CTL celebrates the careers of two employees with long legacies

CTL Engineering recently said ‘goodbye’ to two employee legends cut from very different cloths: one, a farm boy at heart, the other a thinker often ready to get philosophical. But while Tim Darrah and Bipender Jindal have left different legacies, they’ve each carved a path of growth and excellence that’s as long as their tenure.

 

Tim Darrah

Hired in the early 90s as a surveyor, Tim Darrah spent more than 30 years with CTL Engineering, modeling dependability, hard work, and selflessness.

According to Pat Gallagher, that hard work and never-complain-attitude were the reasons he promoted Tim to Civil/Site and Surveying Department Manager.

“Tim was just a perfect employee,” Pat said. “Whatever task needed to be done, he’d get it done. He’d survey for weeks at a time in the remote sections of West Virginia, which was no fun, but he would just go do it.”

Over the years, Pat said, he built powerful relationships with both clients and his employees. People could see his hard work and respected him for it, he said.

That sentiment was echoed by another coworker, Joe Stanley, whom Tim had managed for several years. He called Tim one of the best surveyors or field engineers he had ever worked with.

“Tim is a unique manager; he didn’t rule with an iron fist. He thinks more of the personal relationship before the business relationship,” Stanley said. “He was very caring for his employees.”

Both Pat and Joe attributed Tim’s work ethic to his other job, raising cattle. There were times, Pat said, when Tim would be out rounding up cattle in the morning and in the office, managing the engineering department in the afternoon.

Often dressed in plaid shirts with his lunch pail in hand, Tim had the ‘get it done’ that life on a farm instills.

“He was one of the hardest working employees we had. He worked hard on the farm, and he worked hard for us. He was very selfless.”

Bipender Jindal

Then there’s Assistant Vice President Bipender Jindal, who, in his 31 years at CTL, played a pivotal role in shaping the environmental department. Bipender’s strong regulatory background and technical expertise laid the foundation for its growth and success. But according to colleague Kevin Reichert, his real strength was his ability to form personal relationships with clients.

Kevin said Bipender would often get to know clients personally, even going so far as inviting their families to his home.

“A client that gets invited to your personal residence feels like you actually care about them,” Kevin said. “He’s not an outspoken individual, not somebody that makes a lot of noise, but he’s able to get to know people on a personal level and will get to know their families.”

When he was hired, Bipender brought technical expertise to the job. Having worked at the Ohio EPA he had a strong regulatory background. But while he often considered himself a technical professional, Kevin said he took education, mentorship, and thoughtfulness very seriously as well.

“If you talk to a lot of people about Bipender, eventually you will find out that any meeting he’s involved with, at some point he’s going to say, ‘Now I’m going to get philosophical.’ He will throw something philosophical into just about every discussion,” Kevin said.

That meant when it came to his employees, he always encouraged them to think about how their roles and responsibilities fit into the bigger picture.

“If you have much contact with him, I guarantee you, you will be given a philosophical lesson at least once,” Kevin said.

But Bipender also had a lighter side. At any gathering, he’d bring a camera and take 50 selfies with people in the room. Later, he’d share those pictures with the people in them as memorabilia.

With a legacy as long as his tenure, Bipender built the environmental department from a handful of employees to 13 employees spread over five offices. He also brought in numerous clients that grew the department over the years.

“Now it’s my job not to screw up what he’s done,” Kevin said.