About the Author
John W. Francis (“Johnny Franchise®”) is a franchise strategist and advisor with more than three decades of hands-on experience as a franchisee, franchisor, operator, and board member. He works with franchise CEOs and leadership teams on franchise strategy, operational consistency, and long-term multi-unit growth through Next Level Franchise.
Every February, the franchise world packs its bags and heads to IFA.
The hotel lobbies fill up, handshakes start flying, and optimism is everywhere. But this year, at least from where I sit, the conversations happening underneath the surface feel different.
I spend most of my time working with franchisors, suppliers, and leadership teams who are past the early hustle and staring down the next phase of growth. The questions aren’t about selling more franchises anymore. They’re about what happens next.
How do we scale leadership?
Where are we brittle?
What breaks if we double? And what breaks if we don’t?
And what does maturity actually look like in practice?
That’s the lens I’m bringing with me to IFA this year.
Momentum in the Mastermind Rooms
Over the last year, both my Franchisor Mastermind and Supplier Mastermind groups have quietly gained traction, and not because of clever marketing.
They’re working because the conversations are honest and practical. Leaders are showing up willing to ask tougher questions about themselves and their organizations.
Franchisors are asking things like:
“What should my executive team stop doing?”
“Where am I still acting like a founder instead of a CEO?”
“Why does growth feel harder now than when we were smaller?”
Suppliers are asking sharper questions too:
“How do we become embedded instead of optional?”
“Where do we accidentally create friction?”
“Why do some brands trust us while others keep us at arm’s length?”
More and more, IFA feels less about introductions and more about pressure-testing ideas before the next big move.
Boards, Advisors, and the Shift I Keep Seeing
Last year, I helped launch and restructure several advisory boards and boards of directors across very different industries and company sizes, but the signal underneath them all was the same.
More brands are realizing that growth without governance eventually becomes fragile. Culture doesn’t scale on its own, and founder instinct, as powerful as it is early on, eventually runs into limits.
What’s interesting is not that boards are forming, but why they’re forming.
It’s rarely about optics or investor pressure. More often, it comes from leadership teams recognizing they need clearer thinking and better decision support as complexity increases.
The strongest teams are no longer asking, “Do we need a board?” Instead, they’re asking, “What decisions are we no longer equipped to make alone?”
Those conversations usually start privately, and they often surface at IFA.
What IFA Is Really Good For, If You Use It Right
IFA isn’t where strategies are built. It’s where they’re tested.
The best meetings I have each year usually aren’t scheduled weeks in advance. They happen between sessions, over coffee, or when someone pulls you aside and says, “Can I run something by you?”
If you’re a franchisor feeling the weight of complexity, a supplier trying to move upstream, or a leadership team sensing the need to professionalize the system, those are conversations I’m always glad to have before, during, or after IFA.
A Simple Invitation
If you’ll be at IFA and find yourself thinking, “We’re doing well, but something needs to evolve,” then we should connect.
Reach out before the convention, grab me in the hallway, or follow up afterward. IFA may be the catalyst, but the real work always happens in what comes next.
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