A Fellow, a membership grade of distinction in SDPS related professions, is elected by the Board of Directors based upon a candidate having been responsible for significant engineering achievements in design and process improvement. Normally, a candidate should have ten years of active practice and should hold Senior member grade at the time of nomination. Ten years of membership requirement may be waived for a Fellow candidate who has 15 years of professional practice (as needed to qualify for Senior member grade) and who has demonstrated significant achievements or truly outstanding contributions in at least one of the following categories:

1. Integration of disciplines, theories and methodologies.
2. Development scientific principles and methods for design and process science as applied to traditional disciplines of engineering.
3. Industrial leadership and innovation.
4. Educational leadership and creativity.

A nomination for promotion to Fellow must be initiated by a Fellow of any other society or a Member of SDPS and supported by at least five additional sponsors. The candidate and at least 3 out of 5 sponsors must be Members of SDPS at the time of nomination.