John Lewis Partnership chief executive Nish Kankiwala to step back to non-executive role

Kankiwala, who was appointed as the John Lewis Partnership’s first chief executive only in March last year, will revert to being a non-executive advising the board by March 2025.

The move follows the arrival of former Tesco director Jason Tarry as the partnership’s new chair. The business said Kankiwala’s change of role follows ”the significant progression of the ongoing transformation” of the business, and he will support Tarry with a smooth transition before Tarry takes over as chair of the retailer’s executive team as well as the partnership board.

Kankiwala said: “The board asked me to move across from my non-executive director role to chief executive back in March 2023. This was in view of such a significant time for the partnership and to help accelerate this phase of the transformation. I was delighted to agree to take on the role for a two-year period during this time of pivotal change. Since then we’ve refreshed our partnership strategy to be rooted in retail, significantly improved our cash flows to enable record investment for growth, and returned the partnership to full-year profit.

“It’s been the privilege of my life to lead the partnership as CEO during this period of intense transformation. I am hugely proud of what we’ve achieved so far – thanks to the hard work and dedication of our partners. I have every confidence in Jason taking the partnership from strength to strength in the next phase of our transformation and am delighted to continue to support him and the board in an advisory capacity going forward.”

Tarry said: “I would like to thank Nish for the pivotal role he has played for the partnership. In the past two years, he has been instrumental in accelerating the transformation of the partnership. It’s a pleasure to work alongside Nish and I’m grateful that he has agreed to stay on as a non-executive board advisor and his ongoing support will be invaluable.”

Deputy chair and chair of the nomination committee Rita Clifton added: “We created the CEO role at the beginning of 2023 because of the scale of the transformation and intense level of commercial focus needed in such unprecedented market circumstances.

“With his exceptional transformational experience and track record in consumer businesses, we asked Nish to move across from his non-executive director role to take on this new role of CEO for a concentrated period. We are deeply grateful that he agreed, and for all that he has delivered for the partnership in this particular phase of our transformation. We are delighted that Nish will support Jason during this transitional period. The partnership will also continue to benefit from Nish’s expertise in his continuing role as a non-executive advisor to the board.”

As well as eponymous department stores, the partnership owns grocer Waitrose.