameworks ask for employment status and contract type, but with subtly different codings. The CGE has its own list: permanent contract, fixed-term contract, temp work, paid internship, self-employed, civil servant, other. The CTI has a similar list but sometimes distinguishes a "long fixed-term contract" from a "short fixed-term contract", handles the "PhD candidate" status more finely (which can be employment or continued study depending on the case), and attaches particular importance to the first job on a permanent contract as an indicator of professional autonomy.
In practice, you collect the data in a way compatible with both frameworks: one main question "What is your current status?" with detailed sub-options, then you recode afterward for the CGE export and for the CTI file. It's less costly than two separate questions.
To go further on the definitions and the calculation of employment indicators, see our article on analyzing CGE survey results.
Difference 5 — Salary and bonuses (finer granularity on the CTI side)
The CGE asks for gross annual salary, bonuses included, in France and outside France. Often in brackets (€35-40k, €40-45k, etc.) so as not to frustrate the alumnus. The CTI asks for the same thing but sometimes with a finer breakdown: fixed vs variable salary, expatriation-related bonuses, benefits in kind (housing, transport).
Across the schools we support, the most effective practice is to ask for: (1) the gross fixed annual salary, (2) the estimated annual variable share, (3) benefits in kind (yes/no/approximate amount). This breakdown covers both frameworks without weighing the form down excessively. On salary questions in general, the more precise the wording, the less the alumnus hesitates to answer — and the completion rate on salary questions typically climbs by 10-15 points.
Difference 6 — Submission schedule (CGE 6m+30m, CTI annual)
The CGE expects two campaigns per year: at 6 months (on class n-1) and at 30 months (on class n-3). The schedule is public and stable, see our CGE 2026 survey calendar month by month.
The CTI works differently. The survey is annual, generally on class n-1 (and sometimes class n-2 or n-3 depending on local accreditation-file requirements). The schedule is less standardized than the CGE's, but the data must be up to date and consistent with the pace of accreditation visits (every 3 or 6 years depending on the grade).
The consequence: if you merge the questionnaire but not the schedule, you end up with two 6-month campaigns (CGE + CTI on the same class) and that makes no sense. Best practice: merge the 6-month collection (a broadened questionnaire that covers both), and run an independent CGE 30-month collection that has no CTI equivalent.
Difference 7 — Expected export format
The CGE expects a structured export in the format defined by the CGE association (XLSX with typical columns numbering 25 to 35 depending on the edition). The CTI accepts freer formats in the accreditation file, but asks for summary tables oriented toward indicators (employment rate, median salary, international mobility) rather than raw data.
This affects the post-collection processing phase. For the CGE, you generate a compatible raw XLSX. For the CTI, you instead generate statistical tables with averages, medians, and distributions by segment. A platform like Terrilink Surveys offers both exports natively, which avoids the double Excel reprocessing.
Difference 8 — Aggregation level accepted for publication
For the public-facing publication of the report, the two frameworks don't accept the same granularity. The CGE publishes indicators aggregated at the school level (overall employment rate, overall median salary). The CTI may ask, in the accreditation file, for indicators by specialization or by track — especially for schools with several streams or several campuses.
The consequence: if your sample of respondents per specialization is too small (under 20 respondents), you can't publish the indicator at the specialization level on the CTI side. You then have to consolidate at a higher level, which must be anticipated at the time of collection. This is one of the reasons why maximizing the response rate — through pre-filling and through good reminder practices — is even more critical for multi-track engineering schools.
How Terrilink handles both in parallel
The classic mistake is to fully duplicate the questionnaires: one CGE form, one CTI form, two parallel campaigns, twice as many reminders, and alumni receiving two solicitations three weeks apart on very similar questions. The response rate collapses.
Best practice: a single broadened questionnaire that contains the shared section (civil status, background, employment status, salary, satisfaction) plus the CTI-specific blocks (detailed international mobility, explicit engineer job, training satisfaction). At export time, the platform generates two files: a strict CGE export (expected columns, CGE coding), and a CTI export (statistical tables for the accreditation file).
On Terrilink, these two exports are native. A single 6-month campaign to launch, a single 30-month campaign, two different deliverables. Alumni workload halved, dual compliance. To get started, the fastest route is to book a demo with a concrete CTI + CGE case.