For the past 30 years John Timpson has been Chairman of Timpson Group plc, a retailer with over 1,300 branches in the UK. The company has five directors on its board, none of whom are women. He has a small column in the Daily Telegraph, ‘Ask John’, which I happened to catch today. In it was a piece titled In 50 years, the women on boards debate will be over.
The piece is woeful on a number of levels. We’ve penned a public challenge of John Timpson, which I expect to lead to us presenting him with a Toady award on 25 June.