Remembering MTE founder Bruce Scheifele
September 24, 2021
By CCE
He said "the three most important things in our business are people, people and people."
Photo courtesy MTE Consultants.
Bruce Scheifele, founder of MTE Consultants, passed away on Sept. 21.
Scheifele opened the engineering firm for business in Kitchener, Ont., in 1985 with a focus on consulting services for land development and a vision of adding value for clients through a “more than engineering” approach. The firm grew through its acquisitions of companies like Sze Straka Engineering, Frontline Environmental, Waterloo Geoscience, GlobalTox and McNeil Surveying.
“The three most important things in our business are people, people and people: people as employees, people as clients and people as employees of our stakeholders,” Scheifele said when he retired in 2005. “You can be the best engineers and scientists in the country and provide the finest designs, but one’s association with peers, clients and colleagues is the real catalyst to growth and success.”
He was also a strong believer in supporting communities. By way of example, MTE donated $5,000 to the Royal Botanical Gardens’ Aldershot Escarpment Garden in Burlington, $5,000 to the Robert Bateman Get to Know Your Wild Neighbours program and a variety of civil, environmental and structural engineering services to the Anselma House women’s shelter in Kitchener.
Today, MTE has more than 300 employees and offices in Kitchener, Burlington, London and Stratford, Ont., specializing in civil and structural engineering, building and environmental science, toxicology and land surveying. The employee-owned firm, currently led by president Ted Rowe, P.Eng., says its core values and corporate culture “remain relatively unchanged from when Bruce established them. This is a testament to his foresight, personal nature and influence on those who worked with and for him over his distinguished career.”
