When the boardroom doors close, it isn’t always all strategy and poised handshake photos. For founders and executives, it’s often where egos clash, decisions split the room, and trust must be fought for all over again. That’s exactly why this year’s Ideas Fest panel, Shenanigans in the Boardroom, is the session everyone can’t afford to miss.

Hosted by Julia Elliott Brown, a seasoned board chair, strategic advisor, and serial entrepreneur, this panel rips away the polished veneer of leadership to reveal what really happens behind closed doors. With over 25 years of experience scaling high-growth ventures, securing investment, and guiding leadership teams through make-or-break moments, Julia knows the weight of every decision a boardroom can hold. She’s built, funded, and scaled businesses herself including the award-winning Upper Street and early internet pioneer UpMyStreet.com so she understands the pressures from both sides of the table. Over the past eight years, she’s advised thousands of founders on growth, governance, leadership, and raising capital, helping them avoid the mistakes she’s already weathered. Julia brings a rare mix of strategic foresight and hands-on pragmatism, which makes her the perfect person to lead a conversation about the unspoken chaos and hard truths that come with leadership at the highest level.
Joining Julia is John Stapleton, co-founder of New Covent Garden Soup Co. If anyone knows chaos harnessed into success, it’s John. He transformed a quirky idea into a household name and international export. But the story wasn’t tidy. He once admitted that critics told him chilled soup was unworkable and might kill someone. Still, he pushed through, learning not to give too much credence to conventional wisdom. John’s journey, from battling skeptics and mastering packaging innovation to scaling and exiting the business is a masterclass in resilience. At the panel, John will share the hard-earned lessons of navigating skepticism, scaling with integrity, and the reality behind business exits, lessons every founder needs in their toolkit.
The panel also features Jordan Brompton, co-founder of myenergi, who brings straight talk from the clean-tech trenches. Jordan has steered clean-energy innovation while wrestling with investor shifts, scaling pains, and eco-stakes that go beyond profit and loss. When you’re building tech that powers homes and the planet, the stakes in those boardroom discussions are existential and she’s here to tell us how to navigate them with clarity and conviction. Expect Jordan to lay bare the challenge of balancing mission-driven leadership with the brutal realities of business growth.