Benjamin Torchinsky, P.Eng. receives top individual consulting engineering honour

Benjamin B. Torchinsky, P.Eng., is this year’s recipient of the Beaubien Award, the highest recognition presented annually by the Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada (ACEC) for individual lifetime achievements and contribution to the engineering industry and to the Association.

In accepting the award at the 2001 Canadian Consulting Engineering Awards in Calgary, October 27, Mr. Torchinsky praised and thanked the employees and management with which he worked for almost 50 years in developing AGRA into Canada’s second largest engineering firm before its merger with AMEC p.l.c. of England in April of 2000.

Torchinsky said: “When I first started doing consulting work I was very conscious of my responsibilities both to my clients and to my employees. I was obsessed with giving good value to my clients, and once I hired an engineer, or any employee for that matter, I was also obsessed with my responsibility to keep that person employed continuously. I looked on every employee as being not only one individual but rather as a member of a family — a family whose welfare was my responsibility. When the work load dropped off, I was loath to lay off people to avoid operating losses. I chose instead to open more and more offices in different parts of the country and even in different countries, with the concept that if and when the work slacked off in one area, it would hopefully be expanding in another — so I could continue to offer constant employment to my people.

“Because of these obsessions I did build up a very extensive engineering company. But if anyone deserves kudos for contributing to the stature of the consulting engineering industry in Canada, it is the company employees themselves, whose hard work and loyal service over the past 50 years made us what we are today.”

Mr. Torchinsky is a past member of the Association of Consulting Engineers of Canada and of the Consulting Engineers of Ontario. Through his leadership and strong commitment to the industry he has played an influential role in strengthening the business of consulting engineering in Canada. By encouraging his various companies and employees to become engaged and to work actively on the boards and committees of the association across Canada he has brought vitality, relevance and political credibility to the work of the Association.