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Jim Penman, Phd. is a British businessman and historian in the field of biohistory. He is the owner of Jim's Group.

With a strong Christian ethic, driven mainly by family values and a belief in the importance of fanatical customer service Penman is notable as Australia's largest franchise owner with more than 3,700 franchises in Great Britain, Australia, New Zealand and Canada.

Early Life
Penman read avidly about dinosaurs through novelist Desmond Morris. These early endeavours are now equated to an interest in looking at patterns in the realm of cross cultural anthropology.

As a teenager, he was fascinated by the fall of Rome and why this happened.

With wider study Jim realised that these patterns were biological in nature. This ultimately led to his study in epigenetics and Biohistory.

In 1982 Jim Penman was completing his PhD in history when he decided to turn his part-time lawn mowing business into a full-time job.

Jim’s Group
Jim focussed on setting up and selling lawn-mowing rounds rather than simply mowing lawns, taking on sub-contractors and selling around 100 rounds between 1983 and 1989, to fund his university studies.

In 1988 VIP Home Services came into the market in Victoria, which prompted Jim to systemise his own processes and create the Jim's Mowing franchise.

Jim's mandate is to be fanatical about service to both Franchisees and customers, working constantly to lower complaints and improve Franchisee satisfaction.

After launching the Franchise in 1989, Jim was approached by people who wanted to use the Jim’s banner. The second division was Cleaning and since then the franchise model has been adapted to almost 50 different service industries.

In 2009 Jim faced opposition by his franchisors when fees were raised and almost found himself voted out.

In 2012 $10 million in funding was sought for faster expansion, with the result unsuccessful, delaying future plans to float on the ASX.

The ABC reported a cyber terrorist attack via email on 24th November 2016 which was related to a database breach. In the same year Jim's Group received more than 100,000 leads that were unable to be serviced.

Jim is still the CEO of the group and actively involved in day-to-day operations.

In 2017 Jim’s Group has a turnover of over $400 million, with more than 3,700 franchisees in four countries, Australia, Great Britain, New Zealand and Canada.

Biohistory
Jim Penman’s core interest is in biological sciences, which began in early life as a fascination with the work of Desmond Morris.

The premise of epigenetics is that behaviour modelled in animals is correlated with and can predict human cultural trends. This area of endeavour has been his life’s work, in epigenetics and Biohistory.

In the last decade the revolution in understanding through epigenetics has been correlated with the rise and fall of civilisations in human history. Penman has been actively engaged in this study, publishing Biohistory and Biohistory The Decline and Fall of the West.

Through research run with RMIT and The Florey Institute of Neuroscience and Mental Health Penman is putting millions of dollars into projects dealing with mental illness, depression and anxiety.

In the future, Penman hopes that by an understanding of epigenetic markers there will be advances in drug and alcohol treatments.

Papers
(* peer reviewed)


 * 1. Levay E. A., Govic A., Penman J., Paolini A. G., and Kent S. (2007) Effects of adult-onset calorie restriction on anxiety-like behavior in rats. Physiology and Behavior 5; 92(5): 889-96
 * 2. Govic A., Levay E. A., Hazi, A, Penman J., Kent S. and Paolini A.G. (2008) Alterations in male sexual behaviour, attractiveness and testosterone levels induced by an adult-onset calorie restriction regimen. Behavioral Brain Research 26; 190(1):140-6.
 * 3. Govic A., Kent S., Levay E. A., Hazi, A, Penman J. and Paolini A.G. (2008). Testosterone, social and sexual behavior of perinatally and lifelong calorie restricted offspring. Physiology and Behaviour 9; 94(3): 516-22
 * 4. Levay E. A., Paolini A.G., Govic A., Hazi, A, Penman J. and Kent S. (2008) Anxiety-like behaviour in adult rats perinatally exposed to maternal calorie restriction. Behavioral Brain Research 22: 191(2): 164-72.
 * 5. Abbott J.D., Kent S., Levay E.A., Tucker R.V., Penman J., Tammer A.H. and Paolini A.G. (2009). The effects of calorie restriction olfactory cues on conspecific anxiety-like behaviour. Behavioral Brain Research 201: 305-310.
 * 6. Levay, E.A., Paolini A.G, Govic A., Hazi A, Penman J. and Kent S. (2010) HPA and sympathoadrenal activity of adult rats perinatally exposed to maternal mild calorie restriction. Behavioral Brain Research 208: 202-208.
 * 7. Levay E.A., Tammer A.H., Penman J., Kent S., Paolini A.G. (2010). Calorie restriction at increasing levels leads to augmented concentrations of corticosterone and decreasing concentrations of testosterone in rats. Nutrition Research 30(5): 366-73
 * 8. Guccione L., Paolini A.G., Penman J. and Djourma E. (2012). The effects of calorie restriction on operant responding for alcohol. Behav. Brain Res. 230: 281-7.
 * 9.Guccione L., Djourma E., Penman J. and Paolini A.G. (2012). Calorie restriction inhibits relapse behavior and preference for alcohol within a two-bottle free choice paradigm in the alcohol preferring (iP) rat. Physiology and Behaviour 13: 110-111
 * 10 Govic A., Bell, A., Samuel A., Penman J., Paolini, A.G. (2014). Calorie restriction and corticosterone elevation during lactation can each modulate adult male fear and anxiety-like behavior, Hormones and Behavior, 7 September 2014

Books

 * J. Penman (2015) Biohistory: Decline and Fall of the West, Cambridge Scholars ISBN 978-1443871303
 * J. Penman (2015) Biohistory, Cambridge Scholars ISBN 978-1443871655
 * What Will They Franchise Next?: The Story of Jim's Group ISBN 9780975113202