Building the ultimate family business, with Sir John Timpson, owner of Timpson

Conversations of Inspiration

Holly Tucker MBE

Education, Business, Society & Culture, Self-improvement, Entrepreneurship, Personal Journals

5 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 20 September 2021

⏱️ 60 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Sir John Timpson, chairman and owner of Timpson is the very embodiment of building a business with family truly at its heart and kindness as a guiding principle.

Hailing from a very long line of entrepreneurs, five generations of the Timpson family have been involved in the business that bears their name, business has always been in the blood.

Recognised for his creative approach to employee recruitment and his innovative work helping ex-offenders re-enter the workplace, John shares how fostering a staggering 90 children has influenced his business and his generosity of spirit shines brightly.

A true champion of our high streets, John talks to Holly about how he believes the high street can be rejuvenated, the importance of personality when hiring, and that above all else, you can have a brilliant business and still be kind, a mantra shared by John’s late wife Alex and is lived each day through Timpson.

Enjoying listening to these unfiltered chats? It's worth following Holly Tucker MBE and Holly & Co on Instagram, and subscribing to our weekly newsletter on our website, where Holly downloads her thoughts, and exclusively shares small business finds and topical, 'ungoogleable' business advice.

Transcript

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0:00.0	Wow, so John Timpson, the CEO of Timpson, one of the most extraordinary human beings I've ever
0:07.9	interviewed. I came off the interview scribbling notes because everything he said was golden.
0:18.0	How we treat those who work with us on the journey of building our business? Where do we place
0:23.6	kindness as a value? What does the high street look like? How can we empower people
0:29.5	to be the best versions of themselves? What is upside down management? Why does Mr Men come into their
0:37.2	hiring process? This interview is going to blow your mind. Make sure you have the cup of tea, the pen,
0:45.0	the pad of paper and dream big. Become the best version, the kindest version of incredible human
0:56.2	being that you can. Anyway, just enjoy, enjoy and feel inspired.
1:11.9	I'm Holly Tucker and welcome to Conversations of Inspiration. Back in 2006 I founded not on the
1:19.1	high street from my kitchen table and since then I've gone on to launch Holly and Co. I'm the UK
1:25.3	ambassador of creative small businesses and I believe that having a business doing what you
1:30.6	love is the key to a happy fulfilled life. My dream is to help everybody start theirs.
1:37.2	I'm here to offer advice, inspiration, wisdom and encouragement and, in my view,
1:43.4	the best way to do this is by sharing stories. So I've reached out to my favourite small businesses,
1:50.4	entrepreneurs and those who simply inspire me and ask them to share theirs.
1:56.3	With thanks to Dell Technologies who've helped bring this free podcast to life. Here are my
2:02.3	Conversations of Inspiration. Hello John, it is so wonderful to meet you. I know we've both been
2:11.5	trying to do this for a little while. We've had a few ups and downs by getting the microphone to
2:16.8	Covid, all these sorts of things, but welcome to Conversations of Inspiration.
2:21.2	Well, thank you very much. I've got so many questions so I'm going to just try and calm myself down.
2:26.4	You have long, long been a hero of mine. You're a hero of the high street but we're going to just
2:31.9	start with something that we've been dealing with. This period of time I've been reading articles
	...

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