Reflections on the Glacier Metal Project

Speaker A What Gassier was doing was very much in vogue. He was constantly talking, addressing, writing articles, getting recognition from professional bodies, being given honorary doctorates and fellowships later on in this stage. So there was a lot of recognition of Glacier. The setting up of the Glacier Institute of Management was a direct result of continued inquiries from businessmen at that stage to find out what you're doing, why you're doing it, not only from within the United Kingdom, but from overseas. It folded, I think, to a certain extent, which was a criticism always being leveled against him, is that what we were seeing in Glacier was an outcome of personal dynamism and input? I don't think they were right. I think that entirely right, because I think that the people within Glacier itself bought into the process in ways which I think was quite extraordinary. He gave an example of one occasion which he'd come across, which was a group of visitors were being conducted around the organization and they could sit in on Works Council meetings. And the visitors asked this particular man, who was in fact a member of the Works Council, who was also a representative for trade union, and a representative as well as being what they call a unit. One manager asked him what he thought of his work in Glacier, and he replied with another question. He said, in what role do you want me to answer that? Do you want me to answer as a member of a representative of a trade union, in my role as a unit manager or as a representative of Works Council? Because my answer in each case will be different. They were startled that somebody at the first level of management should recognize in quite a natural way there was nothing false or effective, apparently, about the reply that the distinctions between these different roles. And I would venture to think that I wouldn't say there are none, because I don't know. But I think the number of organizations where you could find employees being able to discriminate between these things in that fashion to be extremely rare, which is our loss, I think, because if people can understand that, you're a long way down to achieving better organizations. Let's put it that Glacier went through and it already started because Glacier was sold, was taken over by Associated Engineering, which was another larger vehicle components manufacturer. Associated Engine thoughting they were taking over Glass. In fact, Glacier and all its theories and things took over Associate Engineering and the Managing Director of Glacier, whose name I forget today, took over on as Managing Director of the whole of Associated Engineering. One thing that did happen in the course of doing this, they lost an individual who then joined another company, which I won't mention in case this is a public tape, who subsequently took over the whole of Engineering and then the course of six months winkled out all the ex Glessier people. So that the situation that I found when I phoned up the glacier. Metal Company. The personnel manager of the Glacier Metal Company some years later didn't know anything of the past history of the organization in terms of what it represented and was quite surprised and shocked a little that he hadn't recognized what it was. So I think in terms of glasser itself, it's a sad story. My father's books are not published within the United Kingdom any longer. They are no longer quoted in academic works. And for that sake, neither is Jake's as well. So most of the books published, certainly in the United Kingdom, make no reference to his work whatsoever, which I think is their loss. But I think that the concerns that I have about it is that the ideas that he formulated were, in some senses, ahead of way ahead of their time. And one of the purposes in donating the books to the society so they could be published is so that those at least the words wouldn't be entirely forgotten, even if the pacts, the intellect that lay behind them of I've gone before.