The IOEE is delighted to offer its most sincere congratulations to IOEE Honorary Fellow John Timpson, who has been awarded a knighthood in the Queen’s Birthday Honours list.

John is the chairman of the cobbler and key repair company that bears his Timpson family name, though his knighthood is also in recognition for his fostering as well as his services to business, as John and his late wife, Alex, fostered over 90 children together over 31 years.

Timpson was originally set up by John’s great grandfather and now has over 1,900 branches nationwide, remaining a private family-run business, and John has gained a reputation as being a paternalistic employer; staff get their birthdays off and bonuses for exceeding targets. John said: “It is blindingly obvious that if you treat people well, they will do a good job.”

In 2014 John attended the IOEE’s Celebrating Enterprise Awards event, which we hold annually at the House of Lords, where he was awarded the IOEE Lifetime Achievement Award and an IOEE Honorary Fellowship. IOEE’s Chief Executive, Sarah Trouten, said:

“We are absolutely delighted that our Honorary Fellow, John Timpson, has been recognised for his hard work, integrity, and his contribution to business services and fostering. His dedication to creating a strong business model that prioritises employee benefits and actively promotes and provides unique employment opportunities to individuals who in usual circumstances may struggle to find employment is an inspiration. It is a great pleasure to congratulate John on the outstanding achievement of his knighthood. It is truly deserved, and we are exceptionally proud to say that he is an Honorary Fellow of the IOEE.”

John said, “I receive this honour with great pride and a certain amount of sadness. I was very much the junior partner on the fostering front, and my late wife Alex also had a fundamental influence on all that I’ve done in business, so I’m bound to regret that she’s not alongside me to be properly recognised as Lady Alex.”